Dear Parents,
Congratulations to you on your students' excellent performance at the concert on Thursday. I was so impressed with the professional manner in which they conducted themselves and the joy with which they sang. Thank you to all you parents for supporting their performance. I know it is not easy to get students to a concert on time and appropriately dressed in the middle of the week, but you managed it. We greatly appreciate all you do to make these concerts happen. Of course, we also owe a lot to Mrs. Washburn and Mr. Scott for coordinating these concerts and to Miss Sassaman for teaching the students such beautiful music. We are also indebted to the people from King of Kings Church for allowing us to use their facilities.
You all know by now that this is the last week
before break. Monday and Tuesday will be full days, and Wednesday through Friday
will be half days. The main motivation
for the half days is to give students more time to study. They will have tests
in all their major subject areas this week. While these are unit tests, not
cumulative tests, there are a lot of tests in a single week, so we feel it is
best to give the students more time to study.
In my classes, we have the following test schedule: There
will be a math test on Wednesday on division. On Thursday there will be a
science test on geology. On Friday we have our Shakespeare festival. The
students’ performance, including their ability to be silent and respectful when
they are off-off stage, will count as their literature test. The study guides
for the other tests are below my signature line.
While it may seem like a big challenge for fourth grade
students to have so many tests in a week, our goal is to prepare them to be
successful in middle school. Many students have never taken several tests in a
short period of time before they reach middle school, and they are unfamiliar with
how to manage their study time. This can impair their performance on tests at a
time when their grades are becoming more important. By giving them the opportunity
to study for numerous tests before their grades are really important, we give
the students tools to succeed.
All this being said, we are very excited to invite you to
our second annual Shakespeare festival! Your students have been practicing hard
and they would love to have you watch them perform. Relatives and friends are
also welcome. The fourth grade performance of “Twelfth Night” will begin at
8:30am in the MPR on Friday. At 9:30am the dram club will have their
presentation, and at 10:15am the fifth graders will present “A Midsummer Night’s
Dream.”
Please note that while we do want you watch your students
perform, the students are also required to stay and watch their peers’
performances; they cannot be picked up until the normal half-day dismissal
time.
We are certainly not assigning any official homework over
Christmas break, but it would be wise for students to review stanzas 1-6 of “Paul
Revere” over break so they do not forget it. Also, students who struggle with
math can benefit from occasion review of multiplication facts and spending a
little time in the RM Wall of Mastery or Office so they don’t forget what they’ve
learned. This need not be a huge time investment; even one or two twenty minute
sessions over break could be helpful.
The first week after break will be project week. This is a
week of half days in which students will be expected to use their extra time to
complete a major project. Last year we had a successful science fair on the
human body. This year our theme is history. Students will be assigned to study historical
figures from a time period their class has been studying. They will write a
paper with important facts about their historical figure and then they will
dress up as their person as part of the formal presentation on project night.
Students will be assigned historical figures for project night by lottery this
Monday.
These are all the notes I have for you this week. If you
have any questions, comments, or concerns, please send me a message through
your Jupiter Ed account.
Sincerely,
Miss Wycklendt
Math Study Guide
1. Division: Students should be familiar with
division as the inverse of multiplication. 12 x 3 = 36, 36 divided by 3 equals
12, and 36 divided by 12 equals 3.
2. Students should know and be able to
articulate the difference between dividing into x groups and dividing into
groups of x. For example, 24 divided by 3 can mean 24 divided into 3 groups
with 8 things in each groups OR 24 divided into groups of 3
with 8 groups of three.
3. Students should be able to draw the
difference in #2 when requested to do so. For example, they should be able to
draw 24 divided into 3 groups by drawing 3 circles with 8 dots in each circle.
Then they should be able to show 24 divided into groups of 3 by drawing 8
circles with three dots in each circle. (Tally marks or other appropriate marks
may also be used.)
4. Students should be able to perform
division with a remainder. For example, 20 divided by 3: Is there anything
times 3 that equals 20? No! What is the math fact for 3 that is closest to 20
but not greater than 20? 3 x 5 = 15; 3 x 6 = 18; 3 x 7 = 21. 3 x 7 is greater
than 20, so 3 x 6 must be the math fact we want. Now subtract to find the
remainder. 20 – 18 = 2. Therefore, 20 divided by 3 is 6 remainder 2. (Students
do not need to put all this work on paper, this is just one example of a
conversation to have in case a student is unsure how to answer.)
5. Students
should know and be able to apply the properties of division. The properties of
division are: 1. Any number divided by one equals itself. 2. Any number divided
by itself equals one. 3. 0 divided by any number equals zero. 4. Numbers cannot be divided by zero. If such
a problem appears, students should state that it cannot be done,
6. Because
column multiplication is one of the fundamentals of math and is not formally taught
again after fourth grade, I will also be including one and two digit column
multiplication problems on the test. Students are required to use column
multiplication (the standard methods you were all taught in grade school) to
solve these problems. Any creative methods of splitting the problem apart or
breaking it down will be marked wrong, regardless of the answer. It is absolutely
vital that they know the standard method of column multiplication because this
knowledge will be presumed in higher grades but it will not be retaught.
Science Test Study Guide
1. Groups of atoms bonded together are called molecules.
2. The three (main) states of matter are solid, liquid, and gas.
Matter changes states according to its temperature. A solid that gets heated
becomes a liquid, and a liquid that is further heated becomes a gas.
3. Heat gives atoms and molecules energy. Atoms and molecules are
always moving, at least a little, but when they get heated they move more
quickly. The hotter they get, the faster they move. The faster they move, they
more space they need in which to move. This need for more space causes atoms to
spread out from one another, which we experience as a change in state from
solid to liquid and then from liquid to gas.
4. Cooling down has the opposite effect on atoms. They slow down, and
they need less space to move. As a result, the atoms are able to stay closer
together.
5. Because the atoms in solids are moving so slowly, solids keep
their own shape. Because the atoms in liquids and gasses are moving more
quickly, liquids and gasses do not hold their shape. They take the shape of
whatever container they are in.
6. The earth is divided into three main layers, the crust, the
mantle and the core.
7. The crust is extremely thin compared to the mantle and the core.
In drawings of the earth, the crust is represented as the outline of the
drawing.
8. There are two kinds of crust, oceanic crust and continental crust.
Continental crust is the crust found on land. It is mostly made of solid rock
covered by thin layers of dirt. Oceanic crust is the crust found under the
ocean. It is mostly made of solid rock covered by thin layers of sand.
9. The mantle is the middle of the earth’s main layers. It is divided
into the lithosphere, the asthenosphere and the mesosphere.
10. The lithosphere is composed of huge slabs
of solid rock called “tectonic plates.” The plates fit closely but not
perfectly together, like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. There are gaps between the
plates which allow them to move and bump into each other.
11. The places in the earth’s crust that
lie directly over the gaps between the tectonic plates are called fault lines.
12. The plates of the lithosphere float on the
asthenosphere, which is made of liquid rock.
13. The mesosphere is the lowest layer of the
mantle, beneath the lithosphere and asthenosphere. The mesosphere is made of
solid rock (not plates).
14. The core is the innermost of the earth’s
three main layers. It is divided into the outer core and the inner core.
The outer core is made of liquid iron. The inner core is made of solid iron.
15. The inner core is about 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit—That’s
as hot as the surface of the sun. Even though it is extremely hot, the inner
core is solid because the weight of the earth above it presses its atoms
together and forces them to remain in a solid state.
16. The inner core and the outer core are
spinning in opposite directions at high speeds. Their motion causes the earth’s
magnetic field. This magnetic field reaches all the way though the earth and
into the atmosphere, which means it is over 8,000 miles wide.
17. Earthquakes occur when heat rises from the
inner core and causes the magma of the asthenosphere to move and bubble. (Think
of water in a pot.) This moves the plates of the lithosphere, which float on
the asthenosphere. When the plates of the lithosphere move, they sometimes bump
into each other, causing earthquakes.
18. Mountains can also be formed by the plates
of the lithosphere bumping into each other.
19. Volcanoes occur when liquid magma from the
asthenosphere bubbles up through the gaps between tectonic plates and forces
its way onto the earth’s crust.
