Reading Logs are due every Monday. This is for a grade. Kids can record their reading online at Reading-Rewards.com OR simply write down their reading on a piece of paper and turn it in.

A few reminders:

 There is a bond issue meeting every Monday at Southside at 6pm.

Hope to see you Friday at the Easter Egg Hunt at SSMS. 6pm!

The last day of the nine weeks is this Friday.

We will have our class party next Tuesday, and Wednesday is a half day. The kids have off Thursday & Friday, and then the following Monday & Tuesday.

This week we are going to be sure that we know how to spell the days of the week, the months of the year, and school subjects.

Reading Rewards

I noticed that many kids have been getting onto Reading Rewards to log their reading time! Letters with directions were sent home last week.
Usernames and passwords were included on the directions page. If you need new login information, just let me know. You can change the password once your are logged in. Here is the link:
http://www.reading-rewards.com/

Reminder: The goal is to read 80 minutes or more each week. That is 20 minutes, four times a week.

Right to Read!

What a fun week! Here is the line up...

Right to Read Week 2013    

March 4^th – 8^th

Monday: Crazy Sock Day –

·         Students can wear their favorite pair of crazy sox. 

·         Stop Drop and Read (2:30 – 2:45) students can go shoeless and read somewhere in the building. 

·         Author Visit: Paul Orshoski Grades K-1 (1:00-1:30). Grades 2,3,and 4 (1:45-2: 15) APR

Tuesday:  Switcheroo Day –

·         Students can dress as someone they would like to be.

·         Stop, Drop and Read (2:30 – 2:45) students can Switch and read in a different classroom.  

·         Teachers (pre-4^th) will switch classrooms with a different grade level teacher of their choosing.  Lesson will be prepared by the classroom teacher for the visiting teacher. Lesson should last about 40 minutes.  Switches will be in afternoon (1:30 - 2:10).

Wednesday: Green Grinch Day –

·         Wear green. 

·         The cafeteria will be serving green eggs and ham. 

·         Players from the Phantoms Hockey Team will be here to read to each class.  Please see attached schedule.

·          (1:15 – 1:30) Stop, drop and Read, sit by something or someone green! 

Thursday:  Inside Out / Reverse Day –

·         Wear your clothes inside out or backwards! 

·         Seuss Movie.. Classes can pick a favorite Dr.Seuss movie and watch it at their convenience.  PTO will provide popcorn!

·         Musical Reading… during Stop Drop and Read (1:15 – 1:30), when music plays move to a place to read. You must stop moving, sit down and read when music stops! 

Friday: Animal T-shirt day –

·         Wear a t-shirt with your favorite animal on it. 

·         Students can bring a stuffed animal and read to it in their classroom during Stop Drop and Read (10:00 – 10:15). 

·         Wild About Books animal show at 1:30 APR

Activities:

Mystery Readers: Each day we will have 2 mystery readers.  Classes can guess to see if they can identify each reader.  Slips will be given to each teacher to record 

The play was amazing! This week we will finish our triple Venn diagrams comparing three different versions of The WIzard of Oz. Word work for the last week of February is focused on the suffixes: TION and SION. These suffixes can change averb into a noun, and show "the act of" that verb. For example: discuss + sion = discussion A discussion is when people are discussing, or talking about a topic. We will be looking at fable this week, and then seeing how the different forms of traditional literature all fit together.

TION video

Our word work focus this week is on the suffix, LYWe are talking about how adding LY to the end of the word changes the word. It makes the word describe how something is done. For example:

The students were happily working on spelling.

How were the students working? HAPPILY

(Sorry, I couldn’t resist that example!)

Some words we will be working with are:

badly

sadly

madly

gladly

happily

quickly

sweetly

dangerously

shyly

quietly

loudly

unexpectedly

horribly

accidentally

silently

normally

eagerly

patiently

immediately

Here's another great video from the past....

Permission slips went home for the field trip to The Wizard of Oz at the Main Street Theatre. We are going next Thursday, Feb. 21 and the cost is $5.00.

Our word work/spelling this week is focused on the prefixes uni, bi, tri and quad. We are talking about root words as well.

We will be reading and writing about The Wizard of Oz in different ways for the next two weeks.

I am trying out some online reading logs. I think these would be much easier for everyone! I will post information as soon as I find one that I think would be easy to use.

Reminder: NO school Friday and Monday!

This week our spelling words are focusing on the prefixes UN and DIS, and how adding these prefixes to a word can change the meaning of the word.

We will wrap up tall tales this week. On Thursday, the students will read two short stories and decide which is a tall tale. More importantly, they will have to support their answer with evidence from the text. This type of activity and higher order thinking correlates to the new Common Core Standards.

Upcoming events...

Next Thursday, Feb. 14th: Class Parties & Conference Night

Please send in a valentine for EVERYONE in our class. A lsit of names is being sent home.

Conference requests were sent home with some students in their report cards. If you ever want to conference with me, please just call me or send in a note!

Thursday, Feb. 21
Wizard of Oz field trip at the theatre uptown. More details will be sent home and posted later this week. We can't wait to see Zhenya, Stanley, Emilee, & the Wilzcak dog!

Tall Tales!

This week we have started a genre inquiry of tall tales.
What is a GENRE INQUIRY you ask?
Over the next week or so, we will be reading many different tall tales and discussing the elements and structures that tall tales have.
The inquiry part comes by not just telling the students what the elements of tall tales are. Instead they have to critically think about the stories. In class, we will define tall tales by asking and answering the following....What do all tale tales have in common?  We will examine the characters, plots, setting and writing techniques used. So far, we have noticed that tall tales feature characters who are physically strong/tough, and the stories have many exaggerations in them. Not bad for just 2 days of reading!

Report Cards and Missing Posts

Well I am not sure where the posts from December and January went to! When I just pulled up the site, they are not here!
As they say...IDK...but I am hoping to figure this out!

What we've been up to:
Last Friday, during Fun Friday time, some of the students chose to make a book featuring Martin Luther King's famous, "I Have a Dream" speech. We are not finished yet, but I can't wait to take pictures and post them. They did a fantastic job of drawing and painting pages to coordinate with the speech.

We have began to investigate MYSTERIES.

I am currently benchmarking all 4th grade students. This is when I read a specific level of book with each child, checking their accuracy, fluency and comprehension.

Coming UP!
Report Cards go home this Friday. So you can imagine what I have been doing this weekend! Grading, grading and grading.
You may keep the report card, but please sign and return the envelope. The fourth grade teachers will include a conference notice if we feel that we need a conference at this time. Of course you are always more than welcome to request a conference...just send in a note or call the office to be placed on the conference night schedule.
Found this interesting article to reflect on:
http://www.scholastic.com/resources/article/what-the-report-card-really-means

and this...
Common Core Big Idea Series 2: The Standards Are Not Curriculum | Edutopia

Last Week of November!

Native American words

This week will be working with words that you will be using in Social Studies class. Choose 12 words. Make a list for home & for school. The test is on Friday.

My Words

1.  _______________________

2.  _______________________

3.  _______________________

4.  _______________________

5.  _______________________

6.  _______________________

7.  _______________________

8.  _______________________

9.  _______________________

10.              ____________________

11.              ____________________

12.              ____________________

Native American

longhouse

wigwam

Miami

Adena

Hopewell

Iroquois

Mound Builders

Wyandot

Delaware

Algonquian

Mingo

Ottawa

Chippewa

Shawnee

nature

conflict

hunting

settlement

leather

chief

headdress

migrate

buffalo

wilderness

arrowhead

crops

3rd Annual Book Parade Info
Attention 4^th Grade Families! It is time for the…

3^rd Annual Book Parade

Timeline
Nov. 5-9 In class, students will write a book blurb for the speakers to announce during the parade.

Nov. 12-16 Bring in your float materials any day this week.
Everyone should bring in…

one or two boxes: cereal boxes or large shoe boxes are great!
one roll of tape…masking tape or scotch tape

Optional items: ribbon, wrapping paper, tissue paper, pipe cleaners, small pom-poms, yarn, craft/popsicle sticks, aluminum foil, brown paper lunch bags, tinsel garland, construction paper, googley eyes, letter stickers, etc.

Nov. 19 MAKE THE FLOATS DAY!  
We will make floats in the classroom.

Nov. 20 Book Parade @ 2pm throughout the school.

Thank you for your support!
Mrs. Strohecker

Fall Fun Day! We can't wait for Wednesday!

We are having a spelling test vacation this week. There is no test on Friday.
 I am actually administering a spelling inventory to all kids, and gaining a lot of valuable information about their spelling development. We are learning about homophones and I have put some practice lists on Spelling City at http://www.spellingcity.com/melaniestrohecker/

Fall Fun Day! We can't wait for Wednesday!

Next week is Red Ribbon Week!

On Monday, students can wear PINK or an animal shirt to participate. A shirt featuring a flamingo would be great! Ha!

Monday   October 22         “PAWS”-itively Drug Free      Animal T-shirt Day

Tuesday    October 23      “PEACE OUT to Drugs”          Peace Signs/Tie Dye/70’s dress

Wednesday October 24    “I’m a Jean-ius-I’m Drug Free    Blue Jean Day

Thursday      October 25     “HAIRS” to a Drug Free Life       Crazy Hair Day

Friday           October 26       “Follow Your Dreams-Don’t Do Drugs”    Pajama Day

Oct. 15-19

It is time to start wearing our Be a Buddy Not a Bully Shirts!

Starting this week, I am going to assess the kids on common spelling words. Eah student will have a list in their Language Arts binder called "Words 4th Graders Need to Know".  They will use these words to add to their spelling lists each week. I will try to copy these lists and send them home asap. I am thinking this might be a great job for a parent volunteer! Let me know if you are interested!

Good news! I think I have figured out a way to add a link to documents. Try it below:

Spelling Words Oct. 15: Water Cycle

T-I-O-N Electric Company