Hello, 4H families. This week I think it will be most helpful to send you a "list" (our kids know - I am famous for lists in the classroom :) ), since there are quite a number of approaching special events, dates, and reminders we all need to keep in mind (grab your calendar!):
1. This very Saturday, the 16th, the WM Winter Carnival takes place at school from 2:00 to 4:30 (come find me in the 'prize room'!)
2. Friday, February 22nd, all of our 4th graders will be touring the State Capitol Building and the Wisconsin Historical Museum. Our students will need to bring a completely disposable lunch. We will leave school at 9:15 and be back by 1:45 that day.
3. Thursday evening, February 28th, all of West Middleton's first through fifth graders will be presenting the annual Choral Program at the Middleton High School Performing Arts Center. The program will begin at 6:30 pm and last no more than one hour. During the school day on Thursday, all classes will have a chance to rehearse on the PAC stage under the direction and supervision of Ms. Bodell and Mr. Macklem.
4. The end of our second trimester is March 8th. Therefore, it is parent/student/teacher conference time once again. The two possible dates are Thursday, March 7th, and Tuesday, March 12th. You should have found a conference sign-up sheet in your student's Take Home Folder this Friday, where you can put down your 1st, 2nd, and 3rd choices for times you can attend with your 4th grader. If I can get these all back in the coming week, I can confirm your time very soon. I look forward to helping your child report their progress in 4th grade. Report cards should be ready for your viewing approximately one week after the end of the trimester.
5. Our annual Literacy Week celebration will take place from March 4th through March 8th. Each day that week all classes at West Middleton will take part in special activities with reading and books to celebrate and encourage our love of good books. Stay tuned for a schedule of our events that week.
6. The CRT Day scheduled for Thursday, March 14th, has been cancelled in order to make up for one of our missed days of school due to snow!
7. Spring Break Week is March 25th to March 29th - no school. We will all be back in class Monday, April 1st.
8. For our 4th grade math students, the final Unit 6 test will be given this Monday, February 18.
9. Students should keep practicing those High Frequency 4th Grade Spelling Words. Those needing to retake the first 25 words will do that on Monday, and all students will be testing on the second 25 words on Wednesday.
10. The Great Bus Race is on! Students riding buses to and from school are earning "Pride Paws" from their bus drivers for the next 3 weeks. They receive these for appropriate behavior on the bus. Pride Paws are being counted daily and the bus that collects the most Pride Paws will receive a prize. This endeavor is part of our building-wide PBIS (positive behavior) program. This past week was Bus Driver Appreciation Week, and we all met with our bus drivers to honor them and talk about expectations for safe bus behaviors.
As always, you may email or call me anytime with your questions or concerns - and reminders of your own! Till next note! Melanie Hannam
Saturday, February 16, 2013
Saturday, February 9, 2013
February 8, 2013 Weekly Update
Hello to all of our 4H families! At least the kids can't complain they haven't gotten enough time to play in snow this season! With yet another snow day this past week, many have wondered how the lost minutes of instruction will be handled by our school district. We have been informed that we can make up the time by cancelling our March CRT day (so we will have a full day of school March 14th), and one minute will be added to each elementary school day for the 4th quarter of this year. To add to the snow fun, Friday afternoon turned out to be a perfect time for our class "Winter Prairie Visit". The sun was shining and we actually could feel its warmth on our faces. We hiked through completely untouched snow halfway up to our knees down the middle of our prairie, and around the back of it. Conditions were ideal for everyone to pick a clear spot to fall straight backwards into a cushion of soft snow, just lie there, and listen to a perfect Wisconsin winter day (interspersed with sounds of giggles and wiggles from endlessly energetic 4th graders!). We came back into the classroom with our Thoughtful Logs already opened, pencils ready, and the title written: "Winter Prairie". We will compare our descriptions with our Autumn Prairie writing from last fall. (Can't wait for our Spring edition!)
Our week ahead will bring us to Valentine's Day on Thursday. We do have four volunteers already (Emma, Avante, Luigi, and Jacob) who have offered to bring in goodies for our card exchange that afternoon - thank you. As I wrote you earlier this past week, students may bring in cards for the whole class that day or anytime during the week, and I will keep them stored until Thursday afternoon. We will have decorated envelopes ready to receive our 'mail'. Other reminders for the week: February Scholastic Book Orders are due Monday, the 11th, and bright green permission slips can be found in Take Home Folders for our Field Trip on the 22nd. Please keep the top half for your information, and fill out and send in the bottom half as soon as possible. We have 4 parent volunteers for our day to the Capitol and Historical Museum so far - I can take one more parent if you are interested in coming. Chaperones will be able to ride the buses with us, and just need to give me $2 for their admission to the Museum - and bring along a lunch.
Take Home Folders should also contain a pink sheet with the 4th Grade 75 High Frequency Spelling Words. No formal assignments to practice these have been given, though our students have been encouraged to practice and be ready for several pretests on these - any missed words will need to be learned and checked off for mastery. The pink sheet should stay in the Take Home Folders, so they are available at all times both at home and at school. In Writer's Workshop, we are at the stage of finishing our realistic fiction rough drafts, and next week we will be revising and editing, and creating our final drafts, with a 'book' cover and backing. With several 30 minute long 'write' times throughout the week, many students are visibly developing their stamina to stay writing for an extended period of time - a most valuable skill!
We are in the midst of a major push to cover most of 3 chapters in our Wisconsin Social Studies texts before our field trip on the 22nd. We are reading and comparing the ways of life for the early people of our state, and plan to get the basics of our state government covered as well (I know - lofty ambitions!). We will do our best! Our new science unit on Rocks and Minerals is also ready for launch. Whew - no more snow days, please!
In math, please continue to oversee and give your 4th grader practice on long division problems. We learned how to measure and create angles with both full circle and half circle protractors this past week, along with continued work on division. We will begin a thorough review this coming week on Unit 6.
Other upcoming events: The WM PO Winter Carnival is taking place next Saturday on February 16th, starting at 2:00 pm at West Midddleton. Also, please make sure our upcoming WM Choral Concert is on your calendar for Thursday evening, February 28th. It is scheduled to begin at 6:30 pm in the Middleton High School PAC. Our students will all get a time slot to travel to the PAC with Ms. Bodell and Mr. Macklem during the school day that day for rehearsal on the stage.
Thank you for your continuing support for your 4th grader to meet deadlines, keep organized with their papers and belongings, and providing regular time to finish homework and READ! Before this month ends, I will be sending out time slots for our 2nd parent-student-teacher conferences during the first half of March. I will get specific dates and times to you very soon, so you can plan. The second trimester ends on March 8th. Time flies when we are busy! Melanie Hannam
Our week ahead will bring us to Valentine's Day on Thursday. We do have four volunteers already (Emma, Avante, Luigi, and Jacob) who have offered to bring in goodies for our card exchange that afternoon - thank you. As I wrote you earlier this past week, students may bring in cards for the whole class that day or anytime during the week, and I will keep them stored until Thursday afternoon. We will have decorated envelopes ready to receive our 'mail'. Other reminders for the week: February Scholastic Book Orders are due Monday, the 11th, and bright green permission slips can be found in Take Home Folders for our Field Trip on the 22nd. Please keep the top half for your information, and fill out and send in the bottom half as soon as possible. We have 4 parent volunteers for our day to the Capitol and Historical Museum so far - I can take one more parent if you are interested in coming. Chaperones will be able to ride the buses with us, and just need to give me $2 for their admission to the Museum - and bring along a lunch.
Take Home Folders should also contain a pink sheet with the 4th Grade 75 High Frequency Spelling Words. No formal assignments to practice these have been given, though our students have been encouraged to practice and be ready for several pretests on these - any missed words will need to be learned and checked off for mastery. The pink sheet should stay in the Take Home Folders, so they are available at all times both at home and at school. In Writer's Workshop, we are at the stage of finishing our realistic fiction rough drafts, and next week we will be revising and editing, and creating our final drafts, with a 'book' cover and backing. With several 30 minute long 'write' times throughout the week, many students are visibly developing their stamina to stay writing for an extended period of time - a most valuable skill!
We are in the midst of a major push to cover most of 3 chapters in our Wisconsin Social Studies texts before our field trip on the 22nd. We are reading and comparing the ways of life for the early people of our state, and plan to get the basics of our state government covered as well (I know - lofty ambitions!). We will do our best! Our new science unit on Rocks and Minerals is also ready for launch. Whew - no more snow days, please!
In math, please continue to oversee and give your 4th grader practice on long division problems. We learned how to measure and create angles with both full circle and half circle protractors this past week, along with continued work on division. We will begin a thorough review this coming week on Unit 6.
Other upcoming events: The WM PO Winter Carnival is taking place next Saturday on February 16th, starting at 2:00 pm at West Midddleton. Also, please make sure our upcoming WM Choral Concert is on your calendar for Thursday evening, February 28th. It is scheduled to begin at 6:30 pm in the Middleton High School PAC. Our students will all get a time slot to travel to the PAC with Ms. Bodell and Mr. Macklem during the school day that day for rehearsal on the stage.
Thank you for your continuing support for your 4th grader to meet deadlines, keep organized with their papers and belongings, and providing regular time to finish homework and READ! Before this month ends, I will be sending out time slots for our 2nd parent-student-teacher conferences during the first half of March. I will get specific dates and times to you very soon, so you can plan. The second trimester ends on March 8th. Time flies when we are busy! Melanie Hannam
Saturday, February 2, 2013
February 1, 2013 Weekly Update
Hello, families! It was an unusual week, with a scheduled day off Monday, a surprise snow day on Wednesday, and our Read-In day on Thursday. We were still able to make some good progress with our work. In math, our 4th graders are mastering long division! They have come a long way in one week, and any extra problems you can throw their way is very helpful (one digit divisors, and up to 3 or 4 digit dividends). Next week we add practice with protractors, measuring angles, and coordinated grids on maps and graphs. Our students will continue with extra division practice throughout this unit, so you will see additional sheets coming home with their math books.
After many step by step lists and single paragraphs, our budding authors have begun to write their realistic fiction stories. We have gotten acquainted with our characters, developed our settings and scenarios, and created the problems and conflicts our characters must resolve in their stories. We've got these hills and valleys mapped out on our "story mountains" and many students are now teetering at the peak of their mountain where the problems appear to be at their most difficult. Next week, we hope to slide down the other side of the story mountain as we realistically resolve our characters' difficulties (there will be no "...and then he woke up and realized it was all a dream...")! :)
This next week your student will be bringing home the list of 75 "High Frequency Spelling Words" all 4th graders should know how to spell. Most of them appear to be quite easy, but we will see! We will be pretesting to see which ones are already mastered, and concentrate on the words each student must still practice, until all of our 4th graders prove mastery over the entire list. I believe we will also tackle the 5th grade words later this year - most of our students should have very little difficulty with them.
We are finalizing arrangements for February 22nd, when all of our 74 fourth graders will tour the Capitol Building and the Wisconsin Historical Museum. A permission slip will be coming home next week. Our WM PTO is covering the entrance cost to the Museum and our transportation - many thanks to them!
You will see the schedule of our day described on the permission slip, and you will need to send in the bottom portion of that page back to school with your signature and emergency contact. If you would like to volunteer to come along, we will have room on the buses for up to 4 parents per classroom, and your admission to the Museum will cost $2 - which you can give to me. Let me know if you would like to join us! We will all be bringing disposable lunches to eat in the lunchroom of the Museum. Our day away will last from 9:15 am until 1:45 pm.
In the meantime, thanks for sending warm and insulating snow clothing each day with your student. It looks like fresh snow coming almost every other day in the next week. An extra pair of dry socks in the backpack is a good idea, as well as a change of shoes for the classroom, while wet pairs of boots drip in the hallways! Melanie Hannam
After many step by step lists and single paragraphs, our budding authors have begun to write their realistic fiction stories. We have gotten acquainted with our characters, developed our settings and scenarios, and created the problems and conflicts our characters must resolve in their stories. We've got these hills and valleys mapped out on our "story mountains" and many students are now teetering at the peak of their mountain where the problems appear to be at their most difficult. Next week, we hope to slide down the other side of the story mountain as we realistically resolve our characters' difficulties (there will be no "...and then he woke up and realized it was all a dream...")! :)
This next week your student will be bringing home the list of 75 "High Frequency Spelling Words" all 4th graders should know how to spell. Most of them appear to be quite easy, but we will see! We will be pretesting to see which ones are already mastered, and concentrate on the words each student must still practice, until all of our 4th graders prove mastery over the entire list. I believe we will also tackle the 5th grade words later this year - most of our students should have very little difficulty with them.
We are finalizing arrangements for February 22nd, when all of our 74 fourth graders will tour the Capitol Building and the Wisconsin Historical Museum. A permission slip will be coming home next week. Our WM PTO is covering the entrance cost to the Museum and our transportation - many thanks to them!
You will see the schedule of our day described on the permission slip, and you will need to send in the bottom portion of that page back to school with your signature and emergency contact. If you would like to volunteer to come along, we will have room on the buses for up to 4 parents per classroom, and your admission to the Museum will cost $2 - which you can give to me. Let me know if you would like to join us! We will all be bringing disposable lunches to eat in the lunchroom of the Museum. Our day away will last from 9:15 am until 1:45 pm.
In the meantime, thanks for sending warm and insulating snow clothing each day with your student. It looks like fresh snow coming almost every other day in the next week. An extra pair of dry socks in the backpack is a good idea, as well as a change of shoes for the classroom, while wet pairs of boots drip in the hallways! Melanie Hannam
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