Peregrine Press
February 9-13
Schedule
Monday: Running Club; Trip to the City Library (BRING LIBRARY CARDS)
Tuesday: 4th Grade State Writing Test
Wednesday: PE
Thursday: 4th Grade State Writing Test; Art (Students need to bring in a landscape type picture of their World Fair Country, it doesn't need to be color. I can make a copy for them if necessary.)
Friday: Valentine's Day (they will have time to pass out Valentines)
***I was very disappointed to see that 11 students did not turn in their sloppy copies on Friday. We talked every day about the due date and it was written on the board for 2 weeks. These students need to take responsibility and do the work. I gave them PLENTY of time and reminded those that were falling behind to take it home to work on it. At this point, if they don't meet the deadline for the rough draft, which is February 20th, I will not be letting them do the final draft that will get published. There needs to be a consequence for those students that are not being responsible.
***This week 7 students did not turn their homework in. Also, please check their homework folders for work that has been passed back. If you are curious about how they are doing with the weekly work we do, check out their folders. Then the work can be recycled.
Last Week
We had a week full of work! The two main projects were their Treasure Books and their World Fair group projects. They worked on the sloppy copies of the treasure books by writing the first draft and then they were responsible for editing and finding a peer to edit. This weekend I took the sloppy copies home and edited them myself to make sure there weren't major issues. The variety of topics is really great and I loved seeing how well some of the students edited. That is a very difficult skill to develop.
The other major focus was geography and the World Fair. We spent a little bit of time discussing the five themes of geography and focused one day on theme one, which is location. We explored latitude and longitude as a form of absolute location. The students also spent time in the computer lab researching the country their team is responsible for. We found a great site through the library that provides most of the information that will be needed for research purposes.
Unfortunately our Out and About to the travel agency was canceled last minute do to an illness so we are unsure if we are going to reschedule. We did do some teambuilding though which was really fun. I asked Laura to do an activity that would focus on a skill the students need to work on more these days: following directions. The students were given a list of tasks they needed to accomplish, like a scavenger hunt, but the first direction says to read ALL directions before beginning. The trick was that the last direction says to just sit quietly. So, while a few students followed the directions properly, the majority of the class was running around singing "I'm a little teapot," counting down from 10 loudly, giving me high fives and doing other slightly embarrassing things because they did not follow the directions properly. It was so much fun to watch! Luckily the students in the end weren't too upset about looking a fool.
This Week
This week the students will start the rough draft (2nd draft) of their Treasure Books. This draft will be a much cleaner copy that will resemble more of what the final draft should look like. They have two weeks to work on this draft, but like I said before, some may be bringing it home to work on if they can't get it done in class.
The students will have some time to work with their groups on their World Fair Projects, but we will spend more time learning more about the themes of geography. We will practice more with latitude and longitude and then we will be exploring theme two: place. This theme focuses on physical and human characteristics of a place and they will practice mapping skills in particular.
Tuesday and Thursday the 4th graders will participate in the state writing test that will be administered by Karen Torry. To be fair, and to have the 5th and 6th graders practice writing, they will participate in a practice writing test in class with me.
Thursday the students will make Valentine containers, and Friday they will be able to pass out their Valentines. My policy is valentines for everyone or no one. Students don't have to give out Valentines, but if they do, they have to give one to everyone in class. I will pass out class lists on Monday so they have all the names.
Upcoming Events:
We are trying to plan our World Fair Presentation Day. It will be the first week of March and I will send out more details once we have the exact date and time figured out.
*Treasure Book Rough Draft Due February 20th
*Treasure Book Final Draft Due March 6th
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