Dear 4B Families,

 Happy Valentine’s week. The mid tri reports that were supposed to come home Friday will be in your child’s filer on Monday. These reports do not reflect the tests the students took last week.

The students need to bring in their special Valentine boxes on Monday. We will be doing several activities and our math work based on the boxes and the grid planning sheet. Be sure that the planning sheet comes in with the boxes. Of course, students should bring in their Valentines as well! Tuesday is free dress/Valentine theme. Students may wear pink, white, red. No face paint or hair dye. Thank you to our room mom, Lynn Harper, and all that are helping our with our Valentine’s Day party

Don’t forget to turn in your BINGO Bash order forms.  This is the teacher auction project and one of the biggest fund raisers for the auction.  This year the BINGO Bash is taking place on Friday, February 24th from 6-8 p.m.  We hope to have a full house! You can get extra forms in the office if you have misplaced yours or download one from the link above.

Mark your calendars for the evenings of March 8th and 9th, and plan on bringing the whole family to enjoy Holy Rosary Drama Department’s debut of The Frog Princess. Come indulge your imagination in an evening filled with fun, humor, whimsical entertainment, and community building!

Religion: Our new unit of study will focus on the 10 Commandments. Fr. Oakland is coming in this week to give the students a little preview. We will be focussing on how the Commandments relate to our daily lives and that following all of the Commandments is really about following the Great Commandment—Love God and One Another!

Speaking of the love and kindness that Valentine’s Day brings—this week is also Random Acts of Kindness Week. As part of our Steps to Respect lessons we will be working to incorporate the Random Acts of Kindness goal of spreading kindness. The students will also be challenged to refrain from any unkind words or actions—and if they do slip up to make a sincere apology. Students also need to let their classmates know how they feel if an unkind comment is given. Our society is filled with examples of disrespect, talking back, and violence. It is easy to get wrapped up in this part of our culture—but there is so much good going on as well—and our goal will be to focus on the positive in people—beginning with us! Thank you for your support at home—keeping the kindness going—encouraging acts of kindness at home and in our community—or world!

Reading/LA: Our reading focus continues to be on biographies and the traits that make people successful. We will also tie in our kindness work here, as research/science shows that kindness and happiness often lead to success (not the other way around). The students will be doing a writing project in class related to biographies as well. As part of the “mini-bio” writing project the students will get a chance to practice selecting important information and speaking in front of the class which will aid in their preparation for their large biography project.

Spelling:The spelling list for Lesson 20 was sent out last Friday.  This test will be this Friday the 17th.

Oral Biography: Students need to have their biography choice selected and approved by this Thrusday.  Approval includes the selection of an appropriate book. Once the students have their biographies approved the next step is to read—and take notes. I will be talking with the students about time management suggestions for this big project in class this week. To begin, students might want to have a pad of sticky notes to mark pages/passages that they would like to include in their reports. They can then come back to these pages later and take down specific notes. Students should write a little reminder on the sticky note as to what they wanted to remember on that page. As they read they should focus on the facts of their subject’s life—of course—but also look for fun stories or anecdotes to include in their presentations. The presentations should be both informative and fun! As students read, building a timeline can also be helpful.

Remember, presentations will be made from March 23-30. At this point students should be putting most of their effort into reading and learning all they can about their chosen person. Books should be read more than once if at all possible.

Math: Last week we finished up chapter 5 on multiplication. This week we will begin our next chapter on long division. As you know and will see with homework, when multiplication facts do not come quickly, long division becomes extra challenging. Basic subtraction is also an important part of long division. I have moved all students to division on Xtramath (except for those who have already passed) as a good review. Remember, nightly practice is expected for all students that do not know their facts automatically. 5 focused minutes a night is all it takes

Social Studies: We will be working our way over the Rocky Mountains this week with the help of the Shoshone horses that Sacagawea helped the Corps acquire. Students should be reviewing for their Rivers and Lakes of the US test. This test will take place on Tuesday, February 28th.  All students should have study sheets in their filers. You can also access them here. Students can take advantage of an online practice site here. This site does not work well on iPads unfortunately.

Science: This week we will be looking at the renewable energy source Wind. We will discuss how wind is created and list the advantages and disadvantages of using wind turbines. Then the students will make their own anemometers and practice measuring wind speed.

Homework:

• There will be a spelling test this Friday the 17th. Words were sent out last Friday for Lesson 20.  There will not be a spelling test next week due to the winter break.
• Valentine boxes are due on Monday the 13th Don’t forget grid model sheet as well.
• As a little Valentine treat there will be no homework on Tuesday.
• Look for math homework Wednesday and Thursday.
• Review SS Rivers and Lakes
• Oral Biography selections and reading

That is about all for this week. Lots of great learning will be happening in 4th grade in the coming weeks. Thank you for helping to keep your child organized at home with his/her studies. Please let me know if you have any questions or need any help from me. 
Remember, this Friday is a half-day and there is no school on Monday and Tuesday next week. I hope you all have a fun winter mini-break.