10.27.11

Happy Last Friday of October, everyone!  Can you believe we are less than one-month away from Thanksgiving?!?  yeee-haw!

WRITING:
We took a quiz over suffixes which has been our concept of focus in writing for this week.
HOMEWORK: I forgot to pass it out...so, none for WRITING!

READING:
We actually got to get in our reading groups today and see how those would work for the rest of the year during reading class.  I believe the students are going to have a fantastic time and will show me what tremendous reading stars they are!
HOMEWORK: EVERY SINGLE student got his/his Literature Circle Role assignment.  All groups have different pages of their chapter books that they need to read by Monday and a coinciding role sheet to complete. 
They ALSO need to study their vocab words for their assessment tomorrow AND complete an "In Context" vocabulary sheet (fill in vocab words in paragraphs, that match the context in which the words are used). 
ALSO...
Do NOT forget that the "Halloween" Scholastic assignment is due by tomorrow as well!

SCIENCE:
Mrs. Butler came in with Ms. Frederick to teach a lesson about shadows that was super neat and way fun and everyone had a GREAT time!
HOMEWORK: none.

MATH:
We took our end of the unit (summative) assessment over Factors and Multiples.  Many did not finish so we will be completing them tomorrow and learning how to score an ORQ.
HOMEWORK: none.

REMINDERS...

PLEASE, Bring in your permission forms and money for the 4H Camp Field Trip! We need all of your paperword ASAP!

Monday is our FALL PARTY at 1:05PM!  We are still missing several items to complete our fun activities!

Art-to-Remember was due YESTERDAY.

Picture Orders are due NO LATER than Monday!

Have a Thrilling Thursday!
xoxo,
Mrs. Thomas

4 days until trick-or-treating!

Thanksgiving is ONLY 4 weeks from TODAY...YAAAAY!!! (Mrs. Thomas's favorite holiday!)

Hey class  this is corie I want to tell you that we rock! When we are good we can do fun things. So lets show all the fourth grade teachers that we can be so we have to be good all the time. Well now lets talk about HALLOWEEN!!! So we all now that hallween is in six days and I bet you are all happy I know I am well I hope you all have fun trick or treating for candy and I want to see all you guys fiction storys comstumes at the fall party!!! Oh yeah I want to tell you that we are all stars at are erqs but we all need to get proficient or distinguished so the whole class can go to the stomp bash because I know all of you really want to go to the stomp bash so do good on your erqs!!!1 So I will talk to you later you guys bye... 

p.s.We all can fly in the air in are dreams, And we are all stars!!!!!

your buddy corie wilkerson
       
         and happy

     
                                      

10.25.11

Good Tuesday afternoon, Gents and Judies!  We have had a bright and sunshiny day here in the DSE!

This morning, the students had orchestra and then we switched classes for Writing and Reading.
WRITING:
We are studying "suffixes" this week in Writing.  Suffixes are groups of letters added to the END of a word, to change the meaning of the root word.  For example, joyFUL means full of joy, or adding the suffix, "-est" means making something the most...like oldEST, or youngEST, or funniEST.
HOMEWORK: complete suffix sheet.

READING:
We are continuing our study of making inferences, but this week, we are making "reader guesses" with nonfiction texts, instead of fictional texts.  To illustrate getting all the facts before we jump to conclusions or make an inference, we watched the video clip seen HERE. 
HOMEWORK (SEVERAL things): Read chapters 1&2 of group's chapter book (Group A = The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe; Group B = Tuck Everlasting; Group C = Holes; and Group D = Maniac Magee).

ALSO...

***Choose ONE activity from the "Spelling Tic-Tac-Toe" menu to complete with vocabulary words on sheet.
***Complete Exercise One sheet (Words and Their Meanings) for vocabulary words. 
***Study vocab words for assessment on Friday.  *Assessment WILL BE over spelling AND definitions.

Our WOW! Words this week are:

courageous

beneficial

detrimental

independently

Frankenstein

SCIENCE:
Ms. Frederick worked with us on parts of an ecosystem and how energy is tranferred.  She also talked about producers and consumers.
HOMEWORK: none.

MATH:
We have our summative assessment over Factors and Multiples on FRIDAY, so the students are reviewing these skills in order to adequately prepare. 
We are also playing all of our games we learned in this unit to help us review too.
HOMEWORK: none.

REMINDERS:

• PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE send in your conference forms so we can get one scheduled!
• Don't forget to continue sending in cans for our "Kids helping Kids" food drive!  We are currently in 2nd place and I. WANT. TO. WIN.!  What an awesome opportunity to help those in need around the holidays!
• Picture order forms are due!
• 4H informational night is THIS WEDNESDAY at 6PM!

10.21.11

Wowza, did we ever have a FUN day?!?  Guess what?!?  The students are master mystery solvers because they figured out who took "Carrie Owl"!!!  And do you know who it was?!?  Mrs. Thornsbury!  That crazy girl, can you believe she wanted to trick us?!?  Well, it was for a good cause, because we got to practice our reading "inferencing" skills and it was SUPER FUN! 

This mystery game took most of our morning and we were biding our time to get past lunch so we could go to the STOMP BASH!!!  Hallejuah, did we EVER have fun!!!!  Poor Mrs. T. though...I did not get to go...I was the teach who stayed in the room and worked with some friends on bringing some previous tests up to Proficient and Distinguished so when the next "Stomp Bash" rolls around, we'll ALL get to go!!!

Don't forgets:

• PLEASE sign up for a parent-teacher conference.  This is the only way to get your student's report card and  alsohave some one-on-one facetime with Mrs. T. about your student's progress and successes in 4th grade! 
• 4H Field Trip Parent Information night is WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 26TH at 6:00PM...so PLEASE make plans to attend where we will be going over very valuable information about our trip coming up a week from TUESDAY!!!  PS, Did you know that the funds for this trip can be discussed with people in the front office???  Just a heads up!
• On Thursday, November 3rd, the students and I have discussed wearing the colors of blue or pink based on our opinion of what this baby is going to be...Boy or Girl?!?  We are going to have a gender reveal party that day as I should be (finger crossed!) finding out what this little nugget is on the 2nd!  Boy or Girl, it should be A LOT of F-U-N! 

Have a FANTASTIC weekend!
xoxo,
Mrs. Thomas

Hey you guys, this is the one, the only... Corie! I just want to drop in and tell you that I hope the class have a GREAT day on Monday so we can get a good report.  And, so Mrs. Thomas can tell the other fourth grade teachers too...ya know, like bragging about us! So let's be G-O-O-D GOOD!!!!!!
                                  
                                                                                                              Love, Corie

10.18.11

Hello all and Happy Tuesday to you!  I have not been on here in over a week...ahhh!!!  I feel so lost with our break and me being out...CRAZY!

Anyway, I hope you had a TERRIFIC Fall Break!  I was super busy...two weddings, orchards, registering for Baby T, family outings, etc.

WRITING:
We are working on identifying prefixes and suffixes from a base word (root word), and noting how they change the meanings of the root words when applied.
HOMEWORK: prefixes worksheet

READING:
We are working on making inferences in our reading.  To make an inference means to take clues from the author in the text, combing it with what we know, and making a guess about something that the author may not come out directly and say.  Our theme is mysteries...and can you believe it, someone stole our CARRIE OWL!!!!???!!!??!?  Ahhhhh!!!!!  We will be using the clues left for us by the thief to make inferences of who he/she is...silly person, don't they know Carrie Owl is THE BEST?!?
HOMEWORK: none

SCIENCE:
Students are studying Energy Transformations with Ms. Frederick.  They made a model of a Food Chain on a diagram and went through a cool and fun activity!
HOMEWORK: none.

MATH:
We are now studying MULTIPLES which is like skip counting by a given number.  For example, the multiples of 3 are 3, 6, 9, 12, 15, 18, 21, 24, 27, 30, 33, 36, etc.
HOMEWORK: WORKBOOK pages 27 and 28.

Conference Request forms were sent home today.  Conference night is Thursday, October 28th, but I am open to having any and all necessary throughout next week.  The sooner you send back your form, the more likely you are to get the time you requested.

ALSO, DO NOT forget to send back picture forms and money!
Have a terrific Tuesday evening!
xoxo,
Mrs. Thomas

10.10.11

Happy Monday, All!  I hope your weekend was a relaxing and enjoyable time with all of your loved ones!

Since we only have 3 days of school this week, we will be working on reviewing content.

WRITING:
Today we reviewed correct usage of pronouns.  We know that pronouns are words that can take the place of a noun like I, me, they, her, she, his, he, their, our, your, us, we, you, him, etc.
HOMEWORK: none

READING:
ALL students should be finished with the reading of their group's chapter book.  They have had these books for well over 6 weeks now and have no excuse to not have them completely read...especially since I have been reminding them for TWO WEEKS now that ALL of the book MUST be read by TODAY!  The reason for this is not only that it's the end of this 9 weeks grading period, but it's time to complete a book report and project on the books.  We began the first phase of these projects today in class so students who were not finished with their reading, had to take valuable work time to read, instead of working on the summary.
HOMEWORK: FINISH reading AND complete "Book Report" Summary page.

SCIENCE:
Students are working on studying different environments, habitats, and ecosystems with Ms. Frederick.
HOMEWORK: none

MATH:
We are reviewing factors before we move onto multiples and students had some work to do in their workbooks.
HOMEWORK: complete WORKBOOK pages 24-26

Have an excellent evening!  See you bright and early tomorrow morning!
xoxo,
Mrs. Thomas

DON'T FORGET: We DO NOT have school Thursday (Oct.13th) or Friday (Oct. 14th) due to FALL BREAK!

10.6.11

Hello all and HAPPY THURSDAY!  This week feels like it has FLOWN by!  I'm sorry about missing the last two days...my blogger at school has been messed up and then today I must leave quickly after school to check on little Peanut. 

Anyway, we had an eventful day and homework is completing a timed multiplication quiz (90 seconds). Also, students MUST be finished with the reading of their group's chapter book BY MONDAY, OCTOBER 10TH! 

Hope you have a great evening!  I'll have more tomorrow!
xoxo,
Mrs. Thomas

10.3.11

Happy first Monday of October, everyone!  What an absolutely AMAZING fall day we had amongst us!  We had a GREAT day of learning and have really been working hard!

WRITING:
We are studying the concept of "prepositions" which are words that describe where something is or is taking place (kind of like the setting of a sentence).  For example, these can be: above, on top, beyond, behind, in front, etc.  Students got to watch an extra special video to introduce this concept...click HERE to see it...and promise NOT to laugh!
HOMEWORK: complete "Prepositions" practice sheet.

READING:
We are now beginning a unit on MYSTERIES and what makes up a story that is a mystery.  We read a story entitled, "The Closet Creature" and talked about any predictions we could make while reading the story about whom the creature in the closet might be.  Next, we added the elements of a mystery to our witch's brew.  Finally, our story is Detective LaRue and we had to use our predictions and thought processes to figure out LaRue's mystery.
HOMEWORK: complete comprehension practice for "The Closet Creature".

SCIENCE:
Students are working on describing the characteristics of different environments. 
HOMEWORK: none

MATH:
We are REALLY stepping up our game with FACTORS!  The students have really been working on some higher level thinking skills and are breaking down numbers into factor trees and factor rainbows.
HOMEWORK: 1) a 90-second timed multiplication quiz (MUST BE SIGNED BY AN ADULT)
2) complete PRIME FACTORIZATION sheet #s 5-12.


I hope you have a MARVELOUS Monday evening! See you tomorrow!
xoxo,
Mrs. Thomas