1.5.12

This week is picking up some momentum it seems!  I guess since it was our first week back, I was feeling that it was going a bit slow and now, it's almost over...crazy!  We had an adjusted schedule yet again today because of an "Artist in Residence" (visiting artist) come to work with us on a colonial era dance.  She worked with each of the 4th grade classes, one hour at a time...so we were not able to complete our flex grouping schedule for today.  Thus, I kept our homeroom...which I love because I get to spend all day with my beeebees!  We had one hour of reading instruction before heading to the gym.

READING:
Our reading concept of focus for today was personfication which is another part of speech within the figurative language concept. 

·       FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE: Figurative language is a word or phrase that departs from everyday literal language for the sake of comparison, emphasis, clarity, or freshness.  Metaphor and simile are the two most commonly used figures of speech in figurative language (which we practiced yesterday), but things like hyperboles, onomatopoeia, alliteration, and personification are also figures of speech in this concept of poetic devices and language.

·       Like I said before, today, we were focusing on personification - Personification is giving human traits (qualities, feelings, action, or characteristics) to non-living objects (things, colors, qualities, or ideas). For example: The window winked at me. The verb, wink, is a human action. A window is a non-living object.

To first practice with this concept, we watched THIS CLIP of "Mater" from the movie, Cars 2 and discussed how Mater was acting like a human (getting bathroom signs and another language mixed up, using the restroom, talking, joking, screaming, rushing to the restroom because of an "accident" etc.).

Next, each student had a different picture book where they read the story and noted places where characters were given human characteristics.

Finally, we read three poems and discussed the personification used by the author in the poem and what the author intended for us to feel about a topic based on his usage of this part of figurative language. 
HOMEWORK: Read the poem, "Brothers" and complete the poetry response guide on the back!
ALSO: if you had homework from YOUR reading class last night, BE SURE to have it ready for her tomorrow when you transition to that class!  My reading class did NOT, but all others DID. 
DANCING ARTS PERFORMANCE:
A woman, Jennifer Rose, came with her two daughters to teach us about dance traditions in the colonial period when Kentucky was not a state, but was part of Virginia which was the largest territory of the time in the earlier days.  Tomorrow, our class as well as the other 3 4th grade classes and all 4 5th grade classes will be performing this dance for the entire school!  We really had a great time learning about the tradition, culture, and history of our ancestors' past.

WRITING:
We worked on finding logical reasons to support a main idea of a piece.  We are really trying to focus in on identifying ONE main topic of focus for a writing piece and using adequate subtopics within it and details to support it.  There will not be much homework dealing with writing pieces, but WE WILL HAVE GRAMMAR homework often!  Grammar practice will resume with our new normal schedule next week!
HOMEWORK: none...yet!

SCIENCE:
Ms. Frederick is working with the students on their new unit of states and properties of matter.
HOMEWORK: none.

Here is our NEW schedule for the remainder of the year:

7:15 - 7:45 Morning Routine (Breakfast, Flashbacks, etc.)

           7:45 Morning NEWS and Announcements

7:45 - 8:00 Calendar Math

8:00 - 10:00 FLEX grouped Reading

10:00 - 10:55 FLEX grouped Math

10:55 - 11:55 SPECIALS

11:55 - 12:25 D.E.A.R. and Recess

12:30 - 12:55 LUNCH

1:00 - 1:40 - SCIENCE (w/ Ms. Frederick)

1:40 - 2:20 WRITING (w/ Mrs. Thomas)

2:20 - 2:30 Closure

2:30 - 2:35 Pack-up

2:35 DISMISSAL

Have a TERRIFIC night!
xoxo,
Mrs. Thomas