A few Fall Party Photos!

Here are some photos I snapped during the Fall Party yesterday!  Thank you to Mrs. Sullivan for planning everything and all the volunteers who came to help with the activities.

Ms. Akbar REALLY wants to be Turkey of the Year!

If elected, I will get to wear a gigantic, embarrassing turkey costume ALL day!  I was nominated last year, which was an honor, but I'd really love to be in the top three this year.  Turkey of the Year forms went home in LAST week's Thursday folders, but I'm going to send another form home today!  For every hour your child reads, they get a vote!  Just cut off the bottom strip from the form each week,  write in the hours your child read, and sign it.  Thank you for supporting my crazy desire to be a turkey.

ALSO!  The phases of the moon quiz is tomorrow, students took a practice "quiz" today, and these will go home today in Thursday folders.  Remind them that the moon gets BRIGHTer from the RIGHT side!  Students are also expected to know how long it takes for the Earth to make a WHOLE trip around the sun, how long it takes for the moon to revolve around the Earth, and how many hours it takes for the earth to Rotate on its axis.

Weekly Update, October 25th, 2015

What a lovely fall weekend, I enjoyed seeing many of you at the Fall Festival yesterday!  This is the last week of the 1st quarter, and we have an eventful Thursday!  Thanks to those of you who sent photos of your darlings, I always appreciate them, and feel free to send me photos even if you've already sent some.  I LOVE posting Halloween photos!

The Week Ahead in Academia...

Science: Students will continue to learn about the Earth, Moon, and Sun relationships, specifically the eight phases of the moon and the reason for the seasons.  We will have a quiz on the eight moon phases on Friday, October 30th.  Students chorally read the poem "The Moon Cycle" every day last week, and learned most of the phases last year in third grade.  I will send home a study guide tomorrow for the Earth/Moon/Sun Science Unit, however, the quiz on Friday will only cover the moon phases.

Virginia Studies: It's 1607 and the British colonists have landed!  We began learning about the Jamestown settlement at the end of last week and will continue to learn about the reasons colonists settled in Jamestown, the hardships they faced, and everything else that comes along with this economic venture.  Ask your child what an economic venture is and if they can give you an example!  Students will have an open-note VA Studies Weekly Quiz on Jamestown on Wednesday, October 28th.  Students as usual will be able to use the VA Studies Weekly that I gave them last week to find their answers.  

Writing: Students are learning subject and verb agreement, as well as how to use pronouns correctly and began writing an opinion piece presenting their opinion on whether or not Minecraft should be played in schools.  Hopefully these will be completed by the end of the week!  The Word Study Test will be given on Friday, October 30th.    Students are expected to spell their words correctly, use five of the words given in a sentence that is a minimum of 7 words, come up with two words that would fit in their sort, and explain their sort to me.  Please refer to the previous graded Word Study test if you feel your child needs to be refreshed of the format of the test!  There shouldn't be any surprises!

Reading: Students appear to be captivated by Samuel's new adventure as he lands in the New World in our Read Aloud, Blood on the River.  This historical fiction book was actually written by a Virginia Studies teacher, and reinforces all the content we teach regarding the Jamestown unit.  Students will be focusing on non-fiction reading this week and identifying non-fiction text features.

The Week Ahead, Important Dates:

Monday, October 26th: NO PHOENIX PARENT MEETING!  It was cancelled!
Thursday, October 29th: Family Life Education begins
Thursday, October  29th: Fall Party from 10:50 - 12:05
Friday, October 30th: Last Day of the Quarter

Monday, November 2nd and 3rd: Conferences!  I will email you individually to remind you of your conference time!

PHOENIX Questions: Regarding grading, we were hoping to have some questions answered tomorrow by our Phoenix contact at a meeting tomorrow, however this has been cancelled.  The LCPS staff is still learning this system and if you are frustrated, please know that we are too!  I will do my best to answer your questions at our conferences, but please make sure you are looking at every page of what I send home in Thursday folders to familiarize yourself with how your child is doing in each subject.  There are often a variety of grades tied to one assignment, which is a new expectation of the grading system.  

Weekly Update, October 18th, 2015

Among drinking pumpkin flavored coffee and sleeping in on the weekends, I also enjoy checking Word Study homework.  Although the word was used incorrectly, I love this drawing too much not to share:

Don't we all?

Please don't forget to send me a photo of your child if you did anything noteworthy this weekend, the kids love seeing themselves on the front board!

Here's what's coming up this week in:

Virginia Studies: Students will have their test on Native Americans on Tuesday, October 20th.  A study guide went home with students on Friday.  Great resources to use to study always include the study guide, their notebooks, and solpass.org.  The study guides I provide are straight from solpass.org if you ever need to print another one!  We will begin learning about Jamestown following the Native Americans unit.

Science: We're sticking with astronomy and will be learning more about moon phases this week.  The quiz/test on this unit will be next week.

Reading: Students are LOVING our new Read Aloud book Blood on the River by Elisa Carbone.  It is a historical fiction novel about a 10 year old boy who is the servant to John Smith and how the British colonized Jamestown.  This week we will continue to learn about characters and how to describe their traits.  Ask your child about it!

Writing: Students will receive new Word Study words this week and their next Word Study test will be on Friday, October 30th.  Thank you for reviewing their work and making sure students are doing the assignments correctly!  This week we will continue to incorporate adjectives into our writing and editing our work.

Upcoming Important Dates:   

Monday, October 19th: PTA Meeting @ 6:30
Wednesday, October 21st: Picture Day
Wednesday, October 21st: Parent Homework Help Workshop @ 6:30
Saturday, October 24th: Fall Festival from 4:00 - 7:00 pm
Monday, October 26th: Parents Night for Phoenix Grading @ 6:30
Thursday, October 29th: Family Life Education begins
Thursday, October 29th: Ms. Akbar's Class Party from 10:50 - 12:05
Friday, October 30th: End of Grading Period
Monday, November 2nd and 3rd: Parent Teacher Conferences

As always, if you have  any questions, concerns, or information you think I need to know - please email me!  

Important Thursday Folder Items!

Parents - in addition to graded papers in today's "Thursday Folder,"  there are two items I need to point out.

1) Recorder forms - these went home in last week's Thursday Folder, there will be another form in today's Thursday folder if I haven't received one back yet.  Please sign it even if your child already has a recorder and have your child bring it back in tomorrow.  They are due tomorrow!
2) Picture Day Form - I received the following information:
    Ordering instructions: 
1. Pick a Pose and 2.  Pick A Background Selection 
3. Insert Payment or online payment information
4. Return envelope.  
Please make it clear to your students that they must bring back their picture envelopes for fall pictures with payment inside or online payment information.  
Parents can pay online, but the photographers will still need the payment envelopes to know which background the pictures require.

The Planets quiz and Word Study test are tomorrow!  Please refer to my previous email regarding what is covered on these tests.

Weekly Update, October 12th, 2015

I hope everyone enjoyed the three-day weekend and the lovely weather!  If you have any photos to share with me of your kiddos from weekend activities, I will proudly display them on our morning message - thank you to those parents who have already sent me a fun photo of their child in action!


The Week Ahead:
Have your child bring a blanket or towel to school tomorrow!  They have earned a picnic lunch outside for positive behavior in the cafeteria!  (Students who do not want to eat outside may still eat in the cafeteria.)

Science: Students will begin to learn about our 8 planets. (When I was a kid there were 9!)  This is a brief unit and students are responsible for knowing the planets in order from the sun as well as the order of the planets from largest to smallest.  We will learn this tomorrow in class and some fun ways to remember the orders. The quiz on the planets will be this Friday, October 16th!

Virginia Studies: Students will finish learning about the Native Americans that first inhabited Virginia this week.  They will be expected to complete Virginia Studies Week 5 which explains how the Native Americans used natural resources to survive.  This Newspaper will be due on Friday, and as always, the crossword puzzle must be completed, questions must be answered, and newspaper must be highlighted to show where the student found his or her answers.  The Native Americans Test will be on Tuesday, October 20th.

Reading: Students had mixed emotions about the ending of The Tiger Rising.  They may have shared with you that they wrote eulogies for the tiger!   This week we will begin Blood on the River, a historical fiction novel about the establishment of Jamestown.  We will begin to look really closely at characters and how the author includes specific details to really teach us about characters.  As your students read their 20 minutes nightly, ask them follow-up questions like, "What can you tell me about the character in your book?"  Make sure they give you specific examples from the book!  (We describe characters through their actions and dialogue.)

Writing: Students will have a review about plagiarizing and paraphrasing tomorrow.  We will review adjectives and begin writing a quick persuasive "Book Buzz" about their independent reading in class and try to get another classmate to read their book through some strong writing!  Their Word Study Test will be on Friday, October 16th!  Students will be expected to spell their words correctly, use five of their words in a meaningful sentence, come up with two other words that would fit in their sort, and explain the rules of their sort to me.  

Other Calendar Events:
Tomorrow, Tuesday, October 13th: MONDAY Schedule
Wednesday, October 14th: Earthquake and Fire Drill in the afternoon
Saturday, October 17th: Stone Ridge 5K
Monday, October 19th: PTA Meeting @ 6:30 PM
Wednesday, October 21st: Picture Day!
Saturday, October 24th: Fall Festival at Pinebrook 4 - 7 PM
Monday, October 26th: Parent Night for Phoenix Grading at 6:30 PM
Thursday, October 29th: Family Life Education, Fall Party
Friday, October 30th: End of 1st Quarter

Pajama Day is tomorrow!

It was announced late, so I'm not sure if parents got the message - but we are having another Pajama Day tomorrow!  Please make sure the pajamas are school-appropriate (no spaghetti string tops), and that your kids still have appropriate footwear.  They will have PE first thing in the morning and will need their sneakers!

Ask your kids about the archaeology dig today and what they learned!  I'll post photos soon!

Responsible Fourth Graders!

As I mentioned during Back to School Night, I expect STUDENTS to be responsible for getting their agendas signed.  When a child tells me, "my mom forgot to sign my agenda," I remind the student that it is HIS or HER responsibility to ask you to sign it, not the parents!

This being said, students will unfortunately have to face the consequence if they don't get their agendas signed and fill out their reading log... ask them what that means!

As you saw, new reading logs went home yesterday.  Students are STILL expected to read a minimum of 20 minutes nightly, but I told students that if they only read 15 minutes one night, they should be honest, and be sure to read 25 minutes the next night so their reading will average out to 20 minutes a night!

Thanks for helping your child study tonight for their science test tomorrow, I'm confident they'll do well!

Weekly Update, October 4th, 2015

Happy Sunday!  Thank you in advance for reading the lengthy email ahead :)

Pinebrook sent home interims on Friday, why didn’t my child get an interim?  As you know, LCPS rolled out a new grading system called Phoenix.  The county has been learning this system since August and the fourth grade team received its first training from the county on Friday.(The day interims were due!) I personally did not feel as though I could portray an accurate snapshot of your child’s progress without going back into the system and entering more data.  Students who currently have a 2 or below in any subject area will receive an interim tomorrow, please cut off the bottom portion of the interim, sign it, and have your child return it to me on Tuesday.  If your child does not receive an interim, he or she is meeting expectations and will not receive an interim.

Here's a brief overview of what went on last week and what's coming up.

Last week in...

Science: We wrapped up our resources unit and learned about Virginia’s native species and how trees provide us with so much more than wood!  Ask your child if he or she can name 5 ways trees help us!

Virginia Studies: Students showed me what they know about our regions, waterways, and bordering states last week and began our One to the World project.  Students are expected to create a commercial or poster “SELLING” the benefits of their region.  The challenge given to them was, “Create a poster or commercial to show/persuade kids how to be healthy in your region, be creative!”  We will finish this project this week.

Writing: Students finished/ are finishing up their fictional narrative about the journey how a raindrop makes its way through a watershed. Students also took their first Word Study Test, those will go home on Thursday!

Reading: Students were assigned reading partners this week and learned what it means to hold their reading partner accountable for their thinking!  Ask your child what kind of questions they ask their partner to explain their thinking.  (Why do you think that? What evidence do you have in your book that makes you say that? Can you explain your thinking more?)  Students are learning the importance of EXPLAINING their answers in reading. 

Next week in...

Science: The NATURAL RESOURCES TEST will be on Wednesday, October 7^th!  Please make sure you review all the notes in your child’s green, science notebook and review the study guide that went home last week!

Virginia Studies: We will begin learning about Virginia’s first, true citizens, the Native Americans!  Students will receive the next edition of their Virginia Studies Weekly, as a reminder, they need to complete the crossword, highlight where they found their answer within the newspaper, and complete any other assignment given in the newspaper.  They will have an open-note quiz on this newspaper on Friday, October 9th. Students will also become archaeologists on Thursday, I wonder what they’ll find!

Writing: Students will receive their new Word Study words tomorrow.  They will continue to learn how to write persuasively and include evidence in their writing. 

Reading: We will finish reading The Tiger Rising this week and students will start responding to their reading more intensely.   Also, new reading logs will go home tomorrow as well, please make sure your child is reading at least 20 minutes a night!

Please let me know if you have any questions, comments, or anything you think I need to know!