Wemberly's Ice-cream Star by Megan

I made an iMovie about the book Wemberly's Ice-cream Star. The reason I chose this book was because I liked the cover.

When I was reading the book, I had to think about not going too fast or too slow. I practiced reading the book until I thought it was perfect. I liked recording the book in iMovie. I hope you enjoy it.

Nonfiction Celebration

For the past month, we've been reading nonfiction texts and learning how to move from thinking about topics to thinking about main ideas that are supported with facts and details (i.e. evidence) from the text.

To celebrate this hard work, students chose a page of notes from their reader's notebook that they were particularly proud of and created a visual that taught an idea from the text with evidence. They added color to show meaning and may have included visuals. The work on each student's poster came from their notes on their nonfiction reading.

Before our celebration, students practiced teaching their reading partner and gave and received feedback to improve their presentation. They presented their posters to a group of three classmates. We ended the celebration with a gallery walk to share our notes and posters with the whole class.

The video below includes photos of the posters created as well as a few moments of the teaching happening.

Artists by Jack M.

This month during Art, we are learning about Van Gogh. Van Gogh sold a few paintings, but after he died, some of his paintings became priceless! Van Gogh lived 37 years and started painting when he was 27 that means he only painted for 10 years. In 1888, Vincent left Paris and went to a French town called Arles. The reason we are learning about Van Gogh is because every month we learn about a new artist so we can learn about different styles of art.

Realistic Fiction Pieces Around Fair Haven

We're excited to share that our realistic fiction pieces have been hung around town! Thanks to Caroline, Lucas, James, and their families for helping to hang these pieces.

Each hanging piece also has a QR code in front of it. The QR codes are the black and white images that can be scanned with a smartphone (there are free apps to scan them). Once the QR code is scanned, you'll be sent to a link that will allow you to listen to the writer read golden lines from his or her piece. Hearing the lines read aloud by the writer really brings the writing to life!

Golden lines were chosen, practiced, and recorded by the writer. The lines reflect the writing goals of each writer during this unit. Some of our goals were to use a variety of details (e.g. action, thought, dialogue, setting...) and to include sensory details and figurative language. (Some writers had the goal of add paragraphs more consistently throughout their piece, which won't be reflected in their recording.)

Here's a breakdown of whose pieces are where:

Tavolo - Jack S., Maia, Marcus, Harry, Patrick, Sophie, Jack M., Sal, Maddie, Megan, Harris, Lily, Lucas, Christina M., Maisy, and Braiden

Fairwinds - Quinn, Christina U., and James

River Road Books - Ellie, Caroline, Connor, and Cameron

We're so thankful to these Fair Haven businesses for allowing us the space to share our writing!

Thankful List Poem

During the month of November, writers in room 101 kept a list of things we're thankful for, adding to the list gradually throughout the month.

Today, we read some list poems from the poetry anthology Falling Down the Page and we each chose items from our personal thankful lists that we wanted to include in our class list poem.

Our published list poem hanging outside room 101.

Room 101 has so much to be grateful for.

Friction Vehicles by Quinn

Vehicles move because they have force, a push, but if you have too much of it, it will never stop.

That's why you need friction. Friction is important because it makes everything stop or slow down. It is like your rug or couch. It is very rough.

The propeller activity was very simple. You just took a vehicle, made sure that it can move, and then add a propeller, wrap it to store energy, and let it go. But sometimes it could get a little hard because you have to work with your group to find a way it can store energy and let it go. Energy is a very interesting topic.

The video above includes images taken by Quinn during an activity involving building and testing propeller-driven vehicles. Quinn also compiled the images to make the video.

Liberty Science Center by James

Field Trip

On October 11, 2013, Knollwood's 4th grade took a field trip to the Liberty Science Center in Jersey City. The whole grade needed 3 buses. Wow! The buses had TVs and a bathroom.

Hurricane Generator

My favorite thing at the Liberty Science Center was the hurricane generator. A hurricane generator is where you're in a small room and a machine generates 100 mile an hour winds and shoots water at you. You have to wear a rain jacket and goggles for safety reasons.

 In the hurricane generator.

Science

Everybody learned something new at the Liberty Science Center. The most interesting thing I learned was that a windshield can block 100 mile an hour winds. Now tall buildings have window shields to help people inside.

Capture the Flag by Maisy

Capture the Flag is a very fun sport to play. But when it comes to an argument, you have to be honest. Honesty is something you have to have when you play Capture the Flag. If you want to play Capture the Flag, you also have to have speed and agility. Speed is very important. If you want to try to get the ball you have to run across the field and run back.

The video above was created by Maisy from photos she took at recess.

The Debater by Sophie

For the past two months in class we have been doing two or three debates.

In the debates, first we read a book together as a class, having two ideas about the character and collecting evidence about why that character is being that way.

The photo above is of Sophie's evidence for two conflicting ideas, that the tree is strong and the tree is weak. She collected the evidence as we read The Giving Tree.

After that, we share some of our evidence with our reading partner. Soon, after that, we get in a caucus and order our evidence. Later, we get with our debate partner and we both get about two minutes to speak. Then we get with our caucus and figure out ways to fight back. After that, we get back with our debate partner and say what we came up with with our partners.

I think this is a good way to learn about perspectives because it teaches us that there is no wrong or right answer and many people can have different perspectives. Maybe if you get fifty people in a room, maybe they could all have different perspectives about the same thing.

The video above contains images and video from a recent debate. The video was compiled by Sophie.

KNOCKOUT by Harry

Knockout is played at recess. You play this game by trying to get the person in front of you out by shooting after they missed to get them out.

The game Knockout is played on the basketball courts at recess. If you want to play, you can just join wherever you want.

Personal Narratives around Fair Haven

We are excited to announce that our first published pieces, our personal narratives, are hanging in local Fair Haven businesses. Thanks so much to Tavolo, Fairwinds, and River Road Books for so generously giving us space to share our pieces with a wider audience!


Here's a breakdown of whose pieces are where:

Tavolo - Ellie, Caroline, Connor, Cameron, Jack S., Maia, Marcus, Harry, Patrick, Sophie, Jack M., Megan, Maddie, Harris, Sal, and Lily

Fairwinds - Lucas, Christina M., and Maisy

River Road Books - Quinn, Braiden, Christina U., and James


At the end of each unit, we'll swap out the published pieces and update you with where each writer's piece can be found.

We hope that you're able to stop by and read our class's writing soon!

pieces hanging at Tavolo

pieces hanging at Fairwinds

pieces hanging at River Road Books

Touch Football by Maddie

I like Touch Football because I watch college and NFL football and it makes me feel like I am in the real stadium. But I'm really not.

So the rules are very simple as well, like no jumping on top of each other and you're not allowed to have the ball for more than 5 seconds then the defender can tag you.

The object is to have fun and get as many touchdowns as you can!! You should try to get the football before it hits the ground. Football is a fun, super fun sport! Have fun!!

 

The video above contains photos taken by Maddie at recess.

Fire Safety Assembly by Ellie

This week we had a fire safety assembly and you learned lots about fire safety. For example, "KEEP OUT AND STAY OUT!" and like "Stop, drop, and roll!" And they showed us their equipment they wear when there is a fire and I thought that was cool! You should make a meeting spot outside in case there is a fire.

FIRE!

one week in!

Our first week was a busy one! Across the week, we began to work on creating a classroom environment that will help us all be successful. We thought about what we value as individuals, our expectations of ourselves and others, and created a class agreement.

We've also dug right in to our work. We learned how to choose just right books, began reading books (many classmates have finished at least one book already!), started a list of Burning Story Ideas in our writer's notebooks, and took a math pre-assessment.

We ended the week by talking about how we've already grown since the first week of school and had our notebook decorating party and first Motion and Design challenge in science. The video below includes some photos from our notebook decorating party and the science challenge.

Social Issues Celebration

For the past month, we've read with a focus on social issues. We grew the chart below as we read across many books this year, identifying in clubs or whole class conversations the issues, ideas, and concepts hidden in the text we read.

Our work during social issues focused largely on determining what each text taught us about the issues and then pushing ourselves to be the kind of readers who change our own ideas as a result of reading the text.

During this unit, in addition to returning to favorite read alouds and rereading them (many we know by heart, practically), we read Wonder by RJ Palacio. (We're sure you know this already, as it's been a favorite in our class and most likely mentioned at home by now.)

In Wonder, one of Auggie's teachers, Mr. Browne, has precepts for each month. Similar to our class agreement - our precept - If you work really hard and are kind, amazing things will happen - Mr. Browne's September precept was "When given the choice between being right or being kind, choose kind."

To celebrate our work for the past month on social issues, each student chose an issue, idea or concept from our chart and wrote his own precept. This felt like an appropriate way to end our time together. We share them with you in the video below.

The Closet by Arabella

Please enjoy Arabella reading aloud her picture book The Closet, an independent project of hers during writing this year. Arabella is both the author and illustrator of The Closet. 

The Flying Bird by William

"Clunk" the window goes as everyone sees a bird fall to the ground. Our teacher goes out, grabs the bird, and puts it in a tissue box on our window sill.

Beating fast, the bird's heart beats. The bird stands up and flies away. Everyone is happy for the bird that visited Room 101 that day.

artwork by Aloka, showing the bird in the tissue box on our window sill

Poems in the Making by Mac

Poems, Poems in the making. In class we were recently making poetry books. The whole class was working really  hard. So was I. It was very hard work, too.

The video above contains photos of our class's poetry anthology covers taken by Mac. It's set to Some Nights by FUN, a song chosen by Mac for the video.

Handball by Andrew

A bunch of fourth graders at recess started to play a new game called Handball.

The things you need are a ball, a net, and friends. There is a goalie in the net and as many friends on the field as you want. You need one pass before you shoot. Every time the goalie makes a save or a team scores a goal, the goalie throws the ball out. And that is how you play Handball.

Book Reviews

Room 101 published book reviews a few weeks ago. You can find our published reviews on our book review blog, Room 101's Must Reads: http://fourthgrade101bookreviews.blogspot.com/. Maybe your next read is hiding in one of our reviews!

The Amazing Book Fair by William

Every year Knollwood has a book fair from sports to cooking to comics and much, much more.

The kids at Knollwood and sometimes Sickles love the books a the Knollwood Book Fair, especially the toys.

There is a big night called Family night. Family Night is when your whole family can come and buy books.

Have fun and keep reading!

Note from the teachers: Thanks for the books you donated to our class library! They've already been snatched up to be read :).

Invention Crazy! by Ellie

Invention time! All over Room 101 are inventions that we worked on. One of the classes came in and looked at the tables. There were different types of inventions.

Some are sporty and some are trendy. We worked hard.

There's a lot going on in Room 101. Lots of inventions and very hard work.

What's Up in Gym Class by Mason

Gym at Knollwood is really fun but it is also extremely different from other classes because you use your body and you get to run.

At gym, the gym teacher, Mr. Lydon, knows a lot of fun games, and even if it's an ordinary game like tag, he knows a really fun way to play it. One of the best games is Capture the Flag, which is the first game we learned.

How you play Capture the Flag is there are two teams and two sides. When the game starts, you try to run or you can try to tag people who are on your side but on the other team. If you run, you have to try to grab a "flag" which could be anything to represent it. If you grab a flag from the box, you are safe, but when you leave the box, you have to run to your side. If you get tagged, you have to go to jail.

When you go to jail, you have to wait for someone on your team to rescue you by running across to the jail without getting tagged.

Gym, in my opinion, is the best subject because you get to run around and have a lot of fun.

Fun Art by Michael

When Mr. Z showed us the Jackson Pollock project, we all got excited. We thought it was splatter paint, but we would put the paint down and blow it with a straw. And at the end of the day, Mr. Z showed us jacksonpollock.org. It was really cool. I even go to it when I get bored. You can visit it at: jacksonpollock.org.

Invention Convention by Rodrigo

In room 101, 24 students have started to ask people problems they have to help them get ideas for Invention Convention.

Students have started brainstorming inventions. Lots of people have good ideas. A lot of people are excited for Invention Convention.

On April 18, 24 students will have inventions to share.

Fantasy Fun by Alex

Us kids in Room 101 do writing celebrations like last week when we just finished fantasy and we had a celebration. It was really fun to read other kids' stories and learn a lot of new things. Some of the things we learned were how to write in third person and how to use dialogue, paragraphs, tiny actions, and punctuation.

In the video above, Alex shares some photos of parts of our published fantasy pieces and names the writing work that she sees in that part of the piece.

Vocabulary by Arabella

In writing, we have these special words like grit and charred and lots of others. We have hand motions for the words. We have lots of different hand motions. We get a lot of new words and when Mrs. Mills or Mrs. Barnett don't know hand motions for the word, it's up to the students to come up with them, which happens a lot. A student came up with the hand motion for grit. 

Sometimes we play this game for the words during snack where someone does the motion and people guess what the word is that goes with that motion. The student doing it for the class calls on a person who knows the answer. This game is really fun. We get to play it a lot.

If you want to see some of the words, watch my video. There will be two people in the video with me. We are going to say the word and do the motion. We're going to say the word first and then do the motion and describe the word. So please watch the video :)!

Note from the teachers: in the video above, Arabella, Allie, and Alex demonstrate the motions for some of our vocabulary words.

Stock Market Club by Wyatt

Every Wednesday at recess I have Stock Market Club. We usually have Stock Market Club in the computer lab, but sometimes it's in Mrs. Dougherty's room. Mrs. Dougherty runs Stock Market Club.

The first thing we do in Stock Market Club is make our group. You can choose to be with anyone. Then you start to buy stocks. Stocks are companies like McDonald's, Disney, and UPS. After you pick your stocks, you try to win.

If you're in first or second place, you get to go to a lunch. At the end of Stock Market Club we get a pizza party. I think that's fun. So anytime you see a Stock Market Club or game, you should try them out.

Here's the website we use during Stock Market Club: http://www.stockmarketgame.com.

Mayhem Poets Assembly by Dylan

We were sitting comfortably in our seats watching the Mayhem Poets make us laugh. They were making us laugh more and more every second. At the end they asked some people to come up for a one word poem. It was funny because they sometimes messed up.

After we went back to the classroom everybody was talking about the Mayhem Poets. "Let's do a one word poem," I exclaimed. While we were doing that I noticed that everyone around us was doing it, too. Cool, I thought.

This assembly was very important because it taught us that poetry can be written in more than one way.

Visit the Mayhem Poets website for more info: http://mayhempoets.com/ .

Baseball Multiplication by Connor

I think that math games are very fun. My favorite one is Baseball Multiplication. It is very fun.

One person puts their guy on home and the pitcher puts down cards. If the product of the cards is 1-21, it's an out. Other products are a single, double, triple, and home run. Win points and play.

Note from the teachers: in the video above, Connor and Dylan demonstrate how to play an inning of Baseball Multiplication. This game can be played at home in the Family Game Kit!

Independent Projects by Bridget

Independent projects are all about, well, you can do anything. You can do comics, interviews, plays, and stories. We do them during writing and it's super fun.  You get to talk and talk about what you are doing.

I am doing an interview and it is fun. I walk around and ask people questions.

First, you get a proposal and fill it out. These are some of the things we do on a proposal. First, you write what genre and topic you will do then you write how you will use your writer's notebook. After that you write what your mentor text will be then you write when you will be done. And that's how to do an independent project.

Note from the teachers: the video above was created by Bridget to showcase some of the independent project work going on in our room.

Six Word Essays

Last week we published and celebrated our essays. Part of our celebration included writing our essays as six word essays, inspired by Ernest Hemingway's six-word memoir.

Writing our essays in six words was challenging. It required us to do the hard work of determining importance and synthesis of several week's worth of writing.

How to do Brain Breaks by Bryn

We do brain breaks when we need to calm down. Brain breaks are a fun way to calm down.

We do brain breaks when we get too loud.

Brain breaks are easy to do. For example, if you do yoga, you will know what the tree pose is. It's when you put one of your legs to your knee and put your hands above your head.

My favorite brain break is a one minute dance party. It's when your teacher plays music and you dance. At the end, you always hear, "Awww."

In the video above, Bryn demonstrates and explains some of our brain breaks.