Please do not feel that you need to wait for the October conference time if you have a concern. Feel free to contact me and we can set up a time to meet or simply talk over the phone. Open communication is the key to your childs success.
Book Orders About once a month, we will send home book orders. Ordering from these book orders is entirely optional. If you are ordering from several order forms, you can write just one check to Scholastic Books. Ordering through these book clubs is a great way to encourage reading and help our classroom library grow!
Snack and Water Bottles: Due to our early lunch (10:45 am), we know that students may be hungry by the afternoon. We encourage your child to bring a healthy snack and a new or clean water bottle everyday.
Birthdays Your fourth grader is allowed to bring in a special birthday treat to celebrate his/her special day!
How can you help? **If you work at State Farm, you can volunteer your time (40 hours) and earn $500.00 for our school or classroom!
**Ways to volunteer your time: -supporting students with reading, writing or math -playing math games -putting up bulletin boards -stapling, sorting, or hole-punching papers -assisting with special projects/celebrations
Website: On our class website you will find links to sites that relate to our curriculum, project information, and an online assignment notebook. Use this to double check daily assignments. You can also find our class list, class birthdays, our schedule, weekly updates, and pictures. Simply go to: schumacher100.weebly.com.
Communication: Communication is definitely the key to success! Please email or call if you have any questions, concerns, comments, or ideas! You may also jot down a note in your childs assignment notebook. If you need to contact your child regarding information that s/he will need immediately, please call the Main Office. Someone from the office will be sure that your child receives the message before the end of the day. Your support and interest are so important to the success of your child. I look forward to working with you to help your child be the best s/he can be!
Fourth Grade Survival Guide 2014-15
Mrs. Schumacher Email: ajschum@ilstu.edu school #: 309-438-3564 website: schumacher100.weebly.com
English Language Arts (ELA): Our English Language Arts curriculum revolves around Reading and Writing Workshop, Guided Reading, skill-based mini-lessons, grammar, and word work.
Reading: Common Core Standards has fourth graders working on determining the main idea of text, making inferences, determining themes, analyzing characters, settings, and events within a story. Craft and structure standards deal with determining the meanings of words and phrases used in text, comparing and contrasting the point of view, as well as making strong connections with text. We will also be working on using reference materials, learning figurative language, similes and metaphors, idioms, synonyms and antonyms and learning Greek and Latin affixes and roots to give us clues to the meaning of words.
Writing: Fourth graders will be focusing on narrative writing, realistic fiction, informational writing, poetry, and persuasive essays through planning, revising, and editing. We will be conducting research, taking notes, citing sources, and publishing writing with correct grammar, punctuation, and capitalization.
Everyday Math: With a combination of Everyday Math curriculum, math workshop, skill work on computers, math games, task cards, projects, and story problem practice, we will be learning a tremendous amount in fourth grade math! Fourth grade common core standards include: using the four operations to solve problems, working with factors and multiples, creating and analyzing patterns, using place value to understand larger numbers, understanding fractions and decimals, solving problems involving measurement and conversions of measurements, representing and interpreting data, and geometry.
Word Work: The goal is to help students learn to spell correctly in their everyday writing. Students will be pretested on a variety of most frequently used words and will work with words that are at his/her level. Science: We have many hands-on activities that go along with the fourth grade Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). We will be asking questions, researching, hypothesizing, experimenting, analyzing, and making conclusions while studying the following topics: energy through electric circuits, animal studies, land and water with an erosion emphasis, and waves (wavelength and amplitude).
Social Studies: We will focus on the five regions of the United States as well as map skills, Illinois, and architecture. It will be a lot of fun learning about our wonderful state and country!
Nothing Notebook: Curious about whats happening in fourth grade? Each week you will receive a letter, written by your child, in his/her Nothing Notebook that will give you the inside scoop. We hope that you enjoy reading this each week and will take a few moments to write an encouraging letter back to your child. Your childs nothing notebook will come home each Friday and should be returned on Monday. (This will be a sweet keepsake!)
Long Term Projects: Over the course of the school year, there will be various long- term assignments and projects across the curricular areas. The majority of these projects will be completed during the school day, but there may be situations in which some work will need to be completed outside of class. Large assignments will be broken up into portions and assigned mini due dates which will be recorded in the assignment notebooks and available on the class website.
Assignment Notebook: We will fill out assignment notebooks every day in class. If work is completed in class, a checkmark should be placed by the assignment. Please take a few moments every evening to check your childs assignment notebook and sign your name/initial at the bottom of the page so I know that you are aware of upcoming activities.
Homework: Homework will be an extension of classroom learning and we expect students to complete all assignments on time. If homework is not handed in on the day it is due, incomplete work will be sent home to be completed. If this plan does not seem to develop a sense of responsibility, teachers, parents and the student will meet to design a different plan. We realize there may be times that a student is unable to complete a required assignment for whatever reason, please write a note in the assignment notebook or email us to let us know there was not enough time and an extension is needed. Students should not have more than an hour of homework a night. If it is taking longer than an hour, please notify us of the problem so we can discuss situations that might be occurring.
Homework Folder: Students will bring home a homework folder each night. Please be sure to check this folder daily as it will contain any schoolwork that may need to be completed. One side of the folder will be marked TO-DO and the other side will be marked TURN IN. We will stress this system for the homework folders to help students establish effective organization habits.
Report Cards: Students will get one grade for each subject and then will be assigned a 4, 3, 2, or 1 for each standard that has been addressed for each of the reporting periods. The focus will be on how each child progresses with regards to the standards that must be accomplished by the end of the school year. The student version of the rubric that will be displayed in our room includes the following information: 4: Demonstrates complete and masterful work. (I can teach it. I can even teach more and explain my work.) 3: Demonstrates proficient work. (I get it.) 2: Demonstrates an emergent understanding. (I kind of get it, but I still make some mistakes.) 1: Demonstrates significant gaps in understanding. (Im starting to get it with help, but I am still confused.)