Hi Families,

It was so nice to meet so many of you during our Open House. Thank you for letting your children be the tour guides -- it was pleasurable to watch them shine with pride as they showed you all their work!

This week, our major focus has been on kindness. We have talked a lot about how to make sure everyone feels included, and we have discussed how sometimes we don't have bad intentions but the impacts of our behaviors can be  hard for others. We have practiced giving and receiving compliments, and we have talked about ingredients for "Friendship Soup." These are all important life lessons!

Here's a rundown of our academics this week:

Math
We have started a new data unit, and it is a lot of fun! We are doing all sorts of quick surveys in the classroom and learning to put data on a line plot. We measured ourselves and compared our heights to the heights of first graders. We are learning to use words like outlier, range, and data points. Next week we will learn how to find the median. We continue to practice our math computation skills during Menu each day.

Reading
We are still working on analyzing the characters in the books we are reading, paying particular attention to the characteristics the author points out over and over again. We are also learning to use precise words to describe our characters -- aiming for better words than "nice" and "awesome." Next we will get into how our characters are all learning important lessons as they proceed through the plot.

Writing
This week we have worked on making sure our realistic fiction stories have a setting that is clear to our readers. We have also worked on making sure they have a compelling lead, looking at leads from famous authors as mentor texts. Finally, we talked about endings and how 4th graders can do better than "The End" by wrapping up a story and making sure the character's problem is resolved.  The stories are looking terrific!

Social Studies
We are just about finished with our geography unit. The students have learned so much about Vermont! This week we made a huge map on the floor and placed all the important rivers and mountain ranges and cities on it. The students accepted the challenge of also pointing out all the counties. I am impressed with what sponges they are!

Science
We began our new science unit which is all about how humans use and impact natural resources for electricity. We haven't gotten into renewable versus non-renewable yet, but our field trip on Tuesday will be the start of that discussion. (Nothing is needed for that field trip!) So far, we have learned to identify what is meant by the term "natural resource." Today we visited our outdoor classroom and read "The Lorax." Eventually we will each decide how we can become a Lorax to help take care of our planet.

Here is a link to a video Mr. Bouchard made from our field trip to the Maritime Museum. Enjoy!
https://youtu.be/0nlW7iCwNwA

Next week's sharing theme is "something that was lost and then found."

I look forward to seeing you all during conferences during the next 2 weeks. Have a fabulous weekend!