Starting the week off right!

I don't have a lunchtime duty this week so I'm going to try writing as much of the blog as I can during this time. I had some kiddos eat lunch with me but they're at recess now.

We have a new student! L came this morning so we've been taking a step back to try and show her all the ins and outs of Arrow and our homeroom.

In academic block, in Insignificant Events in the Life of a Cactus, we found out what was in the desk and the missing picture and guess what?? Aven found her birth mother-sort of. While reading, we wrote down Aven's thoughts, words, actions, feelings, etc. that are helping her to change over time. Then, students had a chance to do their own characterization of the main character in the book they are currently reading. We also turned in our final drafts today. I can't wait to see the elevation of their writing based on their revisions and peer editors.
We spent our final day simulating weathering, erosion and testing out our 'prototypes' for reducing these processes. We uploaded videos of this to Flipgrid-have them show you and explain it to you!

In math today, we took our post-test over factors, multiples, multiplication and division. Overall, their scores increased from their pre-tests, however, I wasn't overly pleased with the level of security so we will continue to practice multiplication as the year moves on.

In meeting, we shared about our weekend in 5 words or less. This made this part of our meeting go super fast! This also creates questions in their minds to later ask their peers. We also shared what we want to accomplish this week and how we plan to do this. Unfortunately, many didn't take this seriously so we're going to try again tomorrow. Hopefully, tomorrow, we'll get goals for the week and action plans for how to be successful.

After lunch, recess and quiet time, we read the book, Dreaming Up, about how our modeling and creating as kids with blocks and such can someday become something bigger. Then we played with legos and created. We'll continue working with this and "dreaming up" our designs throughout the week.

Week of 9/23... I know... so sorry!

We did so many great things and I hate that I'm slacking on sharing them with you! Hopefully, your kiddo is able to talk about what we're doing and share these great things with you. In homeroom this week, we watched Greta Thunberg speak to the U.N. If you aren't aware, she is a 16 year old girl from Sweden that is very passionate about climate change. This led us to create our own passion projects! What is your kiddo's passion?

In our academic block, one thing we've been working on is writing short narratives about a small moment. This week, we hired editors to help us to revise our work and also were hired as editors ourselves. We had specific talents we were hired for and looked for certain characteristics in each others' writing. We even got paid for our work! Today, we got our own work back and are using the editing ideas from our editors to create our final draft.
Another thing we've been doing is with weathering and erosion. Using the design thinking process, we have researched and created possible solutions to reduce erosion. Toward the end of the week, we build models to simulate this erosion to see if our solutions would be plausible. On Monday, we are going to upload videos of these simulations to flipgrid so that we can then assess their sustainability.

In math, we continued our work with using algorithms to solve multi-digit multiplication and division problems. We played games and practiced and today worked on a review packet for all of the different skills. Most were able to check with me but for those that didn't finish, they should finish this weekend and submit it on canvas so I can correct their mistakes if needed. We'll take our post-test on Monday.

There were so many little things, I'm sure, that I have left out. My goal is to blog every day next week... fingers crossed! :)

Too sporadic~So sorry!!

I know, this year has started off a little too sporadic with my blogs. I'll try to do better this week! Life just gets in the way sometimes. Sorry!

We started a new schedule today and will keep this schedule for the remaining five weeks of the quarter. Our biggest change is that lunch is about 20 minutes later than it was. Everything else is just shifted slightly. So, our day began looking at this new schedule. Students answered our morning question for Motivation Monday~What will you do to stay motivated this week? and then got themselves Ready to Learn before we headed down to special.

In my room during our academic block, we caught up with Aven in our read aloud, Insignificant Events in the Life of a Cactus. Not too much happened today except Aven is trying to help Connor stick up for himself when others make fun of his tics. After reading, we continued the discussion we have been having about how words, actions and experiences change the characters over the course of a book and like books, we, too, are changed by things. Using Kidblog, we shared how we have connected to the changes the characters are making to our own lives.
Mr. Smith's kiddos then came over and as a whole 4th grade, we perused some book collections to make connections to the photos of Mr. Smith's new property and our notices and wonders from last week. They made some great connections. Next, we started a list of problems they could research and discover solutions for.

In math, we practiced and practiced and practiced multi-digit multiplication. 4th grade is still in the development stage of this multi-digit work so the way your kiddos solve problems may look different than the traditional method that we use and learned. Some of them use the traditional method but many are not there yet. We also played a game practicing our basic facts.

After our late lunch and recess, we got set up on Brain Pop! where we are going to be learning about and practicing setting goals.

Taco Tuesday

I don't know about you but this is my favorite day of the week! The cafeteria even jumps on board with taco Tuesday! Our morning message was Taco-bout it Tuesday where I encouraged them to discuss our morning puzzles (brain teaser type things) with each other. They got the talking part but missed what they were supposed to talk about...

In academic block today, we all took Star Assessments. These assessments are one piece to the puzzle that is your child. They take these assessments in reading and math every year and we look for them to improve over time. Many of our students are already in the 99th percentile so it isn't as helpful for us as for others but again, it's still just one piece of the puzzle. Unfortunately, the Star website crashed and many of us weren't able to complete both today so we'll be back at it again on Thursday. 4th graders also used multiple perspectives to put themselves in the shoes of a homeowner. Mr. Smith is buying a new home and we showed them pictures of the property. Together in small groups, they looked over these pictures and wrote down things they noticed and wondered. This will make more sense after we discuss our intentions. :)

In math, in my room, we began by playing Buzz. We started with multiples of 4 and made it to 52! We tried multiples of 6 but couldn't make it further than 42. Then, we looked at multiplying by 10 and how this isn't "adding a zero to the end" but moving the place of the numbers changing the value. We also looked our the cool patterns from yesterday (and Danny showed us some amazing things his brain can do!) and went on to complete a problem but more importantly explaining how we solved the problem. I told them that I'm trying to slow their brains down so they can see what they are doing when they do it in their head so that when we get to harder problems, they'll know what to do! They took turns putting their work on the Apple TV and sharing their thinking with each other. Although we all got the same answer, we each solved it somewhat differently-which was neat to see!

In meeting, we shared what color crayon describes us best. I said rainbow because I like rainbows and what they stand for. Some other colors were: the darkest blue possible without being called navy, reddish-orange because they like that color, empty (whatever color that would be!), sparkly rainbow, sparkly yellow, gold, pastels... Then, we acted out the Fidget Family play. They seemed to really enjoy this! We also discussed making connections with others and getting out of their comfort zones.

We also had a pretty typical lunch and recess, a mostly quiet quiet time and finished up our complexity frames that we began yesterday. Ask your kiddo to see theirs and let them explain it to you!

Mindset Monday

What a great way to start the week! Our morning message stated that you become what you think... our question asked for another way to say that something is too hard. They had a lot of great ways to look at a challenge positively! After special, we watched the school news put on by the 6th graders and headed off to our academic block.

In my room, the 4th grade students wrote descriptions based off the book, Motel of the Mysteries, about an object and then brought in the artifact but we needed to guess what it was first. I was extremely impressed with their writing! We had a lot of fun guessing too! Then, we reviewed primary vs. secondary sources. Next, we read a primary source on Newsela: a letter from a housewife to Thomas Edison. Finally, we wrote letters (primary sources) to ourselves about what is going on in their lives right now. I'll be mailing these out to them the last week of school. We also caught up with Aven, Connor and Zion. After reading today, we had a great conversation about how you can connect to others in many different ways including experiences and other things that happen throughout our lives. I challenged them to look for others that might need help making connections.

In math, we played, Buzz, a game where we counted by multiples. We struggled a bit at first but will keep practicing to get more fluent with our multiplication facts. Next, we worked with multiplicative comparisons. It's not always about the answer but also understanding what is being asked as well as the process. Next, we applied this thinking to real world shopping problems and wrote equations to model our thinking. Finally, we took some time to observe some patterns with numbers.

In meeting today, we shared about our weekend. We also discussed our social media board in our room. It's a pinterest/snapchat/instagram/photos board where I am encouraging students to bring in pictures and things to share with others about themselves from outside of school in order to help them make connections and share their interests with the class.

After lunch, recess and quiet time, we used Byrdseed TV again to learn about complexity. Today, we focused on multiple perspectives by looking at the different roles we have: student, son/daughter, soccer player, dancer, artist, etc. Then, we took 3 of the depth icons and used them to explain our different perspectives. Again, this is all in preparation for being able to go deep and complex with everything we do this year. If learn it all now, we don't have to spend time explaining what to do and can get right to learning. 

Thoughtful comments

Today was "Thoughtful Thursday" and for the morning question, we focused on the quote by Kid President, "If you don't have anything nice to say, you aren't trying hard enough." Then, they picked a post-it note and wrote a message to a classmate. What did your child's note say? After special, we watched our first WCAT news broadcast and then headed off to our academic block. 

In my room, we caught up with Aven and Connor in Insignificant Events in the Life of a Cactus. Aven met a new friend today, Zion, who happened to not want to eat around other people either. So, they ate lunch together. Nest, we read an article on Newsela about a teenager with no arms that participates in triathlons. We then wrote about what we would do if we didn't have arms. We wrote digitally in Google Docs so if you are curious what your kiddo said, have them show you. We also kept working with primary and secondary sources using Motel of the Mysteries.

In math, we reviewed strategies for solving problems and then took another look at the work we began yesterday. Today, there was much more perseverance when encountering problems! We also took a look at multiplication fact fluency. After 5 minutes to complete 100 basic facts, we graphed our results and discussed what we can do to improve this number. 

In meeting, we shared the nicest compliments we've ever received and played "What are you doing?" We also wrote in our 'planners' and then got ready and headed down to lunch and recess.

After recess, we continued our work with the Depth icons and completed our frames about ourselves. 

What a glorious day!

It has been a great start to the week! I love being in a routine! We began as always with reading our morning message which reminds us to check in, get ourselves Ready to Learn, answer our morning question and work on our morning work while we wait for our shuttle friends to arrive. Once everyone gets to school and gets themselves set up for success, we head down to special.

After special, in our academic block, we began looking at primary and secondary sources through the book, Motel of the Mysteries. First, we looked at some "ancient" artifacts (like from the last 20 or so years!) and tried to infer what it was used for. Then, we began to read the book, which takes place in the year 4022. Using detailed excerpts from the book describing artifacts, we have been trying to draw what we think is being described. Ask your kiddo what the first two artifacts actually were. We also read more from Insignificant Events in the Life of a Cactus. Aven has made a great friend in Connor and they are spending more and more time together. We also had time to blog, read and write.

In math today, we continued our work with prime numbers but dove deeper learning language of the discipline and applying our understanding. We had a tough time persevering through these problems today...

Lunch and recess have been great, however, not everyone has found something to do or a group to be involved with yet. However, we are working on it! I've encouraged them to break out of their comfort zone and try new things and I noticed today that some truly were talking with new people or trying to get a game of something going.

After recess and some quiet time, today, we learned about the Depth and Complexity icons. These are symbols that help to signal us to go deeper and more complex in our learning. We learned about 4 of the 8 depths by writing about ourselves using: Language of the Discipline, Ethics, Big Idea and Trends. We'll work with the rest tomorrow and Friday.