Charlemagne 4th Grade

 le 10 au 13 octobre 2022

Upcoming Dates:

• Friday, October 14:  NO SCHOOL (Professional Development)
• October 25 9:00-12:00 Field Trip to Alton Baker Park
• Monday, October 31 – Halloween parade (time TBA)
• Wednesday and Thursday, November 8-9:  Parent/Teacher conferences
• Friday, November 10:  NO SCHOOL (Veterans Day)
• Thursday and Friday, November 24-25:  NO SCHOOL (Thanksgiving)

Field Trip

On October 25, both classes will go on a half day field trip to Alton Baker Park. We will go on a short hike called “Kalapuya Quest” led Nearby Nature. As part of our study of Oregon history, students will discover how Kalapuya, the Willamette Valley’s first people, historically used native plants and animals for shelter, food, and clothing. They will also learn about Kalapuya transportation, traditions, language, games, and stories.

Field trip permission slips will go home on Tuesday this week. The cost of the field trip will be $10. Scholarships are available and can be requested on the paperwork going home this week. If you are interested in chaperoning, please email Mme Shelli know. Also, please be sure to fill out the background checks with Bernadette in the office as soon as possible.

What’s up! Quoi de neuf?

Please make sure to send your child to school in proper footwear and a water-repellent jacket when the weather is threatening. Students will go out to recess unless the principal decides that the weather or air quality prevents it. If your child is ill, or has had a fever or vomited within the previous 24 hours, please keep her/him home. Please continue to follow current Covid rules as well. If your child will be absent, please email both teachers (kincaid_j@4j.lane.edu and hopper_s@4j.lane.edu) and Bernadette (conover_b@4j.lane.edu) or please call in and leave a message on the school line (541) 790-7080.

Le français:

Mme Jana, French & Science kincaid_j@4j.lane.edu

•We do our best to express ourselves in French.

•We continue to learn how to use a translating dictionary.

•We have a positive attitude and growth mindset.

This past week, your children and I met to work on our classroom code, which is about how we want the classroom to feel. I made a poster of our agreements, and we all signed it, so I expect them to do what they agreed to…

We continued our cursive writing instruction practicing words with letters that can be difficult to attach to the next letter. We have five more lowercase (minuscule) letters, then we’ll begin uppercase (majuscule) letters, and we’ll work on writing our signatures.

No French homework this week. 

Last week, we conjugated the verb être (to be), which most students seem to remember. Next week, we’ll conjugate faire (to make or do), then aller (to go). After that, we usually do verbs ending in -er (90% of verbs), then pouvoir (to be able), and vouloir (to want). 

We completed our first “J’observe” writing activity, writing four sentences together to describe the photo to the left, and will do our second one this week, this time with a bit less help from me but still with sentence starters.

We also began Tap’Touche, our French typing program, which we’ll normally do twice a week for about 20 minutes each time.

We also had buddies this week, and both classes enjoyed it very much. We’ll usually do buddies one week and library the next, but on Friday everyone got library and buddies.

We still aren’t yet ready to begin reading and FLA groups. We have a few things to finish up before we add yet another new activity.

Students have been working also on the “Moi!” project which is all about them… in French. Most students are completing their art, and many are in the midst of writing their paragraphs in cursive. Some students have completed the project already, and we’ll begin hanging them in the stairwell that leads down to our level.

Les sciences:  

We completed our first science experiment in the Soils, Rocks, and Landforms (La terre, les pierres, et les formes du relief) unit last week, learning about the components of soil. Soil is composed of humous (l’humus), pebbles (les cailloux), gravel (le gravier), clay (l’argile), and silt (le limon). We touched and described four different soils, then added water to our soil samples, and shook up the vials. Now they’re settling, and we’ll observe and draw the layers of soil next week. We’ll also determine where we think the soil samples came from, the forest (la forêt), a river delta (le delta d’une rivière), the desert (le désert), or the mountains (la montagne), based on their components. Our next experiment will be an introduction to physical weathering.

Mme Shelli, English & Math
hopper_s@4j.lane.edu

Our first math homework will come home this week. Students will have about 10 minutes of homework each night that is comprised of material that should be review. Please be sure your child does their best, but if anything is too difficult, please have them leave it blank and come to class the next day for help from me as we start our day. Homework should come back and forth between home and school each day. This should not require any extra teaching from parents or tutors and should definitely be low stress, no tears homework.

We wrapped up the unit “Applying Place Value Concepts in Whole Number Addition and Subtraction” last week. Look for an exit ticket & the booklet to come home this week. Also by the end of the week, students should bring home the unit 1 assessment. Please note that the Unit 1 workbook was not fully completed as the booklets came just this week from the printer. We’ve been doing other activities to support understanding of the standards while waiting for the book. 

This week, we will do a short review of multiplication, factors and multiples. Please help your child practice the facts of x 1 through x12 at home. We quickly move into multi-digit multiplication and students who have most fact memorized will be able to more quickly multiply larger numbers.

English:

In our ELA Module 1 A Great Heart, we continue a two week study of the literal heart. We will read the wonderfully complex text, Circulatory Story. Some of the goals of this week’s work will be determine the main idea and details, summarize, and determine meaning of metaphors and similes in the text.   Last week, students practiced writing organized summaries and informational paragraphs about what they have been reading. You can find out details about our first unit “A Great Heart” on this Parent Tip Sheet .You can learn more about the 4th grade curriculum here.

OBOB Volunteers Needed

Principal Joe signed up Charlemagne for OBOB with Mme Ginger being the contact person for informational emails and content. We are looking to have teams in grades 3-5 as an after school club run by parent volunteers. 

We would like co-leaders (one parent from each grade level) and support volunteers for each grade as well. This would allow for a rotation of support so as to not have too much on the shoulders of one person. It would also allow for “expert” volunteers in subsequent years to get the teams up and running quickly and effectively. Since this would be held on campus, we would have to ensure that all volunteers are on the approved list through 4J. Please reach out to Mme Ginger (topize_g@4j.lane.edu) or Principal Joe (hadley_j@4j.lane.edu) if interested.

Outside of school opportunities:

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 le 3 au 7 octobre 2022

Upcoming Dates:

• Friday, October 14:  NO SCHOOL (Professional Development)

Parent Volunteer Opportunity

As we study the human heart and circulatory system in English class, we would love to invite one or two medical professionals to share with the class. Do you work in the medical field and have some knowledge and experience working with the heart?  If you would have time for a short class visit, please email Shelli at hopper_s@4j.lane.edu.

What’s up! Quoi de neuf?

Please make sure to send your child to school in proper footwear and a water-repellent jacket when the weather is threatening. Students will go out to recess unless the principal decides that the weather or air quality prevents it. If your child is ill, or has had a fever or vomited within the previous 24 hours, please keep her/him home. Please continue to follow current Covid rules as well. If your child will be absent, please email both teachers (kincaid_j@4j.lane.edu and hopper_s@4j.lane.edu) and Bernadette (conover_b@4j.lane.edu) or please call in and leave a message on the school line (541) 790-7080.

Our French intern:

We are delighted and so lucky to present our French Amity intern, Lisa Himpens, who will be working in 4th and 5th grades this year. She joins us from the region of Picardie in the north of France. This is her first experience in the United States, and we encourage families to include her (and our other intern in 2nd & 3rd, Laurine) on an excursion somewhere in Oregon. Or maybe invite them to visit the coast with you, go on a hike, or invite them to a homemade dinner or a local dinner out? If you’re interested, please reach out to Mme Jana or Mme Shelli via email, and we will put you in contact with Lisa. Merci!

Le français:

Mme Jana, French & Science kincaid_j@4j.lane.edu

•We do our best to express ourselves in French.

•We continue to learn how to use a translating dictionary.

•We have a positive attitude and growth mindset.

This past week, your children and I met to work on our classroom code, which is about how we want the classroom to feel. I make a poster of our agreements, and we all sign them.

We continue our cursive writing instruction with the letters o, w, b, & v, which aren’t difficult to form but can be confusing to attach to the next letter. We have five more lowercase (minuscule) letters, then we’ll begin uppercase (majuscule) letters and work on writing signatures. All the assessments are completed, thanks so much to Lisa being able to take kids a few at a time to record their speaking assessments. We don’t do these assessments again until the end of January. Yay! They give me a lot of information, but they do take time. Now I just have to grade them all!

We begin French homework this week! At school, I will explain the homework & give the students the first answer for each evening’s work. Students will come home with a lavender sheet of paper. This paper must go back and forth from school to home every day, which is why it should reside in your child’s homework folder. One-fourth of the paper is done each night. Monday night, they rewrite the vocabulary words with vowels in one color and consonants in another. Tuesday night, they rewrite the words in cursive. Wednesday night, they will do a fill-in-the-blank activity, and on Thursday night, someone in your house (older siblings who speak French can administer it) a quiz to practice writing the words to ready kids for our Friday quiz. The quiz will also be a fill-in-the-blank (cloze) activity. Your job, parents, is to initial the sheet every evening, only showing that you saw they did the work, not that they necessarily did it 100% correctly. We will grade homework together every day. On Friday, there will be an in-class quiz, which is also a cloze activity. They get one grade for spelling and one grade for vocabulary. I try to minimize the stress.

Last week, we conjugated the verb avoir (to have), which most students seem to remember. Next week, we’ll conjugate être (to be), then faire (to make or do), and aller (to go). After that, we usually do verbs ending in -er (90% of verbs), then pouvoir (to be able) and vouloir (to want). 

In the coming weeks, we will be working on some activities to help kids better understand how to use our translating dictionaries. It is a great help also in reinforcing alphabetical order.

We’ll begin reading and FLA groups in the second week of October. 

Students worked a bit on their “Tubes” art this week, and we began the “Moi!” project which is all about them… in French. Nearly everyone has filled out his/her/their document, and now we’re working on some art. Next, they’ll write their paragraphs in cursive and put the art and the writing together.

Les sciences:  

We will begin our first science experiment in the Soils, Rocks, and Landforms (La terre, les pierres, et les formes du relief) unit next week, learning about the components of soil.

Mme Shelli, English & Math
hopper_s@4j.lane.edu

“Applying Place Value Concepts in Whole Number Addition and    Subtraction.” The key concepts in this unit are:

• We can estimate addition and subtraction to decide if our exact answer is reasonable.
  
• There are multiple strategies for adding and subtracting numbers. One efficient strategy is the “standard algorithm.”

This week, we will continue to use rounding to estimate approximate sums and differences as a way to check our calculations. Students enter 4th grade with lots of experience adding and subtracting with strategies and varying experience with the standard algorithm. Last week, students practiced the standard method for adding with “carrying” or “regrouping.” This week, students will see modeled subtraction of multi-digit numbers using base ten blocks as a way to understand what happens when we “borrow” or “regroup” in subtraction.  There will be practice time and games to support fluency in this addition and subtraction.

GAMES of of the week:  Subtraction games to play at home

English:

In our ELA Module 1 A Great Heart, we begin a two week study of the literal heart. We will read the wonderfully complex text, Circulatory Story. Some of the goals of this week’s work will be determine the main idea and details, summarize, and determine meaning of metaphors and similes in the text.   You can find out details about our first unit “A Great Heart” on this Parent Tip Sheet .You can learn more about the 4th grade curriculum here.

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 le 26 au 30 septembre 2022

Upcoming Dates:

• Monday through Friday, Sept. 26-30: School safety week (one drill per day)
• Friday, September 30: School picture day

Please ensure that you email BOTH TEACHERS when you communicate with us. Your child will begin with his/her homeroom teacher again this week. So red class will begin with Mme Shelli and blue class will begin with Mme Jana. We communicate weekly on this 4TH GRADE BLOG (please bookmark) and send a weekly email reminder when we update information. You can also find links to French, Math, English, and other supplemental activities on the red tabs at the top of the blog.

Our French intern:

We are delighted and so lucky to present our French Amity intern, Lisa Himpens, who will be working in 4th and 5th grades this year. She joins us from the region of Picardie in the north of France. This is her first experience in the United States, and we encourage families to include her (and our other intern in 2nd & 3rd, Laurine) on an excursion somewhere in Oregon. Or maybe invite them to visit the coast with you, go on a hike, or invite them to a homemade dinner or a local dinner out? If you’re interested, please reach out to Mme Jana or Mme Shelli via email, and we will put you in contact with Lisa. Merci!

Le français:

Mme Jana, French & Science kincaid_j@4j.lane.edu

We continue our cursive writing instruction with the letters u, y, i, j, k, r, & s. We’ll go through all lowercase (minuscule) letters, then progress and work through all uppercase (majuscule) letters. This past week, the students completed the writing, comprehension, and reading assessments. The only remaining assessment is the speaking one, which they will complete this week. I’ve been impressed thus far with how they’re doing! We’ve also begun French-only for 10 minutes at a time. We’ll move up to 15 minutes at a time later next week. We’ll begin reading and FLA groups the first week of October. We’ll also begin French homework the first week of October.

Most students nearly completed their practice art projects in my absence, so, we’re starting our final project, which is twice the size of the practice one. Next week, I’m planning to begin the “Moi!” project which is all about them… in French. It includes writing and drawing, and they end up really sweet.

Les sciences:  

The kids are excited to start science, and Lisa has begun sorting and preparing the science kit ingredients for us. There is a lot of mixing and prepping in these science kits. We will begin our first science unit experiments, Soils, Rocks, and Landforms (La terre, les pierres, et les formes du relief) in early October. 

Mme Shelli, English & Math
hopper_s@4j.lane.edu

We continue the math unit “Applying Place Value Concepts in Whole Number Addition and    Subtraction.” The key concepts in this unit are:

• Digits in numbers represent ten times what they represent in the place to the right.
• We can use our understanding of place value to round numbers.
• There are multiple strategies for adding and subtracting numbers. One efficient strategy is the “standard algorithm.”

This week, we will review forms of numbers (standard form, base-10 form, expanded form, expanded notation). We will create “function machines” as we explore x10, x100, x1000 and ÷10, ÷100 and ÷1000 in relation to place value. Here is an online game similar to the puzzles we will make in class this week. We will also discuss how rounding numbers to the nearest ten, hundred or thousand can help us estimate sums or differences.

GAME of of the week: Skunk

Here’s a game for your family to play at home. We will learn this one in class this week. You can also find a number of resources for additional both online and tech-free games on this site under the tab “Math.”

English:

We continue Module 1 A Great Heart. Last Friday, students defined and explored the word “greathearted.” Students gathered facts about the life of one three famous women, Clara Barton, Helen Keller, or Anne Frank. This week, students will look closely at their actions to determine why people might say that they were “greathearted.” 

We will analyze the organizational structure of an informative paragraph (hook, thesis, supporting points, concluding statement.) Then, students will write a well developed paragraph about the person they chose to study. The structure of the paragraph will eventually lead to writing an organized essay following a similar model to the one on the right.

Over the course of this unit, students develop a deep understanding of the heart, both how the literal human heart functions in the body, as well as how the figurative heart represents the center of the human spirit and emotions.  You can find out details about our first unit “A Great Heart” on this Parent Tip Sheet

You can learn more about the 4th grade curriculum here.

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 le 19 au 22 septembre 2022

Upcoming Dates:

Thursday, September 22 Curriculum Night from 6-7 pm.  Childcare will be available in the cafeteria from 6-7. Schedule: 

           6:00-6:20: Grades 1-2 Presentations in Classrooms

                                             6:20-6:35: PTO Meet & Greet in Gym

                                             6:40-7:00: Grades 3-5 Presentations in Classrooms

• Monday through Friday, Sept. 26-30: School safety week
• Friday, September 30: School picture day

Please ensure that you email BOTH TEACHERS when you communicate with us. Your child will begin with his/her non-homeroom teacher this week. So blue class will begin with Mme Shelli and red class will begin with Mme Jana. We communicate weekly on this 4TH GRADE BLOG (please bookmark) and send a weekly email reminder when we update information. You can also find links to French, Math, English, and other supplemental activities on the red tabs at the top of the blog.

Le français:

Mme Jana, French & Science kincaid_j@4j.lane.edu

I am so sorry that I had to miss the whole week. My mom’s surgery and recovery had some issues. Her blood pressure was all over the place. My daughter is taking family leave from her work next week, so I will be present.

Since my subs are not Francophones, most of the work they did was in English, except of course, we have the wonderful Lisa Himpens as our amity intern in fourth grade this year, so she took over some of the French routines. They continued our cursive writing instruction with the letters h, t, p, e, l, and f. We’ll go through all lowercase (minuscule) letters, then progress and work through all uppercase (majuscule) letters. This week I’ll be able to work on verb conjugations, reviewing the four major irregular verbs, avoir (to have), être (to be), faire (to make or do), and aller (to go). Students seem ready to jump back into conjugating, so we’ll review what they’ve already learned, then we’ll dive into conjugating additional commonly used verb conjugations. Since I wasn’t present this past week, the only French assessment that took place was listening. I felt I need to be present for the instruction for the other French assessments which include writing, speaking, comprehension, and reading so they go as well as possible. None of the assessments are very long, and we won’t do them all on the same day. Students also went around and “Read the Room,” i.e. read everything on the walls, and got to explore my in-class French library.

Students may have continued the first art project in my absence, so I’ll see where we are on that when we get back into the classroom. It takes a few weeks, but you should see those lovely projects soon as we hang them on our walls. This week, we’ll try to begin the “Moi!” project which is all about them… in French, we just have to get through the assessments.

Les sciences:  

This past week, I had my guest teacher, Clare, do a KWL chart with each class. First, they told her what they Know about soils, rocks, and landforms, then what they Want to know, and after the unit, we’ll do what they Learned. We will begin our first science unit, Soils, Rocks, and Landforms (La terre, les pierres, et les formes du relief) in early October. 

Mme Shelli, English & Math
hopper_s@4j.lane.edu

This week we will continue to practice mathematical routines, play some math games to build fluency with addition, subtraction and place value. We also begin our first math unit “Applying Place Value Concepts in Whole Number Addition and    Subtraction” The key concepts in this unit are:

• Digits in numbers represent ten times what they represent in the place to the right.
• We can use our understanding of place value to round numbers.
• There are multiple strategies for adding and subtracting numbers. One efficient strategy is the “standard algorithm.”

This week, we will observe powers of ten in place value. Students will identify place value of digits through millions and will begin to compare numbers through millions using < > and =.

GAME of of the week: Roll and Place (aka Build a Bigger Number)

Here’s a game for your family to play at home to build on the concepts learned in class. You can also find a number of resources for additional both online and tech-free games on this site under the tab “Math.”

English:

Our English Curriculum,”Wit and Wisdom,” integrates reading, writing, listening and speaking goals while building deep knowledge and vocabulary about art, science, and history topics. You can find out details about our first unit on this Parent Tip Sheet.

We begin Module 1 “A Great Heart” this week with the focus question: How does someone show a great heart, figuratively?  Students explore the word heart, considering its literal and figurative meanings. Students begin the process of reading, annotating, and analyzing texts by working with these two short quotations that use the word heart literally or figuratively:

“It is infinitely better to transplant a heart than to have it devoured by worms.”

-Christaan Barnard, first cardiovascular surgeon to transplant a heart.

AND

“Wherever you go, go with all your heart.”

-Confucious, a Chinese philosopher

Over the course of this unit, students develop a deep understanding of the heart, both how the literal human heart functions in the body, as well as how the figurative heart represents the center of the human spirit and emotions.

PE Note from Mme ErinMarie

Music(al) note from Mme Doyle:

Welcome back, or welcome for the first time to…Music! Mme Doyle is excited to welcome you all back into the music classroom this new school year. Your child will have Music on Monday and Wednesday

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 le 12 au 16 septembre 2022

Upcoming Dates:

• Monday through Friday, September 12-16 – Mme Shelli will be with 5th grade at Canoe Island; Mme Ginger, our 5th grade teacher, will be our guest teacher in English.
• Monday, September 12 – Mme Jana will be absent. Her sub will be Debra Gelzer.
• Thursday, September 22 – Curriculum Night – Visit your child’s classrooms and hear from teachers. More info coming later.
• Monday through Friday, Sept. 26-30: School safety week
• Friday, September 30: School picture day

Please ensure that you email BOTH TEACHERS when you communicate with us. Your child will begin with his/her homeroom teacher again during the first full week of school.

Le français:

Mme Jana, French & Science kincaid_j@4j.lane.edu

First, thank you for sending your kids to school ready to learn! I think we had a great short first week. It’s nice for school to almost be back to “normal.” 😜

I will be gone this Monday because I am the caretaker for my 89-year-old mother, who unfortunately fell and broke the head of her femur about 10 days ago. I will, undoubtedly, be gone some other days to help with recovery, so please be patient with me during this time. My mom was walking five miles a day up until this, so we’ll hopefully get her up and moving smoothly and soon.

We mostly went over school and classroom routines this week. The students did a little alphabetizing exercise for me, and most students were able to do it perfectly. Everyone also wrote his signature, which we will redo about six times this year to monitor progress. We began our cursive writing instruction with the letters c, a, d, and g. We’ll go through all lowercase (minuscule) letters, then progress and work through all uppercase (majuscule) letters. Students seem ready to jump back into conjugating, so we’ll review what they’ve already learned, then we’ll dive into conjugating additional commonly used verb conjugations. This week and next will include French assessments which include writing, speaking, comprehension, reading, and listening. None of the assessments are very long, and I don’t put them all on the same day.

We also began our first art project which involves concentration and fine motor control. It takes a few weeks, but you’ll be seeing those lovely projects soon as we hang them up on our walls. This coming week, we’ll begin a “Moi!” project which is all about them… in French.

Les sciences:  

We will begin our first science unit, Soils, Rocks, and Landforms (La terre, les pierres, et les formes du relief) in early October. 

Mme Shelli, English & Math
hopper_s@4j.lane.edu

English:

In English last week, we began to set up our English Writing & Reading journals.  Students explored our class library and made a wish list of books they’d like to check out from our library. Every student has a choice book to read in class going into this week.  This week, students will begin to learn some routines around reading and writing with our guest teacher, Mme. Ginger.

Music(al) note from Mme Doyle:

Welcome back, or welcome for the first time to…Music! Mme Doyle is excited to welcome you all back into the music classroom this new school year. Your child will have Music according to the following schedule:

PE, MUSIC, & Library (Repeated from last week)

PE & MUSIC will be on Mondays and Wednesdays, so please help your child wear PE-appropriate shoes and clothing on those days. Our library time will be on Fridays starting in October.

We communicate weekly on our 4TH GRADE BLOG (please bookmark) and send a weekly email reminder when we update information. You can also find links to French, Math, English, and other supplemental activities on the red tabs at the top of the blog.

School supplies

Most school supplies are supplied by the district this year. Here is a list of the items your child should bring to school beginning Wednesday, September 6:

• 2 folders – two pocket folders. Any color but NOT binders- just a flat folder to carry papers.
• 2 masks – every day (optional)
• water bottle if desired, although we do have water fountains in classrooms
• daily nut-free snack 
• 1-2 boxes of good tissues (no lotion please)

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