FOURTH GRADE NEWS
MAY 12th, 2016
What's Up in 4th Grade!
End of the year MAP Testing starts next week and will continue through the 26th of May. Please let your homeroom teacher know if your child is going to be absent, or you are planning a trip.
The deadline for registering for summer school is this Friday, May 13. Here is the link that you can use to register: http://www.pisd.edu/students/summer.school/index.shtml
The PTA Carnival is this Saturday, May 14th from 2-4 PM. We would love for you to visit with your family and friends.
Please encourage your children to bring their own device to school. We will need them during Language Arts during the next few weeks for our Project Based Learning and Social Studies for the Texas Presidents project.
Thank you so very much to those who have donated items for the parachute project.
Please scroll down to find a flyer for the seventeenth annual basketball clinic for boys and girls entering 1st–9th grades in the fall of 2016. Clinics are designed to include competitive drills, various competitions for prizes, and plenty of scrimmaging. The Plano West basketball staff is focused on building a strong foundation for future development of all athletes. Teams are welcome, but players must sign up individually. Fun! Fun! Fun!
Make sure that your child is reading 20 minutes every night and recording it in their planner. A parent signature is also required to ensure this process.
Please take a moment to see the links below for parenting classes offered in May. The last parenting class will be held on May 16th at Skaggs. Parents with middle school students will highly benefit from this class as it will make the transition an easier process. Scroll down to learn more from the flyer attached below.
Language Arts
"Snowflake Bentley" is our main selection next week. Students will monitor their comprehension by drawing conclusions based on text clues and prior knowledge related to text to form a new understanding of what they are reading. They will learn how authors use common text structures for conveying information and describing explicit and implicit relationships among ideas.
In writing, students will use research based facts to create open ended problem statements, and come up with a list of solutions as part of their project based learning.
The spelling pattern for next week is suffixes.
Math
Next week, students will continue with our Step Up to Grade 5 Lessons. These lessons will preview important content and help prepare our students for the next grade level. We will subtract fractions with unlike denominators, multiply a unit fraction by a whole number, and students will use an area model to help find the product of a fraction and a whole number. Students will discover that multiplying a whole number and a fraction involves both multiplication and division.
Science and Social Studies
Students will be finishing our Project Based Learning by creating a parachute that carries a load within a specific range of speed. Be sure to follow us on Twitter @SkaggsMrsEstep and @SkaggsMukherjee for pictures of our design process.
Science MAP Testing Begins May 24th
From the Teachers
- Reading Logs: 4th grade participates in our Skaggs reading program, The Skaggs Scribe. We require that every student read at least 20 minutes per night and record their time in their planner. Please sign your child's agenda every Friday and students will enter their time on a Google Form where they could win prizes. They may enter this information at school or at home. This is the website students will use to record their minutes: http://tinyurl.com/SkaggsReadingLog
- We would like to encourage your child to bring their electronic devices. Electronic devices are being used in all subject areas every day, along with music and art.
- Be a star for our students and write a check to our PTA. See the information below regarding the Skaggs PTA Check Writing Campaign.
- A fourth grade website just for parents! You will find links, important information, and much more. https://sites.google.com/a/pisd.edu/fabulous-fourth-grade-friends/
Important Dates
5/13 Science Test
5/14 PTA Carnival from 2:00-4:00
5/17 End of Year MAP Test begins