Learn about wacky inventions in Science!  How many people live in a square mile?  Find out in Social Studies.  What is 1/4 of 12?  Math will give you an answer.  How do you make your writing interesting? Find the answer in Writing and learn about realistic fiction in Reading!

   "You want a piece of this???"  Here's 1/6 come on into Math!  Watch OUT!!!  … A rubber band almost hit you there coming off the geoboards - everywhere!  You'll see fractions trying to make a whole!  Did you know that 1/2 of 16, 1/4 of 16 and 2/8 of 16 equals 1 whole? Also I can tell you don't know that 2/32 = 1/16 and 2/16 = 1/8 and 2/8 = 1/4. 

   This is not a run-on-sentence and it has great sentence fluency.  Listen… It's windy outside.  It's cold outside. We walked outside.  We ran outside.  It rained outside.  We went to school.  Wasn't that great? Just kidding, let's change it.  Today it is windy and cold outside.  My friends and I ran in the park.  While we were out there I started a game of tag.  A few minutes later the school bell rang and we had to go in.  Which one was better?  #1 or #2?

   In Social Studies we are learning about population density in rural areas and in the city.  We are also learning about inventions from the 1800's and 1900's.  One invention was by Elis Elevator.  He made an elevator with a brake.  We are mostly learning about the northeast.  It is densely populated in the city and there are lots of skyscrapers. We have gone to many places on our bus and boat tours such as Jamestown, New Orleans, Cape Canaveral.  That's what we've learned!

   We are here to tell you about some of our Science projects.  Sit back, relax and enjoy!  3..2..1.. BLASTOFF! We had a tanning box, reading lamp and old carousel, a morse code box, a ship, car, a fish tank that lit up, a light house, a jewelry box/ make-up box and so many more!  We used our creativity and our knowledge of circuits.  We needed to know about parallel and series circuits to light up our bulbs and run our motors.  We needed to be able to connect the D-cells (not batteries) and how to make a switch.  Listen to some questions asked of two inventors.  "What is the purpose of your project?"  "To get a tan even if the sun isn't out and not to spend a lot of money at tanning places."  "What circuit did you use?"  "A series circuit."  "What supplies did you use?"  "A cardboard box, tissue paper decorations, 2 D-cells, 2 light bulbs, 7 wires and a switch."  "Nice job!"

   Once we finished our projects we had to make a presentation.  The presentation was how you would tell people about your project.  Some ways we could do our presentations was by a talk show, a commercial, a computer slide show or anything really! We thought everyone's presentations were amazing!

We have been reading realistic fiction books in our guided reading groups.  Some of the titles are: Bridge to Terabithia, The Report Card, Lunch Money and Judy Moody Goes to College.  We also have to read the books independently and answer questions like, " Do you feel you should go along with the people around you to be the same as them?"  "How do you earn money?  What do you do with your money?" "Describe what happens at school and at home on report card day.  How do you feel right before you open your report card?"  "What do you think college is like?"  Pretty interesting right?

We've also been practicing for the MCAS long composition.  We can write 5 interesting paragraphs that are about our own lives.  One was about a snow day and another one was about the best day we ever had.  We're all set for the MCAS long composition.  By the way it is next Tuesday, March 20th.  We also have become experts at practicing how to answer Open Response Questions or ORQ's.  We include topic sentences and always add 3 specific (not general) details from the stories. Sometimes we even add quotes.  We're ready to go for the Reading Comprehension MCAS on Thursday, March 22nd, and Wednesday, March 28th.  Make sure we get plenty of sleep and have a nutritious breakfast.

We'll see you when we get home!

                                                                                                                                                          January 1, 2012

Dear Fourth Grade Families,
   Happy New Year! I hope you have been enjoying your winter break with your friends and families.  It was so much fun watching my little grandson ripping off the wrapping paper and opening his gifts.  Two of his favorites were a kitchen that included a microwave oven and a recycling bin and a realistic upright vacuum cleaner!  I'm glad he's getting into chores early!
  I wanted to thank you for the many kind words on your holiday cards. I also appreciate the time and effort that went into making all the homemade candies and baked goods.  I was able to share them with some of the teachers and my family.  It was great having them in my house to enjoy over the holidays!  
    Last night my husband and I enjoyed a magnificent meal at the Capital Grill.  It is quite expensive but the generous gift card paid the bill in full!  Thankyou for helping me celebrate my New Year!
   In a couple of days we will be back at school starting many new exciting things.  For example long division with remainders, fractions, reading realistic fiction stories, writing a  five paragraph essay and studying more about rocks and minerals.  I can't wait to see your childrens' faces again so we can resume our learning together.
                                                                                                                                                            Happy New Year!
                                                                                                                                                            Sue Sherburne 
  


We're Back!!!

   Have you ever walked down the fourth grade hallway?  Take a look into a busy fourth grade classroom. Everybody is working very hard because we are learning many things in Math, Science, Social Studies, Reading and Writing!  You will be amazed at everything your children are learning! 
   Let's start your day off with Morning Work.  We start working as soon as we get in.  Some of the Morning Work we do is math.  For example we practice line graphs, fractions and multiplication facts like 7 x 6 and 8 x 8.  We also learn about geometry, algebra and place value.  For example if you have the number 198,100 what number is in the tens place or round this number to the nearest thousand.  Do you know the answer?  Number sentences are fun!  "Ray ordered pizza for 9 of his friends.  If each person gets 4 pieces how many pieces of pizza will Ray have to order?"  (36 pieces of pizza)  We also count money.  What is the value of 5 quarter, 3 dimes, 2 nickles and 4 pennies?  ($1.69)
   One other part of Morning Work is Language.  We edit sentences, name possessive nouns and even add prefixes to words. On Mondays we do a Spelling pre-test.  We get quizzed on 30 words!  Twenty of them follow a pattern like silent consonants (knife and answer) and 10 challenge words.  (pneumonia and lackadaisical)  Our tests on Fridays are on the first 10 words we got wrong on the test.
Thank you for listening!!!! By Anya, Iva,  Amanda  and Antonia.
    In Social Studies we've been studying Immigration.  Immigration is when someone comes from another country to live here.  Some people who came here were the Latinos, the Native Americans, the European Americans, the Asian Americans and African Americans.  
   The Native Americans got here by a land bridge connecting Asia and North America.  The Latinos and Europeans got here by boat. The African Americans were brought here by the force of slavery and the Asians came to find gold.  
    They all settled in different areas.  For example, while the Native Americans were everywhere, the Europeans were on the East Coast.  In New York City,  years ago only the Lenape  (Len-App-Ae) tribe lived there.  From 1609 - 1624, the Dutch began a colony at the tip of NewYork  More and more people moved here.  By 1644 it was as diverse as it is today! People living in New York lived in tenements.
    LET"S TRAVEL ON A TRAIN!  We're going to the Erie Canal, the White Mountains, Cape Cod, Boston, the West Quoddy light house and Hershey, Pennsylvania. In the Northeast there is only 1 mountain range and it is called the Appalachian Mountains.  The Appalachian Mountains begin in Maryland and end in New Hampshire.  This is the most famous section because it has Washington D.C..  This place also has New York City.
   This area is famous for its fall colors.  A lot of people come here to see the trees changing colors and the Statue of Liberty along with the Empire State Building.  In Boston there are two historic trails.  The most famous is the Freedom Trail.  We have been learning about Immigration and the Northeast and now you have too! by Daniel, Liam and Pranav

   Come on into Science.  The simple circuit will burn your eyes out!  The motor powers will send you flying out the door! The D-cells power will explode you like an explosive!  Once you walk through that Science door you will enter the journey of your life!
   In magnetism we are putting magnets in a cup on a magnet post.  A magnet on a  post is like a scale and you put 2 cups in a holder.  Then you try to break the force of the magnets.  You record your data in your binder.  When we say data we mean how much stuff it takes to break the force of attraction.
   In our Electricity unit we are learning how to build a complex circuit with 2 D-cells, three wires, a light bulb holder, and a light bulb. 
by A.J. and Trevor
   "Ding, Dong, the Doorbell Rang!" In math we have started long division.  We read a division book called,  The Doorbell Rang.  It is a picture book but it also has some division problems in it.   For example there are 12 cookies and each time the doorbell rings more children come in to share them.  Just when 12 children are there grandma comes in with 36 more cookies.  The division continues!  Then we created our own division stories with much larger numbers.  We also read a book called  17 Kings and 42 Elephants.   Do you know how many elephants each king gets and what do you do with the extras? (remainders)  We'll be playing Division Bingo and I Have..., Who Has... Division . soon.  Who knew division could be such fun!
   You've heard of families but have you heard of fact families.  Here's a couple of examples.  5   + 2 = 7 so 7 - 2 = 5,
7 x 5 = 35 so 35 divided by 7 = 5.  Addition and multiplication make the answers larger and subtraction and division make the answer smaller. They are called inverse operations! That's it so far, but we will continue later.  
    In Reading we have been listening to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.  Since we're doing an author study on Roald Dahl we are also reading his books in our guided reading groups.  We have read, The Twits, Fantastic Mr. Fox, The Giraffe, Pelley and Me, Esiotrot, The Witches, Mtilda The BfG and The Magic Finger!!!   Once we've read a few chapters we are writing journal entries.  Some of them are: writing a letter to a character and pretending you're a character and writing a diary entry.We also have been practicing making connections and writing three character traits about a character.  It doesn't matter what kind of journal entry we are writing we have to prove our answers by giving examples from the book.  We'll give you some more information after our vacation.  Have a great day!!!  Sophia, Jackie, Ghasif and Clara.
   We have been including many new things in our narrative writing. First we're going to talk about "leads."  Writers often create great leads to make readers keep reading.  We looked at different leads from different stories and then we had to come up with new leads for our narratives.   We also included similes.  Similes are things that are compared and use the words like or as.  We looked at some similes for clouds.  "puffy like whipped cream, white as snow, round as cotton balls and soft as a blanket.  Next we read some poetry and high-lighted the similes. "A volcano explodes like an exclamation point!"  
   Now we're going to talk about paragraphing.  We read a story called, "My Crazy Hat Adventure."  Whenever we saw a new paragraph we put the editing mark in.  This is how we know how to paragraph.  P.A.T.S.  P stands for when a place changes.  A stands for when an action changes. T stands for when the time changes and S stands for when the speaker changes.  In our writers notebooks we wrote our rough drafts and revised and edited them.  Finally we wrote our new and improved final drafts.

                                                                                                                                                Happy Vacation!
                                                                                                                                                Mrs. Sherburne's 4th graders

 

Happy Holiday's Dallin Families,

 With the holidays upon us and the shopping frenzy we are all in, why not get yourself, your spouse, your child or actually anyone in your family one of the new Dallin Products now being offered!!

We are now taking pre-orders for Grey Dallin Hooded Zip-Up Sweatshirts! Only $25 for youth and $35 for adults. The Dallin logo is on the upper left side of the sweatshirt!

 Another new offering is a Long Sleeve Dallin T! Now you can show your Dallin Pride all year long with our long and short sleeve shirts.

 Our final new product is a Stainless Steel Water Bottle. It is 25.4 ounces and BPA free.  It has a wide mouth for easy ice cube insertion and it comes with a clip.

 We are attaching an order form for you to fill out. Be sure to put your name, address and phone number at the top of the order form. Please make checks payable to DALLIN PTO and send the forms and the check to school in your child's folder in an envelope marked "Dallin Products" by December 6th.

 We will announce pick up times for orders in the next week or so, but you will definitely have your order by Dec 23rd. 

Please feel free to email either of us with any questions. 

Thank you,

Margaret mkohler@nclc.org

and Simona - mona3712@yahoo.com

 Please feel free to email either of us with any questions.