September 5, 2016 Classroom Update

Se​ptember 5, 2016

Hello, dear "4H" families!

I am so happy to welcome you all to our new class family!  You will be hearing from me regularly through email to keep you updated on our work and activities in Room 117, sometimes through a longer newsletter, and often through quick notes when it's helpful to keep you informed of upcoming events and reminders.  You can always feel comfortable reaching me through email.  If you want to call, remember that during school day hours, it will automatically switch to a phone message for me, and I will return your call as soon as I can.  If you need to reach me during the day without delay, you may call our school office (829-9360) and you can be put through to my phone immediately, or Mrs. Anderson can get a message to me.  See my contact info below, and my email is: mhannam@mcpasd.k12.wi.us .  If you prefer an additional, or different, email to receive my newsletters and quick notes where you are now receiving this note, just let me know and I will adjust my group list!

Our classroom blog also has a link below.  Take a look!  It will contain all my newsletters on the main page, where there is also a google calendar for upcoming events.  If you submit your email address on the main blog page, you will be able to receive notice in your inbox of newsletters that I post.  However, I do also send these through email.  I can also send print copies home if you request that.   Another page has our Daily Schedule, and one other page is our Homework Page!  Every single day, right after classes end, I update this page with all assignments and reminders for due dates and activities.  This is a valuable page for parents who want to be sure their 4th grader is getting all the news home accurately :)

I want to thank you for the time you are taking to fill out my student information sheets that went home on Back To School Night (or in your student's Take Home Folder this past week).  I've received back just over half so far, and they help me get to know your child so beautifully.  I appreciate your honesty and your trust in me to take care of your child with sensitivity and understanding.  My main goal even beyond academic progress is that your 4th grader feels safe and cared for in our classroom community.  Our class of 24 students and I have already talked together about what it feels like to be a "framily" - we are friends and a special kind of family, where we can all feel comfortable helping each other grow and learn, without fear of making mistakes or trying something new.  We are there for each other.  I want your child to grow in self-confidence, and to discover a never-ending love for investigating new knowledge and trying new skills.

In hopes of keeping this first note from getting too long, I want to explain some of the first important items to know:  (I will fill you in with other notes in the coming days!)

SNACKS:  Students can bring in their own snacks each day.  With such early bus times, it's tough to get in a good breakfast.  Every day, we go to our Specials Classes from 8:00 to 9:00, and when we return to our classroom at 9, we have our snack time (they are pretty hungry by then!), and hold our morning meeting.  We go to lunch this year at 11:30.  So please send along food that has some healthy substance to carry your child through a busy morning of literacy and social studies/science.  Water bottles at their desks throughout the day is a great idea!  Also, please read through the pages I sent home about treats for the class - there are many great suggestions to treat the class with healthy options, for birthdays or any other time.  (Birthdays could also mean treating the class with a 'non-food' item!)  Going through the school lunch program is another way to send in treats or snacks.  We do not have any nut allergies so far in our classroom this year, though we do have some restrictions on food dyes, milk, eggs, wheat products.  By the way, 4th grade does not get a milk snack through school as it was in 3rd grade.

SCHOOL PICTURES:  If your student got their picture taken earlier in August, the envelope should have found its way home, and I can collect your order through tomorrow!  If you want a retake, or still need a school picture taken for this year, the photographers are coming back on Friday, September 16th!

GYM SHOES:  It is highly recommended that a simple (not expensive) pair of gym shoes be stored at school for gym days, so students are always prepared for class.  Out of our six day rotation, FOUR days are gym days!  That way no one has to remember on which days they should come with the right footwear, which is tricky during sandal weather now, and boot weather this winter!  Thank you so much for helping us all avoid the hassle and disappointment when our kids can't participate on the gym floor just because they don't wear proper shoes.

ORCHESTRA LESSONS:  I am amazed - we have 13 students in our class who are taking orchestra lessons!  The first whole group lesson starts on Tuesday, September 13th, at 7:15AM!!  Small group lessons will also be on Tuesdays, in half hour sessions throughout the morning.  I am sure you will get information from our Orchestra Leader very soon.

UPCOMING EVENTS: 

Our wonderful PTO will again be providing a white t-shirts to every WM student to tie dye in special colors for each grade level.  This activity will take place on September 13th this year, and instructions for washing them that week will come home with the shirts sealed in a bag.

In 4th grade, we do field trips!!  Our first two come fast:  On October 5th, we visit the World Dairy Expo - it ties in perfectly with our social studies focus on all things WISCONSIN!  More details coming soon.  Also, on October 13th, our class goes to nearby Pope Farm Park, compliments of our school district, to participate in sessions with naturalists, geologists, gardeners, and historians.  We have such history and evidence of our state's unique geology right in our 'backyard' at the Park.  More details later on that trip.

MATH:  All of our grades in the district from K through 5th, are now using Bridges Math for our math curriculum.  We teachers did several days of training on the program this summer.  It involves our students' engagement more than ever before in investigating different ways to solve problems.  I expect that the homework load for this subject will be as it always has been for my classes --  we work as much as we can IN class to complete our practice work, and some days (most days?) there may be parts of pages to complete at home for the next day.  As I get better acquainted with the lessons, I can fill you in more completely in the coming weeks.

LITERACY:  Reading and Writing are favorite times in our classroom for me, and I hope that my students will ALL feel the same way before too long!  The only constant for 'homework' each day is that our 4th graders will always have a good book with them, to read at school AND at home.  I love it when students can tell me they read not only for 30 minutes at home each day, but that time was forgotten, and they read even longer because they got lost in their story!  More detail about our routines and special units of study will come!

SOCIAL STUDIES/SCIENCE:  I will be teaching Social Studies to both my own class and Mrs. Bertz's 4th grade class, and Mrs. Bertz will be teaching Science to both of our classes.  We will keep our own classes for our 'own' subject on Days 1, 2, 3 and switch our classes on Days 4, 5, 6.  Again, more details to come!

I think I will stop for now with information and notes!  A new school year can be overwhelming at first for parents as well as for kids!  We enjoyed a great first two days together, but we still have so much to learn about each other, and about our routines at school. Every day we will get better acquainted with each other, and I look forward to a very fulfilling school year for all of us!  More news coming soon! 

Sincerely,

Melanie Hannam

August, 2016:

I want to welcome our new "4H" families!  This is the main page of our classroom blog!  There is also a page showing you our daily schedule of classes, as well as a HOMEWORK/REMINDERS page, where all of our students and families can check for DAILY updates.  A Google Calendar will also keep us on track for upcoming events and special days during the school year.

I will be back in touch very soon.  On August 30th at 4:30 to 6:30 here at school I hope to meet each and every one of you, and students may bring in any school supplies they have collected so far.  The PTO is treating us to an ice cream social, too!

In the meantime, I have to find room for all of our polar bears....!!!!!!  :)Mrs. Hannam

April 30, 2016 Update

Hello to all of our 4H families!  This past month has gone so very fast!  We have been filling our days with good books, new math lessons, a change in our social studies and science focus, and making plans for an exciting new month ahead with special events for our 4th graders!  We have ended our Forward Exam - with just a handful of make-up sessions left to do. Our fourth graders handled it all very well, and hopefully put forth their best effort.  I do not know exactly when you will receive results, but I will be sure to let you know as soon as I learn anything.

We have all discovered some new books to share with partners as we dove head first into our "Social Issues Book Clubs" the last few weeks.  This has been a fun experience as our kids are reading books that are surprising them - they are enjoying stories and characters they might not otherwise have discovered on their own.  We are talking together daily about the struggles and challenges their characters are facing, and comprehension skills are getting a renewed 'workout'.  Our students are helping each other identify more than one lesson and message in each book as they analyze their stories together.  I love overhearing some deep thinking comments coming from their club meetings.  We are beginning to write out our impressions and ideas from both short and long stories, as we evolve into writing some literary essays in the process. 

In Math class, we are coming to the end of Unit 10, practicing patterns and symmetry along with some new work with integers - adding positive and negative numbers.  This is requiring our students to dig in and build persistence in their learning as they try to understand what can be a confusing concept at first.  We are going to keep practicing for some extra days, and our final unit test will take place during the middle of next week.

We have all been having fun watching the rapid daily progress of sprouting seeds in Science!  In Social Studies, we have left our Wisconsin textbook to roam farther away from home.  We are traveling through several regions of our beautiful United States to compare the geography, climate, people, and notable sights and landmarks (Midwest, West, Southwest, Northeast, Southeast Regions).  We have already begun a mental list of places that our kids wish we could all take trips to see (warning to parents!! :) ).

One special event that takes place in May every year for our 4th graders is the 4th Grade Track Meet at the Middleton High School Track and Field.  On May 10th, you are most welcome to stop by and try to catch your son or daughter run a race or compete in a field event.  The approximate schedule of events is on the back of the permission slip that you kept after sending in the bottom part with your signature.  Speaking of signatures --- your 4th grader will be bringing home a contract that outlines the expectations for respectful, responsible behavior on this busy day at the MHS Track.  It is a day with less structure than a usual day in school, along with increased responsibility on the part of our students to be on time for events, and as a part of a crowd of several hundred other 4th graders.  This contract should be read together, signed by both you and your child, and returned to school as soon as possible.  Thank you very much for your support and encouragement here.

The month of May also includes a morning tour of Glacier Creek on May 13th, another half day with naturalists and guides at Pope Farm Park on May 24th, and a couple of special presentations and assemblies.  I will email you details of these events as we come closer to each one, and you may look for more permission slips to sign!  Our special trip to Cave of the Mounds will be on June 7th.

With the last weeks of elementary school for your child approaching, it is an exciting time of year.  It is going by very quickly, and we are trying to savor and enjoy and learn all we can yet fit into our days together.  Thank you for your encouragement at home to keep up your child's motivation to stay focused on good work and self control.  This gets to be more of a challenge as we spend our last month together before big changes ahead!  :)Melanie Hannam

February 29, 2016 Update

Hello to all of our 4H Families!

Tomorrow is Leap Day! -- and the end of two big winter months.  I have high hopes for signs of spring in March!  There are just short of 4 weeks of school in March, with Spring Break Week from the 21st through the 25th.  I am looking forward to our chance to sit together around the table with you and our 4th graders during conferences - a chance to show you some good work and our goals for the last trimester of our year.  The second trimester officially ends on March 4th, and you will receive the second of three report cards before Spring Break.

We have moved from Historical Fiction in our Readers' Workshop to a short unit on Poetry and poetic language.  We are amazing ourselves with our ability to find poetic and vivid language that touches right to our hearts even in our 'prose' reading books!  That's been a revelation to us all, and I am quite proud of how our students are finding these colorful and meaningful passages.  It is helping them to read more deeply, and this is a big step toward improving our reading skills.  Discussions are getting deeper as well, as we ponder together what some of these lines really could mean. I love it!!  Writing Workshop is going right along with the reading unit - we are starting with writing Haiku poems.  Wow, I was so excited this week as I started the class off with the basic techniques of 'wordsmithing' and even before I thought they were ready, students were asking if they could keep on going, and they started putting together their lines into very descriptive Haiku!  We have decided we want to print out our best ones and mount them in the hallway by conference time, so you can all see them when you come. Fun stuff!

We went on our annual field trip this past week to the Capitol and saw each of the most beautiful meeting halls in that historical building, which all happen to be in our Wisconsin textbook.  The kids were thrilled to see these fancy rooms and even sit in the cushy leather chairs.  At the Historical Museum, being able to gather our whole class into the "Aztalan House" also pictured in our book, and handling real beaver and mink pelts like the fur traders we've been studying were highlights. I am so thankful to all of our chaperones who were able to come with us.  In Social Studies we have moved from native culture to fur traders from France and then Britain, to the new "Americans" taking over, and now - to how this Great Lakes territory became the state of Wisconsin.  Science with Mrs. Bertz will be completing the Magnets and Electricity experience in the next couple of weeks.

This coming week, we will do our last math lessons in Unit 7, review for a couple of days, and then have the final test later in the week.  Please check in with your 4th grader as you look through their workbooks.  Ask them if they can show you how they add and subtract fractions, especially the ones with unlike denominators. 

About half our class so far has returned the envelopes for purchasing the 2015-2016 West Middleton Yearbook.  The due date for your order is March 13th.  If you do not have the special envelope any more, please have your 4th grade let me know and I will see if I can find more.  This book becomes a meaningful keepsake, and during one of the last school days in June, we hold a special "signing' time for our kids, which becomes even more meaningful now for our 4th graders who will be moving on and spreading out to Glacier Creek next year.  If anyone needs assistance with purchasing this booklet, do let me know. 

I am happy to let you know that we have added a new friend to our class in the past week - we are now a classroom family of 22!  Her name is Najmo, and her family moved last year to Wisconsin from the country of Somalia.  We are having fun getting acquainted, and I am impressed by how beautifully our classmates have welcomed her and made her feel comfortable with us.

This coming week is "Literacy Week"!!  Each day we will all be adding in some special activities and extra chances to enjoy the art of literature in many forms.  Please see the Homework Page of our classroom blog (link below my name) to see the list of each day's events.  Monday is "PJ" or comfy clothes day, and will include a period of time when our entire building will just Drop Everything And Read!  Friday morning will include our annual Dress Like A Book Character parade around the hallways.  Outfits can be very simple to elaborate, along with the book that features your character.  Cameras will be out!  We are decorating our classroom door with all of our favorite book titles and authors, and on Thursday we have a visit from a local author.  The Drama Club will present "Fractured Fairy Tales" on Tuesday - and Wednesday we want to wear clothing with WORDS on them.

As we work our way through the next month, I will keep you posted on any other details!  Please check that your conference time is on your calendar, and we will talk soon!  Sincerely, Melanie Hannam

January 18, 2016 Update

Hello to our 4H Families, and I hope you are all staying warm and cozy in this super cold.  It was a well timed day off from school today.  The last two weeks since our Winter Break have been busy with new lessons and some quite rewarding classroom discussions. 

We have started our Historical Fiction unit in Readers' Workshop, using Number The Stars by Lois Lowry as our class read aloud mentor text (such a captivating book - I highly recommend it to all!).  It has opened up a whole new awareness of World War II and the Holocaust to our 4th graders.  I appreciate how it gently presents the serious issues involved with this time period, centering on a preteen girl and her family in Denmark who leads us through her growing awareness of what is happening in Europe.  We see the events unfolding through her eyes, and even though she is fictional, the events she lives through are accurate. We are also researching more on the historical facts as we go along.  Our kids are very wrapped up in the suspense, and the new thoughts, questions, and ideas that are occurring to them daily as we read and discuss are so exciting and satisfying.  They are hopefully carrying this enthusiasm and good thinking into their own new historical fiction books.  They chose their first stories this past week, and they should be doing their best to read these every day.  I give them time in class as much as I can, and hope they can read them at home, too.  Thanks for supporting them with special time to read as much as possible.

Writers' Workshop is helping us to write up information from history in a logical and clear way.  We are using our social studies topics.  Right now we are well into discovering how the first native people in the area of Wisconsin and the Great Lakes survived and adapted over time to living in this climate with the resources of this rich land.  I am walking our class through a first informational report, and then each student will have the chance to write their own historical account.

Our last unit in math had us learning the steps to longer multiplication problems (thanks so much for the extra practice help at home!).  I hope you've had a chance to look over their Unit 5 tests and sign them.  They need to come back to school this week so we can save them. The unit we started this past week is mainly about learning the steps to long division problems!  Any time you can throw an extra problem (or three or four!) your student's way, please do!  You will see what kind of problems we are tackling each day from their homework - we are working our way up gradually to bigger numbers and longer problems.  Remember you can take a look at our assignments and reminders for all subjects and other activities on the Homework Page of our classroom blog.  I update it every singe day after school.

Otherwise, there are quite a few extra opportunities for growth and teamwork happening these days -- our Battle of the Books teams (competition coming up in early February), the Fruit Bowl Writing Club, the Math 24 Club...and soon to be announced, our own classroom Gold Star Researchers (stay tuned).  We will get through this winter with a flurry of fun learning activities!  I will keep you posted on all events and reminders!  Until next note --!  Melanie Hannam 

December 7, 2015 Update

Happy December, everyone!  Here's an update on what we've been working on in class lately!

In Reader's Workshop, we've been wrapping up our unit on exploring non-fiction - digging into all kinds of resources, finding out what makes each book/magazine/article/online report a valuable and helpful source of new information.  Along the way we've been having a good time learning new facts about such wide ranging topics as extreme weather, natural disasters, global warming, drones, wild animals and sea creatures, glaciers, current events...  I am also taking the opportunity whenever I can to give our students practice picking out the main ideas, identifying the supporting details, and learning the most efficient way to take notes - all skills that will serve them well in their future years.  When we return from winter break, our focus will move to Historical Fiction, where we will also get experience reading and sharing our ideas within student Book Clubs.

I would like to encourage all of our families to keep it a priority, as much as it is possible in your busy days, to make special quiet time for your student to read and "get lost" in a good book daily.  I know this can be a challenge.  We stop and talk often in class about where and when we have each managed to find a time to cozy up with a good story, and it sounds like most of our kids love those times.  This is probably the single most effective way to foster a love of reading and your child's reading skills, along with the ability to stay focused, and they will grow with every single day this can happen. 

Writer's Workshop has been full of essay writing, and our students have done a beautiful job with clear thesis statements and supporting evidence.  We are just wrapping up one last essay about an important person in our lives. We are typing them on our Chromebooks in the classroom which is also great for more keyboarding practice. These last essays will be coming home to be presented as gifts to their 'person' - and they are quite touching.  Enjoy!

We've been using our various spelling lists to give ourselves additional creative writing experience along with handwriting practice!  (Much needed!!)  We turn our lists into creative sentences and imaginative stories as we practice the spelling patterns.  This coming week we will receive one more big list of seasonal words before the holiday break which should give us another fun chance to practice our writing skills.

In Social Studies, we are finishing our chapter about the geography of Wisconsin.  Warning -- many ideas for cool family trips around our beautiful state keep cropping up in our discussions!!  :)   Our next focus will take us back in time to how the first known native people of our state survived. We will move through time to discover how and why the first Europeans came here, and then on to how we became a state, exploring all the fascinating changes that had to happen along the way. In Science, it looks like our kids are coming to the end of their Rocks and Minerals Unit with Mrs. Bertz.

We should be able to take our final test on Math Unit 4 around the middle of this week.  I took some extra days during this unit because it covers some major new concepts.  We got into decimal numbers, banking, and the metric system!  Yikes - all big, new information for our 4th graders!   The whole concept of what numbers mean when they are behind the decimal point takes some new understanding.  Using the idea of money helps that, so that led to the very informative lessons on withdrawals, deposits, interest, and balance (hence the questions that came home about savings accounts, etc.!!).  Our decimal work was also the perfect set up to understand how the metric system works, which is also quite new to our kids.  Meaty, useful stuff -  these topics got a solid start here, and will be expanded upon and reinforced in future work both in this grade and in fifth grade.  

Whew, we pack so much into our days!  Along the way we've had fun with our Class ReadAloud book, Rain, Reign, collecting Pride Paws and growing our 'compliment chain' with our appropriate behavior and social skills, fighting to stay number one in the school wide contest for Box Tops For Education (we find out on Wednesday!), and of course, our Read-In Day was a hit.  Thank you for your support with homework, regular reading times, and staying up to date with the contents of your student's Take Home Folders and Assignment Notebooks.  Along with checking the Classroom Blog for the daily homework and reminders, these are the best ways to foster your own child's growing ability to be responsible for themselves.

It will be fun to see many of you on the morning of our Winter Tea on December 16th.  I like to take some family pictures that day.  See you then! 

Sincerely, Melanie Hannam

October 2, 2015 Update

Hello to all of our 4H families!  We had such a busy, fun week!  Our two field trips turned out to be full of new and valuable experiences for the kids, from handling a 1000 year old stone artifact to petting a fuzzy calf!  We trekked all over Pope Farm Park in autumn sunshine to role play survival for the winter as early Native Americans, and got up close and (sometimes very!) personal with both ends of a cow and a milking machine!  :)  I so enjoyed having so many of you join us as chaperones, and wholeheartedly want to thank you for being with us!  I should be able to send you all some pictures soon (many thanks to Mr. Olson, who became our unofficial photographer!).  We all created some precious memories together, and the following two days of the week back at school felt good - we were ready to settle in, make some excellent progress with our lessons, and have some good laughs together, too.

We also shared some tears - thanks to the finale of our class read-aloud book, Stone Fox.  Wow, this book never fails to hit right in the heart, and you truly could have heard a pin drop as we reached the gripping end of this story together.  Books like these bring home the message that reading can transport us completely into worlds and emotions and situations that we would never experience otherwise.  So cool!!  Speaking of books, you will notice that the new October Scholastic Book Order forms have come home.  Please do not ever feel obligated to order every month.  If you do want to order books this month, the due date is October 12th.  We had such great response in September that we ended up getting 39 new books for our classroom library with bonus points!  It took me several days to preview all of them with the class, and many of them got snatched up right away.  The love of reading is spreading fast in Room 117!   Woohoo!

We made good progress getting into Unit 2 in math, even though we missed two days of class.  Thank you for your support at home by looking into the kids' journal and studylink pages, asking them what they are learning, and also by continuing some regular practice with basic facts!  I see scores going up gradually with our daily 3 minute drills, but numbers could climb faster (and they do so noticeably) when there is extra practice at home.

We have been adding paragraphs to our realistic fiction stories in Writers' Workshop, and most of us are coming down the 'story mountain' now - trying to resolve the 'mess' we have put our characters into!  I will want to give our students the chance to edit and revise this coming week.  If you think you could be free to come in to class any day this next week or two from 1:45 to 2:30 - and like to help with spelling, punctuation, sentence structure - would you let me know when you'd like to come?  It is difficult for me to get to everyone who needs editing help when we get to this stage of writing, so the extra adult attention is so valuable!  Thanks a lot!

In Social Studies, we are transitioning from Wisconsin agriculture, to some mapping skills, and then on to the glacial history of our state, and our own area in particular.  Science continues with Mrs. Bertz leading them through experiments with rocks and minerals.

We have a number of friends in our classroom who are struggling with some self control when it comes to social conversation during class time, listening accurately to directions, and managing their papers and folders back and forth to home and school each day.  I've told our 4th graders I have given them the whole first month to work on developing good habits, and I do need to see better improvement.  Another challenge for many is their effort to work neatly and do their BEST job with each task.  I appreciate your sitting down with your fourth graders and asking them if any of these are areas they think they could improve upon.  Your support at home is powerful - so, thank you!!!

On Tuesday afternoon, October 6th, our class will spend a good hour in the computer lab to take the MAP Assessment (Measure of Academic Progress) for Math.  We will not be taking the Reading portion this year, since we are meeting with each student individually to read for us and determine their skill levels.  The MAP assessment gives us just one picture of where our students are with math skills compared to 4th graders across the country, as well as telling us which skills need more attention.  We will do this Math portion again in spring. 

Feel free to stay in touch with me with any concerns or questions, and I will do the same!  Sincerely, Melanie Hannam