Spring Creek Cardinals
4th Grade Newsletter September 2018 Edition
Welcome to 4th Grade at Spring Creek Elementary!
We are all excited to teach your child this year! Each month we will send out a newsletter highlighting what is going on in 4th grade at Spring Creek Elementary.
MATH Update
This week we will begin exploring and reviewing place value, which will include writing numbers in “Expanded Form” and “Expanded Notation” as well as finding the value of a digit in a numeral. Again, it’s important that students understand the numbers they work with, so I want them to know that 645 is 6 hundreds, 4 tens and 5 ones. But it can also be looked at as 64 tens and 5 ones or 5 hundreds, 13 tens and 15 ones or even 645 ones. When “decomposing numbers”, the possibilities are endless. Rounding numbers up to the 10,000 place value position is another concept students will be learning this month.
Students will also be practicing their fluency by using the program XtraMath every day. All of the students will start with multiplication. Once they are able to master all of the facts they will move on to division. Students are welcome to use the program at home as well to increase their math fluency of basic facts. Their login will be given to them this week as well. When they logon to the website, XtraMath.org, it will ask for an email. They will choose the students tab and then use my email account of lphillips@csisd.org along with their login information. Knowing basic math facts fluently frees up working memory to allow your child to focus on the process of the math concept they are learning rather than spending part of that working memory trying to figure out the math fact as well.
Along with new material, students will continue to work on math problem solving strategies. I want students to understand the reasons behind what they are doing and I want them to see that throughout the year.
How Can You Help Your Child Become a Better
Mathematical Problem Solver?
Ask your child:
● if their answer is reasonable
● to explain how they derived at an answer
● to draw a picture or diagram showing their
thinking
● to explain their thinking in more than
one way
● if their answer makes sense & why
● to make up questions with numbers
that come up daily-for example: How
much will 2 boxes of cereal cost?
As always, if you have any questions please feel free to contact me by phone or email.
READING/WRITING Update
Reading Language Arts
Wow, what a great start to the school year! Your child is actively participating in class, engaged in reading, and diving head first into writing. We have started our first read aloud, The Tiger Rising by Kate Dicamillo. Ask your student to tell you about the main character, Rob.
During the next month, students will publish their first writing piece. We have been gathering our thoughts in our writing notebooks up until now, and will choose a topic to develop in about 2 weeks. Please encourage your child to write in their notebook with remarks like, “That is a great idea! You should write that down in your notebook” or “This would make a great story. You should write it down in your notebook.” You can also encourage them by asking to read something in their notebook and notice all the things the are doing well as writers.
Students will continue to develop their reading life. We will focus on thinking while we read in order to develop deeper meaning from a book. Students will be learning how to stop and jot about questions they have while reading, predictions, interesting events, and how the book makes them feel. You can see a list of things "I can jot about..." on the pink tab in their reader’s notebook. If you can keep post it notes handy, students can stop and jot notes about their thinking when reading. Here is a picture of the chart we use in class to remind us the type of jots good readers make.
Every Monday is dedicated to poetry, spelling, and grammar. We will hopefully participate in our first Poetry Friday on September 7th. Students will write poems and then publish to our class blog. They will be able to access a google drive, that I set up for my classes, both at home and school. The username and password will be in their planners. This month students will review past spelling patterns and homonyms. New rules we will study are: when to double letters at either the middle or end of words, and when to change y to i. Grammar skills we focus on in September are parts of speech, as well as complete subject and predicate.
BOOK ORDERS ARE HERE!
Your child brought home a book order form in their Monday folder on Tuesday, September 4th. I encourage parents to have students choose one book they are interested in purchasing and do chores to earn the money. If you would like to order online please use the online code at https://clubs.scholastic.com/ : Mrs. Dungan's code is LQQT3
The books you order also allow me to add to our classroom library. Teachers earn points for each dollar spent in though student orders. The points allow me to “buy” books.
Requests for donations:
If anyone has the following sitting around the house, we would love to incorporate it into our classroom: yoga/stability balls or a bean bag chair. Other donations appreciated are used children’s books to add to our classroom library. When cleaning out your bookshelves, please consider adding it to a classroom at school.
SCIENCE/SOCIAL STUDIES Update
For Science we have started the year with mini lessons on how scientists observe. We are looking for details and then using these observations to infer and develop our own educated guess. In addition, we are building a foundation of measuring skills so we can use them all year long. **This week in your child's Monday folder, there will be a lab safety contract you need to sign and send back so your student can participate in labs for the remainder of the school year.
In Social Studies we have already looked at the symbols of Texas and moved on to "finding Texas" interpreting data related to Texas' place in the world. This week we will now look more closely at the regions of Texas and geographic factors that contributed to our growth. We will then turn our focus to historic documents of Texas and the U.S. Constitution.
Each week students will have a weekly quiz to see if they are understanding the concepts we cover that week. Be looking for this quiz in their Monday folder.
Don't forget to check out Mrs. Mann's website: http://mann4thgradeclass.weebly.com/
Students can study their vocabulary at home and parents can see what is on our calendar each week.
What else is happening this month?
September 18 - Watch DOG Kick Off
September 20 - PTO Meeting 6pm
September 24 - Boosterthon Pep Rally
October 5 - Boosterthon Fun Run
**We have the date for our first field trip**
We will visit Washington on the Brazos on October 19
Spring Creek Elementary
Website: http://sc.csisd.org/
Location: 2450 Brewster, College Station, TX
Phone: 979-694-5838
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CSISDSpringCreek
Twitter: @sc_elementary