September 18, 2025

Dear Parents,

Happy Thursday! We have had a long week! I think the field trip on Monday, which was super fun, made for a long week. Homework is becoming more of a constant in our room. I have been giving out late slips. Fourth grade is always a big adjustment. The students are getting used to being more responsible for their work and managing their own time. They also have to work on organization. They are doing a good job adjusting it just takes some time.

Language arts

We are reading a story called The Year of the Rat. One way I prepared them to read the story was to show them the Chinese Zodiac.  They all found what year they were born and what animal they were. I am the year of the dog. I looked up this story yesterday and found that it is a book and actually the 2nd book in a trilogy. The books were very reasonable so I ordered them to put on my shelf. I hope some pick them up and read them. In grammar we are learning about the 4 kinds of sentences: declarative (telling statement), interrogative ( question), imperative (command) and Exclamatory (with great feeling). They have learned 2 at a time. We also practiced sorting the spelling of short e sounds and long e sounds. The last thing we talked about were 3 prefixes: mis-, pre-, and dis. Yesterday we read the story for the 3rd time and took the selection test. This test is 5 comprehension questions over the story. Today we took our spelling Post Test and the end of the story test. This test gives them a "cold" read (story they have not seen) and it asks them to apply the skills they have learned to this story. Sometimes this is not easy. Tomorrow we will begin a new story which is our 3rd story in this module. That means after this story we will take a Module (Unit) test over the skills they have learned so far. I will also assign their first book report to them and we will do a writing activity.

Math

We finished up with rounding this week. We talked about constructing arguments yesterday. Which is mainly knowing what information you have and how to prove your answers using that information. Today we will start a chapter review. They will work on 1 page of the review and then they will finish it on Friday. Monday and maybe Tuesday we will correct the review together so that they understand how to do each problem. It depends on how long we take to go over the review on when the test will be. It will either be Tuesday or Wednesday. It will most likely take 2 days to complete the test. The test is identical to the review they just change the numbers. So if they understand the review they will understand the test. I allow them to ask me any questions they need to on the review but no questions on the test.

Social Studies

We have been discussing Government this week. We talked about how the government works and things we have to do to be good responsible citizens. We talked about the levels of government today ( local, state, and National). Tomorrow our focus is on all three branches of government. They should know them and what their purpose is. Next week our big topic will be Time zones in the U.S. We will be looking at working on our first test soon.

Spirit Day

Tomorrow is a Spirit day. Pay $1.00 to wear sweats or a hat. Looks like temps tomorrow will make for a perfect sweat pants day.

It is Balloon days weekend! I sure hope the balloons can go up. It is always disappointing when the wind is too much or it rains and keeps them from going up. I will be out of town Saturday. I didn't plan that very well did I? Enjoy the weekend no matter what you do.

God Bless,

Mrs. Sickels