Hello, again, 4th grade families!
We have all kinds of news to share with you. The next two weeks in particular bring all kinds of changes to our routines. As you know, we have full days on Monday and Tuesday, and then on Wednesday it is a CRT (collaborative release time) and all elementary students will be dismissed at 11:00 am. Those who reserved the school (sack) lunch will be picking them up before leaving and taking them along home that day. On Thursday and Friday there is no school.
Also next week, we are beginning the first testing sessions of the WKCE (Wisconsin Knowledge and Concepts Examination). For your own information, our class will not be holding regular math class on any of the three days of school next week. We will be taking the three 4th grade Math sessions during each of the regularly scheduled math times, first hour of the morning. Also on Monday and Tuesday, we will be taking a Reading session at 12:05 each day. That leaves, for the following week, one more Reading session, two Language Arts sessions, and one Science and one Social Studies session. These exams will be spread out across the first 3 days of the following week, October 29, 30, 31. You should have found a complete schedule on a white sheet in your student's Take Home Folder this past week. If you have any questions at all, do not hesitate to email me. I have encouraged our kids to make sure they get a good night's sleep each night, and eat a 'good' breakfast each morning.
This coming week is also a national recognition of Character Education. To emphasize that good "Character Counts!" West Middleton students can "Turn Your Back On Disrespect" on Monday by wearing a shirt backwards. On Tuesday, we can wear comfy PJ type clothing for "Follow Your Dreams Through Good Character" day, and on Wednesday, we are wearing a shirt with numbers or a numbered jersey for "Count On Character" day.
The week of October 29 through November 2 also has some special events in our own classroom. We will be having a "Harvest Party" in our room on October 31st beginning at 2:00 pm. Thanks to some creative moms who have volunteered, we will enjoy some spooky snacks, and have a game and activity to celebrate this festive time of year. Take note - West Middleton Elementary does not encourage the wearing of any kind of Halloween costume that day. In addition, our class is ready to celebrate ourselves, for our noticeable progress in following our behavior rules and to celebrate the hard work and progress we are making with our classwork. (Yes, Mrs. Hannam's head has 'exploded' with the collection of good reports and observations about our kids - you can ask your student about this!) As a result, we have all agreed that November 1st will be a good day to devote to some of our favorite things: We will have math class, music class, art class, lots of 'stamina' silent read time, "Ivan" readaloud time, and hopefully a pizza lunch in our room that special day.
This coming week marks the beginning of a new "BOX TOPS FOR EDUCATION" contest at West Middleton. Our classroom envelope has already collected a nice pile of Box Tops, but we are greedy, and want LOTS more than 'nice'!! So parents, thank you in advance for your patience as our students scrounge in cupboards and pantries, and for keeping a lookout in the grocery aisles for Box Top products. Each Box Top is worth 10 cents! All proceeds from our classrooms will go to the PTO for equipment and items for our building and playground.
With so much going on, yes, we are still holding substantive academic sessions each and every day! :) The Unit 2 math tests showed excellent results for our group, and we dove right into Unit 3 this past week. Please look over with your student the Progress Report in their Take Home Folder which gives you a picture of their progress with automaticity in recalling their math facts. (5th grade math students practice these with their 5th grade teacher.) You will be able to see which operations your student needs more practice on. This coming unit dives deep into their understanding of multiplication factors.
In Literacy we are continuing our study of character traits and how that helps us comprehend more deeply, and our class reading and discussion of "The One And Only Ivan" is really enhancing those lessons! We also made time during one of our very last beautiful weather days to visit our school prairie last week, and with clipboards in every hand, we all wrote down what we experienced with our senses out there! Wow - the beautiful, almost poetic descriptions that came out of that exercise was so impressive. In fact, we all agreed we should take some of our sentences and highlight them in large print around our room - so we will! And in science class we have been experimenting with magnetism as a lead in to more experiments with electricity - very fun!
Whew, lots going on and lots to tell you. Thanks for reading! As always, check the classroom blog and the homework page for daily listings of homework assignments and other reminders and deadlines. After next week, I will be confirming with each of you about our parent/student/teacher conference times which happen in mid November. The first trimester ends November 30th, with report cards ready for viewing the next week. I'll keep you posted on everything!!
Melanie Hannam
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