Letters from Language Arts
What's Happening In ELAR, Issue 2
Dear Families,
We are moving along fast and furious, and we were so excited to share with you what happens in the classroom during Back to School Night. We hope that gave you some insight into the classroom. We understand it was a lot of information to take in, so if you need anything further, please reach out. I have included the Google Slides presentation for your review.
With Sharpened Pencils and Journals Ready,
Caitlin Mozisek and Anne Smalling
Tuesday is Library Day!!
In at attempt to maximize our curriculum time, we will be having our library lessons and checkout on the same day. With support from our wonderful librarian, Smalling and Mozisek homerooms will visit the library from 8:00 - 8:45 on Tuesday mornings. Smith and Lindsay homerooms will be visiting the library from 2:00 - 2:45 Tuesday afternoons. At the current time, we are highly recommending a checkout limit of three or less. We don't want the students to have a plethora of books checked out at once.
Book Fair is Upon Us!!!!
Monday, September 17 will be our preview of the book fair. We will take the students to the library to make a wish list of their must have books. We will take them back to the library on Tuesday to "Shop Til They Drop!" During the week if they want to go back to the fair, we will be sending them during their recess time. If they have finished their classwork, we can also work out a time to send them then. Don't forget the spaghetti dinner book fair kickoff party on Monday!!!
Writers In The Schools (WITS) - Begins Thursday, September 20th
I'm so excited that Summer McGee will be back with us, on an almost weekly basis, beginning September 20th. This program is a creative outlet for our students, and it is also nice for them to gain instruction from another voice. Through this program, we will also be visiting the Menil in the early spring.
Subjectively Speaking: What To Expect When You're A 4th Grade Parent
Reader's Workshop
We have been focusing our studies on the genre of traditional literature. We looked at study stacks on epic that covered myths, legends, tall tales, fairy tales, folk tales and fables. Making a list of characteristics found in this large genre, students were able to determine what type of traditional literature they were reading. In the following weeks, we will be working on memoirs and realistic fiction.
Writer's Workshop
We just left our writing of fairy tales, and we used the characteristics we noticed from our reading to help us make sure that our writing contained similar elements. We will be moving on to begin our study of narrative and memoir writing.
Social Studies with a Texas History Twist
We have finally finished our study of maps and regions of Texas. After the celebration of Freedom Week, which is September 17 - 21, we shall move on to the first inhabitants of Texas.
Spelling: Words Their Way
We spent Monday, September 10, making sure that each student could access their itslearning account. This is the primary way students will access the spelling curriculum. We have already given each of them their groups based on their performance on the Beginning of the Year inventory. There is a lesson they can watch every night if they like and assignments for each day. The normal cycle of words will be 2 weeks. The next test will be September 21st.
Grammar Rules
As you may know, writing takes center stage in 4th grade. We also focus on grammar as well. We are currently reviewing parts of speech and how they create effective sentences. Students will begin crafting more complex sentences with a variety of punctuation used. As we mentioned in our presentation last night, we are color coding parts of speech this year.
Noun Markers: Red (The, A, An)
Nouns/Prounouns/Direct Objects: Yellow
Verb: Orange
Adjective: Blue
Adverb: Purple
Preposition: Green
Conjunctions: Pink/Beige
Flocabulary
We are very fortunate to have Flocabulary.com as a vocabulary resource in 4th grade. This computer based program creates raps to introduce students to new words and their definitions. It is our hope that these words will make their way into student writing. Each student will have their own login and password to access the videos and quizzes that accompany them. This resource is coming soon.
UpComing Events
September 17th - 20th: Book Fair
September 17th: Book Fair Preview during library times
September 17th: Spaghetti Dinner
September 19th: Donuts with Dad 7:15AM
September 21st: Prepositions Quiz to Smalling
September 25th: Author Visit - Max Brallier
September 28th: Spelling Test Over Sort 2
October 9th: Trip to Austin
October 18-19: Parent Conferences 1/2 Days for Students
About Us
We are overjoyed at being your language arts and social studies teachers. It is our goal to not only create good readers and writers but lifelong readers and writers. Thank you for making this journey with us.
Email: Anne-Louise.Smalling@springbranchisd.com
Location: https://maps.google.com/?cid=7155001544484722155
Phone: 713 251 6300
Twitter: @MDESmalling