Volume 3: 31 August 2015

Reading 20 minutes will add 1.8 million words to your child's language in one school year!
Please read each night!!!!

What a fabulous Open House! We are lucky to have such wonderful children to watch grow and learn!

This week has been busy and great fun! In math, we have been working on place value and the base ten system through games called Close to 100, How Many Steps? and 101-200 Bingo. These activities help students use multiple strategies such as find groups of numbers to put together (i.e. multiples), identify patterns (like skip counting by 10's and 1's) to strengthen mental math computations, and develop accountable talk using new math vocabulary.

In our Unit of Inquiry, students learned what we eat might not be what the package says... it might just be disgusting! We continue to explore our food books and learn how conventions of non-fiction texts help us understand important facts and what the text is really saying. We are also reading for a purpose: Finding answers to wonders we've posed as a community. These wonders continue to grow and drive us towards several lines of inquiry: How our food is distributed? How our food is produced/grown? What affects people and food choices? At times, global and food scarcity has come up as well.

We continue to work on our first writing piece and our taking it through the writing process. Students are working on choosing stronger adjectives and verbs using a thesaurus.

Lastly, we have a field trip to the farm this week. Please pack a little extra snack and wear sneakers. A hat might be a good idea, too. Any other questions, please email me: michaelr@tashschool.org That's it for now. Have a wonderful week! Check out this week's pics below!

Homework:
Read 20 minutes each night, plus the following...

Monday: Number Patterns

Tuesday: No School Uzbekistan Independence Day

Wednesday: IXL Math Grade 4 A.1-A.3 Number Sense

Thursday: Word Problems: Illustrate and Solve

Friday: Read and Relax! Remember 1.8 million words! Elementary Camp Out!

We continue to add Wonders about food!

Morning activities have been a blast!

Watch as we uncover the mysterious patterns and create rules to help us add, subtract, multiply, and divide!

Nothing is better than having your head stuck in a book! Food Book Exploration!

Ms. Shakhnoza came in and we had an Uzbek Tea Party. Raisins, Tea, and Nan (Bread) was had by all. 

Harlin is our first Owl of the Week and she runs a community meeting (ignore the sad faces - they were just posing!)

Working hard, or hardly working? Of course, Working hard!

Volume 2: 24 August 2015

Big Hello from 4R!

What a fun and fantastic first week back to school! Students are digging deep into our first unit of inquiry: Let's Eat! Our central idea is Sharing food is complex and present challenges, or in our own words, Sharing food is complicated and gives big problems. So far, students have wondered how food is shared across the planet, how food is available in some places but not others, the different types of food choices people make (e.g. eating frozen broccoli vs. eating fresh broccoli), and where different foods come from. These wonders also came from our study of photographs of families around the world and what they eat in one week.

In math, we have begun our Investigations study called Mathematical Thinking in the 4th Grade. To brush up on our mental math and estimating skills, we've learned the games Close to 100 and 101-200 Bingo. Students are using words, numbers, and pictures to share their thinking both verbally and in written form. 

We have also begun a writing piece in response to the question, "What is one thing you did for the first time this summer?" Everyone is excited to listen to what everyone did this summer, as well as sharing what they did. 

Homework:

Please remember to read at least 20 minutes nightly. It is so important to build great reading habits now!

Monday: Naming Nouns p.6

Tuesday: Good Form & More than One p.7-8

Wednesday: Math IXL Log-in Grade 3, Estimation and Rounding M.7 Estimate Sums

Thursday: That's my Noun & Comparing and Contrasting p. 9-10

Friday: Relax, Rest, Rejuvenate, Read!

About Physical Education.

The TIS Physical Education Department would like to welcome everyone to the start of a new year at TIS. We are very excited about what we can achieve this year and look forward to a year of partnership with you.

In order to ensure that your child is ready to participate in PE class, there are a few points that we would like to bring to your attention regarding our program:

PE has an important role to play in various aspects of child development: physical, social, personal and emotional. We will develop these aspects by giving students the opportunity to learn about movement and through movement.

Your child’s Physical Education class will be on Monday and Friday. Please make sure that your child is dressed appropriately for physical activity.  For comfort and safety purposes, he/she should wear sneakers/athletic shoes and clothes suitable for activity. Students will need two pairs of sneakers/athletic shoes – one for indoor use and another one for outdoor use. Parents of students with improper dress or footwear will be notified by the school.

Physical Activity must be done regularly to achieve health benefits. Therefore, your child’s participation is very important. If your child is sick or unable to participate in all activities, please keep them at home. 

Please note that experts recommend children receive at least 60 minutes of physical activity each and every day. Please help you child meet these recommendations by helping them seek active opportunities outside of school. Each week you child will have a PE line on their homework assignments. Please encourage your child to complete this physical activity time as an important part of their balanced health and well-being.

18 August 2015: Volume 1

Beginning of the Year Grade 4 Selfie

What a wonderful start to the school year! Our day began with a special surprise delivery from Ms. Jan, our new Elementary Principal. Inside a box was a piece of food and a letter that sent our community on a journey to find clues, or letters. We found them in the Library, PE, and around our community. We were overwhelmed when we realized the clues spelled the word...

"Wonder" is one of our themes for this school year!

Our journey continued as we read Miss Nelson is Missing. Based on our discussion about what we want our learning to look, sound, and feel like this year, we created essential agreements for our community to follow. Here they are:

• people listen to me
• ok to disagree and argue
• ok to say what's important to you
• respect others' beliefs/opinions, culture, religion
• be kind
• take responsibility for your choices
• have fun
• responsibility to listen to everyone
• appreciate who you are
• be creative, imaginative
• be a risk-taker with an open-mind
• solve problems together
• work hard
• explore by asking questions

We illustrated what each agreement looks and doesn't look like.

It is clear we have a talented, imaginative, and creative group of students. We look forward to year of fun learning and building creative, inquisitive minds. 

Homework

*In addition to a standing assignment to read 20 minutes daily, please complete the homework each night below. 

Tuesday: Information About Me page

Wednesday: Mystery Object

Thursday: Hopes and Dreams Reflection

Friday: Relax, Read, and have fun!

Check out these photos from today!

General 'Wonderings' from the morning.

 Ms. Jan delivers our box!

 Getting to know each other and Recess!

Working to unscramble the clues, as wonderful detectives often do!