Mr. Blanc's Class

Updates We will take a vocabulary test on 12/6. Students will also be given their new words for the following week that day. Math The vocab test that we will be taking on Tuesday, December 6th, covers math terms. Having a strong understanding of these words will help students be successful in our current multiplication and division unit. See if your student can tell you the difference between a multiple and a factor. Remember to please check with your student and make sure they are finishing their math homework each day. Reading Last week students had the chance to demonstrate their nonfiction reading proficiency. They all read a nonfiction text and wrote a summary explaining the main idea with supporting details from the text. After they turned in their summary they were given feedback on what they could do to improve their summary. Have your student tell you what improvements they made to their summary. Next week we will begin using our nonfiction reading skills to research ...

Updates I hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving Break! Remember, there won't be any school for students on Monday, 11/28. Reading Students were sent home with a Long Weekend Reading Log before Thanksgiving Break. Any student who records at least four hours of reading over the break will get on the classroom Wall of Fame. In addition, the student who records the most hours read will get on the Wall of Fame twice. Idiom of the Week : Leave the door open Writing We are continuing our "about me" informational writing. Students are working on writing complete paragraphs that include a main idea, key details, elaboration of key details, and concluding sentences. After Thanksgiving break, we'll work on an introduction paragraph, concluding paragraph, and transitions to connect our paragraphs. Math When we get back to school on Tuesday, 11/29, we will be on module 3, lesson 22. This will bring us to the study of divisibility, composite, and prime numbers. This w...

Updates We have two days of school next week because of Thanksgiving Break. Students will take a vocab test on Tuesday, 11/22, but will not be given new words that day. Their next set of new words will be assigned on Tuesday, 11/29. Writing Our writing focus has now shifted from narrative to informational. We're working on writing paragraphs that include a main idea, supporting details about the main idea, explanations of the details, and a concluding sentence. We are practicing these paragraphs by writing about a topic we know very well, ourselves. Idiom of the Week: cost an arm and a leg Math Next week we will continue our study of division. Similar to multiplication, they are learning different strategies to solve division problems. We will continue with module 3, lesson 20 on Monday.  Inquiry We have done brief overviews of many historical migrations during our inquiry time. We plan to finish the historical overviews next week. Once they are complete, the students...

Updates There were no new vocabulary words sent home on Tuesday, 11/8. Students will get their next set of new words on Tuesday, 11/15. Also, students will be sent home with an optional Long Weekend Reading Log. The student who records the most minutes read over the long weekend, will get on the classroom Wall of Fame.  Math Students were sent home with their scored Mid Module 3 Assessment on Wednesday, 11/9. We went over the answers in class, but check with your student and see if there is anything they need an extra explanation on. Let me know if you have any questions or concerns after looking at your child's test. So far in Module 3 we have focused on multiplication, as we move to the second half of the module we will begin our study of division. Writing We finished up our narrative final drafts on Wednesday, 11/9. If your student hasn't completed their narrative final draft you will receive an email from me. Students who didn't complete their final draft are ex...

Updates Next week will be a short one as there will be no school for students on either Thursday, 11/10 or Friday 11/11. Students will be sent home with a "Long Weekend Reading Log". The student who records the most minutes read over the weekend will get on the Wall of Fame, which, as I'm sure you've heard, is a pretty big deal in our class. Math Students will take the Mid Module 3 assessment on Wednesday, 11/9. You can help your student prepare for the test by going over the practice test with them on Tuesday evening. Also, check in with them and ask them which of the different multiplication strategies we have learned is their favorite. Reading  We are continuing our study of nonfiction reading. So far we've studied the different text structures of nonfiction texts and learned that if we can identify the type of text structure, it can help us figure out the most important information from the text. The common text structures we've learned about are ...

Thanks to the parent volunteers who made our Halloween party so much fun! Enjoy the pictures!

Updates Thank you to everyone who stopped by at conferences. It was great to have the chance to get together and make sure we are all on the same page. I hope you all feel like you have a good idea of what your student can do going forward to ensure they are successful in 4th grade. Please let me know if you ever have any questions. Reading Next week we will continue our study of nonfiction texts. Students are expected to record at least two hours of outside of school reading each week. The reading logs are due on Tuesdays. Because last week was a short week, we didn't assign vocabulary words to be tested next Tuesday. However, students will get their new words that will be tested the following Tuesday, 11/8. Idiom of the Week: turn a blind eye Writing Students are currently in the middle of revising and editing a narrative paper. In my experience, it is challenging to get children to look critically at their work and find ways to improve their writing. Often they just wa...