Weekly Newsletter
Week of January 20-23
Week of January 20-23
The second semester of 4th grade is continuing. My goal is to strengthen your child's reading, critical thinking and writing skills to make them a successful 5th grade student.
GROWTH is the goal for everyone this year, and each day brings opportunities for students to strenghten their reading skills. Independent reading at home is a huge part of that success, so I encourage you to set aside 10-15 minutes each night for your child to read a chapter book. They can log their minutes on Beanstack and continue to build their stamina and excitement for reading.
We are continuing Module 5 and will finish the short informational text, Let's Dance Around The World. We will review central idea and supporting details as well as text structure. Vocabulary words are rhythmic, distinctive, highlight, horizontal, curator, foreground & background. Since our text is short, we will have our open-book test combined with vocabulary on Thursday of this week.
Resources are posted on Google Classroom and under Reading Resources for your reference.
We are continuing uppercase cursive letters, and it is so exciting to see your child progress! We will be doing more assignments in cursive to ensure students are proficient with this skill. Your child will now be able to write names of specific people and places, as well as full complete sentences. Cursive homework will now be in a workbook for students to bring home and will be due on Friday.
We are reviewing how to distinguish shades of meaning between related words (quickly, swiftly, rapidly). Students will review suffixes -ity and -ty this week. We continuously use the skill of using context clues to determine the meaning of unknown words.
We are beginning our unit on Opinion writing, which is always so much fun! Students will practice with a variety of different topics, but dance will be the first one. It ties in perfectly with our reading story this week.
Unit 4: Fractions
This unit will take us eight weeks to complete. We will learn about fractions and connect them to decimals.
Equivalent Fractions
We will begin by learning about equivalent fractions using concrete models and number lines. We will work with fractions with like and unlike denominators. We will connect our understanding of equivalent fractions with multiplication and division to help us make an equivalent fraction by multiplying or dividing both the numerator and denominator by a fraction with the same numerator and demonominator. See the Equivalent Fractions Video for a demonstration.
Comparing Fractions
We will use our understanding of equivalent fractions to begin to compare fractions with unlike denominators. This will require that we get a common denominator for both fractions which will require using multiplication or division. This will mirror our equivalent fractions lessons except that we will determine which fraction has a greater or lesser value.
Adding and Subtracting Fractions and Mixed Numbers
We will learn how to add and subtract fractions with like denominators and UNLIKE denominators. Additionally we will examine how to add and subtract mixed numbers.
Unit 4: Space
We will begin an exciting unit this week which will lead us into space.
We will begin with space exploration and how technology has improved over time. Our studies will take us through launches of space propes, rovers, and telescopes.
Key Vocabulary:
telescopes, satellites, space probes, observatory
We are continuing our study of Westward Expansion. We finished The Indian Removal Act & The Gold Rush last week. This week we will discuss The Oregon Trail, & The Battle of The Alamo.
Lewis & Clark on The Columbia River
Be sure to keep an eye on our Social Studies page for additional review resources.
1/19-No School in Honor of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
1/23-Rock Your School Day
Wish List Items-Paper towels, hand sanitizer, Clorox wipes, candy for our treat jar (no peanuts, please)