Sunday

December 15, by Ashley

It's raining! It's pouring! Where's my umbrella!?!

Well we (the class) started the day off with some easy similes and metaphors. What are similes and metaphors, you ask? Well you're lucky that you know me. Oh, excuse me. My name is Ashley. I'm in 4'th grade in Mr Kootman's class at Mary Fay Pendleton School. Where were we? Oh right. A simile is something that compares two things using the word "like" or "as". A metaphor is comparing two things not using "like" or "as".

After that, we went on to math in our Saxon Math book. The lesson we were learning about is about Adding and Subtracting Decimals. Adding and subtracting decimals is pretty easy once you get the hang of it. For example,( 5.4 + 6.1=11.5). How you can figure it out easier is by lining up your decimals.

Ring-a-ding, ding!!!!!!!!!

Recess time! So at recess no one could go outside because it was still raining!!! So instead the class watched a BrainPop video inside our warm and cozy classroom. Some people talked to each other after the video. Myleigh brought some Saltines for a snack. She didn't like them so she gave them to me because I love them so much!!!!!!!!!! After recess, we read our class chapter book called The Homework Machine.

Soon after recess, it was time to go to lunch. Now it's time to go to lunch. After lunch we had a music assembly. It was part assembly, part concert which had the woodwind family. The instruments that were in the family were the flute, oboe, clarinet, and the bassoon. We traveled to different places like France, Europe, Africa, and other places around the world to hear different types of music. The orchestra played different sorts of music like peaceful music and traditional music. I think that the assembly lasted 30 to 45 minutes. But the music assembly was interesting!

Minutes later, it was time to go home. Thank you so much for reading my Daily Blog!!!!!!!!!! See you next time. Good-bye!

Here are the image credits for the pictures:

http://www.how-to-study.com/images/simile2.jpg
http://www.gearpipe.com/i/StudentBandInstruments.jpg
http://www.ashevillemusicandart.com/MusicImages/instruments275.jpg

Wednesday

December 9, 2008- by John

Wahoo! It's almost Christmas! On Tuesday December 9 the class stood on the black top, and then Ms. Kepley told us to run around the track two times. Afterwards when everyone finished running we all went inside and started our morning work. For todays morning work we had multiplying with triple digits. Ex. 200x50= 10,000. The secret is looking for the simple fact, such as 5x2.

We didn't have any D.O.L but I don't know why. D.O.L is a tool that helps with spelling, grammar, speech, and etc... Next, the class started on our Saxon Power Up workbook- page thity-nine. Once we finished, our new math lesson was on Word Problems about Multiplication. It was pretty easy, but then we did another lesson on Rounding to the Thousands Place. That was also easy. After we did one more lesson that was about Decimal Place Value, then we got our homework assignment. Our homework assignment for today was pg. 277 through 280, 1 through 30.

When we finished math we went to recess, except for the people that had their cards up. During recess, people played different varieties of sports and other things. When the bell rang everyone went straight to their lines and waited for their teachers to signal them to come inside. It took a while for Mr. Kootman to come get us because he was doing something in the front office. Once recess was over Mr. Kootman let us inside and began to read The Homework Machine by Dan Gutman. The Homework Machine is really only dialog from the characters, but everyone still likes the book. There are many characters in The Homework Machine like Brenton Damagatchi, Judy Douglas, Kelsy Donnelly, Sam Dawkins, and all their parents too.

When we finished reading we started to read our new story of the week called "Sewed Up His Heart" by Lillie Patterson. "Sewed Up His Heart" is about a man named James Cornish who was stabbed in the chest and needs an operation. Then Dr. Dan looks after Cornish over night and Cornishs conditions worsened over night. Dr. Dan had to make a decision fast or Cornish would die in a matter of hours. Finally Dr. Dan made his decision to operate on the chest. When Dr. Dan entered the room he was bathing in perspiration. During the operation he would discuss what he found because he was pioneering an unknown territory.

The final part of the operation was sewing up the pericardium and sewing up the skin as well. Finally the operation was over and Dr. Dan became famous for the first successful heart surgery. In the middle of the story, while Nina was reading, Mr. Kootman interrupted and told us what a pericardium was. The peri- in pericardium means "around" and card- means the heart. For todays Language Arts homework we had to make a drawing of Dr. Dan out of facts from the story.

After Language Arts we went to lunch instead of going to writing. For lunch there was pizza and PB and J, but I brought my lunch and had a burrito, granola bar, mandarin oranges, and apples. For lunch recess everyone played either wall ball, kickball, hangout, or played on the big toy. After lunch recess Mr. Kootman came up to the black top and didn't see Hunter. Mr.Kootman asked what happened and Bryce told Mr. Kootman that Hunter was slammed into the ground and his tooth was out of place. When we got in the classroom we got our science materials and went to Ms. Barone's class. In science we did a lesson on Ecosystems like the Rain Forest, The Desert, and The Coral Reef.

Finally, in Social Studies we did our presentations for our missions and explorers reports. The first person to go today was Destiny and she was doing mission San Luis Rey. Dimitri went right after Destiny and did a great job, and he had great pictures for his poster board. Finally Katelyn went and she did an excellent job on her mission San Luis Rey. The last thing we did was reviewed our homework, cleaned up the room, and went home.

Image Credits:
http://www.latimes.com/media/photo/2008-03/36648660.jpg

http://www.eos.ubc.ca/courses/images/course/eosc315.jpg


http://www.wired.com/images/article/full/2007/09/pericardium_580x.jpg

December 8- by Kaylee and Room 40

Aahh!!! A wave of mission projects! Today our California history projects are due. Mr. Kootman had to find places in the classroom for all the models that some students built. Of course, not everybody built a mission; some people did Photostories, some created a poster and some visited missions or did reports.

First,we started out with DOL by respelling words that are spelled incorrectly. Next, we did extremely easy multiplication facts for our math lesson. Ms. Kepley, our student teacher, instructed us on this topic.

Then, at recess Jordyn,Nina,Jena,and I played extreme hopscotch by doing two twists, two handstands ,and one cartwheel.

After recess, we began reading our new chapter book, The Homework Machine. We don't really know what it is about yet because the characters
are keeping it a secret, but we know that the perspective is first person.

At about 11:00am we moved into language arts. We learned our vocabulary for our new story "Sewed Up His Heart." One of our words was anesthesia, which is a drug that puts you to sleep for surgery. Then Mr. Kootman gave us some time to start our Clues Chart. This is our prereading so we can get an idea of the
story before we read it.

We did this up until lunch, which was turkey hot dog and taco salad. At lunch recess, I did pull-ups on the monkey bars.

After lunch, we went to Ms. Barone's for sc
ience. We learned about ecosystems. Two of our vocab words are biotic and abiotic.

Then we went back to Room 40 where we graded people who were presenting their mission projects. One of the qualities that makes a good report is if people speak loudly.

After that, Mr. Kootman gave a bit more time to start our homework and then we went home!

Image credits:
http://www.davidwallphoto.com/images/%7B3CE41A08-4EA7-46D6-93E9-798894B73EDD%7D.jpg
http://www.missionsofca.com/mission-images/hcay9014-mission-03.jpg
http://www.canaryzoo.com/Geog/ecosystem.jpg


December 5, by Jordyn

Yeah!!!! Today is Friday!!!!! That means we can have HOT time (homework on time). There are 20 more days till Christmas! We started our day with a morning run around the track. Me and Destiny also ran all the way to the big toy (it was not for extra credit). When we came inside it was as warm as toast. First we started to do our morning math, it was all multiplication it was mostly 3-4 digit numbers (piece of cake). Following math, we took out our Saxon Math power up lesson 37 it was multiplication.

Afterwards , me, Jena, Nina, and Caylee played extre
me hop-scotch. Here's how to play, for 1,2,3,6 and 9 you jump all around. Then for 4,5,7, and 8 you do a hand-stand. OK, now you guys know how to play extreme hop-scotch.

Afterwards, Mr. Kootman read us our new chapter book The Homework Machine by Dan Gutman. It is where these 4 kids got in trouble, but they keep going off topic so we still don't know how they got in trouble. They live near the Grand Canyon in Arizona. The kids' names are:Sam Dawkins, Judy Douglas, Brenton Damagatchi, and Kelsey Donnelly.( They are called the "D squad" because they all sit at the same table.)

Ring a ding, it's lunch time! When we got into the cafeteria it smelled like, PIZZA! Not just cheese pizza it smelled like peperoni and sausage. First I sat down at our regular table and ate my lunch. For lunch I had chicken nuggets with ketchup. Then I was surrounded by all of my all of my friends I was so happy they chose to sit by me.

Once we came into the classroom it was time to read time to read Medicine : Past and Present for the last and final time. It was about how people died from a type of medicine. Did you know that the Native Americans used to chew willow bark to reduce the pain. But it grossed me out when it told me that when your body gets rid of smallpox it produces a scar from your face and you have to heel it with lemon and lime juice.

In Social Studies, Kiara and Ashley started their mission projects early. Mr.Kootman thought that it was so nice that they wanted to go first. First, Kiara shared with us her project about the San Luis Rey mission. One of her facts was that a 500 foot wall was build around the mission. Next up was Ashley, her topic was the San Diego de Alcala mission. It was really fascinating to here that it was the first mission to be built in California.

Finally its H.O.T. time!!! H.O.T. time means "homework on time". I played extreme hop-scotch just like what I played at recess. And I also got to do pull ups on the littlest bar there is (I'm still shorter than it) and Ms. Betty counted. I hope you liked reading my daily blog on Friday.

Image Credits:

Tuesday

December 2, 2008

Time to go back to school! I wonder if Mr. Kootman will remember all of our names after our nine day Thanksgiving break. Many students are almost done with their Photostory projects!
We started off our day with DOL, just like we usually do. One of the questions asked us to find the correct spelling for “cookie.” The second part of our morning work was to complete an x, y table. This is when we get an equation like y=2x+ (x+4) and we have to solve several equations.

After our morning work, we reviewed for our math test. This math test was totally different than all of our other math tests. We usually have a test on a single topic, like rounding, but our new math book, Saxon Math, tests us on many bits of different topics. Some of the questions on this test involved perpendicular and parallel. Most students thought it was an easy test.

After math, we went out to recess where kids played all different kinds of sports, including wall ball, soccer and football. Joshanda saw a teacher helping a student who was injured.
When we returned, we read “Medicine: Past and Present.” This story gave us the history of medicine and various diseases throughout time in many cultures. When we were through discussing the story, we reviewed synonyms and antonyms in our Spelling and Vocabulary Skills book. We used the SMART board to categorize different words.

When we moved into social studies, we watched the video for lesson 3.1 which was about pioneers moving into California. When the lesson was over, we summarized it out loud and clapped it shut into our brains.

Finally, we saw a BrainPop movie about “The Black Plague”, which related to our medicine story. Then Mr. Kootman gave us our drawing prizes from last week and we went home!

Photo credits:
http://images-cdn01.associatedcontent.com/image/A8209/82090/300_82090.gif
http://www.cagenweb.com/cpl/west008BB.jpg

November 17, by Jaclyn

Time to begin our day in room 40! If we get to school early we get to play for 30 minutes on the blacktop. When the bell rings we get to line up and our teacher comes and sometimes we jog,run,and skip.

Next we went into the class room and we took out our homework and our homework checkers checked it. If we don't do our homework they put our card up. Then we have to stay in for recess and Mr.Kootman would have call the people who did not do their homework. He would ask what you did not do. I only have been in there 3 times."Oh" and on Fridays we don't have extra recess time if all of our work is not done.

Then, we take out our yellow book so we can do our DOL. A "DOL" is where you look at the SMARTboard and we copy it down in our small yellow book. When we are done with DOL we check it and we do some of our homework.

After we were done we did x and y math. For example:if y=100(311+600) you would have a number like 6 so you add 100+6=106 then you would add 311+600=911 lastly you add 106+911= 1,517 so 1,517 equals y.Sometimes you get to make your own x."Oh" and Mr.Kootman gives us 5 min. Mr.Kootman tells Tory to put on the 45 sec. timer and open up to lesson 28 multiplication facts and he gives us 2 or 1 min. to finish the multiption facts.

Before we take out our hardcover math book and white board and open to page 199 and he says I do it,we do it,and you do it.Once he is done doing it we do it. Once we are done doing it Mr.Kootman points to us if we're right or wrong. Sometimes our classmates check it like Christopher and Bryce.We sometimes get our paper ready for notes or homework.

Ding,Ding,Ding time to line up for recess. Some teachers are on duty because some people don't follow the rules at recess. Some people bring a snack like Top Raman,chips,brownies,and muffins.

On the blacktop there are many fourth,fifth,and six graders. They play soccer,football,play on the playground,and they bring out a teniss ball and throw it on the wall. We only have 15 min. to play and eat. On the playground there are 4 swings,2 swirl slides,2 leaders,and a spider web were you can hang up side down on and people like to climb up yo the middle of the spider web. On the swings people get in a line and they count to 100. Then they have to get off or some people will tell the teachers. Ding,Ding,Ding time to line up says the teachers. Mr.Kootman tells us to walk down to the class and who ever is first in line they get to open the classroom door and it's a gold key.

Before we take our trimester 1 test we did Fluency.Fluency is where you get with your partner and Mr.Kootman gives us a folder with the papers you are suppossed to be reading and writing. The teacher gives us 1 min. to read. If we get a word wrong our partner puts a dot above the wrong word. Mr.Kootman put on 1 min. to read and when the timer rang we had to STOP reading and our partner put a line after the word you stopped on. We look on the side of the paper and it is in a row and the number stands for the words in that row and if you missed a few you subtract that number you read. That creates a graph for us to see our progress.

Then we took our trimester 1 test and we got our name in dark words and it came with a packet so we can see the question and on the other paper and fill in the bubble so we can get the answer right. Some people had to finish it the next day, me too.

After we are done with our test we had to go to Miss Barones class and you have to bring a small yellow book,highliter, pencil,and Comprehension and Language Arts Skills book and in writing we are writing what we are afraid of.The most people wrote about clowns. To me they are scary.

Ding,Ding,Ding "time to go to lunch"said Mr.Kootman and once we walked into the lunch room we were the first one in there and why you were walking you can smell your lunch why you were walking.We had chicken nugget and mini cheese burgers.When we went outside on the black top there were people that played soccer, football, play ground and tennis on the wall.Ding,Ding,Ding the staff tells us to line up until we see our teachers.

Once we get into the classroom we have to get our science, we walk to Miss Moore classroom that is 45.We are learning about microorganisms and we took notes that were about other germs.

After we were done with science we had to do S.S. and take out our book and we did a S.S. video and we had to build one of the 21 missions and you can do a photostory, go to missions, build a mission, and type a missions. After Mr. Kootman told us it was due Dec. 8th and we were post to go up to the classroom and tell what your mission is about.

We filled up the marble jar so we got to watch a Brainpop video and we got to take notes on the brainpop viedo and it was our first.We were taking notes on test taking notes.
Lastly we had to go home and get payed tomorrow.

Images Credits:

Thursday

October 29, by Jashanda

Everybody please be quiet! The room needs to be clean because Ms.Kepley is our student teacher and she is training to be a teacher. So she wants to be really prepared today because her teacher from her college is coming. She asked us if we could pay attention because she really wants a good grade. Her teacher came in and sat in the corner. Since Ms.Kepley's teacher was here, Ms. Kepley was mostly taking over our classroom. Her teacher never said anything, she just was writing on a piece of paper. I wonder what she was writing...
Oh would you like to hear about what we were learning about? How to make your writing interesting like starting your sentence with capitals and the rest needs to be lowercase and it needs to end with punctuation like .,?,!. Now the day starts getting better.
You want to know why it is getting better? It's because it is math time! Guess what? We are going to learn about using "Equations for Comprehension Problems" Example:5+x=9 5+x-5=9 -5x=4 Do you see the letter in this equation? This is kind of tricky because the letter looks like a multiplication sign but its really a variable. My teacher, Mr.Kootman, said he does not like using x as a variable because younow know that it looks like a x sign. Would you like to hear the problem that Mr.Kootman gave me? It was y+7 -5. If you think you can do that problem you're wrong because you don't know what y equals but in this problem. Now y equals four. So if you work that out on a piece of paper you would get six. My teacher, Mr.Kootman likes when you show your work because then he knows that you put all your hard work in it.
Well now it's time to switch in to our homework problem solving book.We only had 8 questions 7.4 page 74. After a math lesson Mr.Kootman usually let's the class do their work but we only get 10 to 15 minutes to do it then he will write it on the white board and say if you didn't finish it that is your homework. Barely anybody finishes it when Mr.Kootman says time is up. You don't want him to catch you writing down math answers during language arts.

This is what he will tell you for your first warning "I'm glad you want to do your work but not while I am teaching." Then he will say I will put 1 minute on the timer to do our reading fluency. We weren't going to read our real story after math; we were going to do the story after lunch. My partner is Teion. He usually reads first. This is how it works: he has the story that were reading all about seeds and I have the same one in my hand so when Mr.Kootman says go Tieon starts reading if he says the word wrong I but a dot another it but if he goes back and corrects himself I can erase the dot when the timer goes off. Then I have to pick up the chart of where he stopped. He did not get any wrong; it surprised me.


Well now it is time to go to Ms.Borone's class; she is new this year but she is our writing teacher. Shes always telling us to study because we are having a test this Thursday. Mrs.Barone hopes that we pass the test if we don't pass the test she will know that you did not study. Here is a reason why you should not talk in her class because she well tell you that you that you either need to give her a 20 dollar bill or a 10 dollar bill she told us if we were ready to stop fooling around and learn we only had 15 minutes left to watch a movie paragraph but she promised us that we were going to play charades only three people got to go up there and do it and those three people where Tieon, Mikaela and Miranda.

It's time for or lunch today I am going to sit by Ashley and Nalani; we all brought lunch from home I had nachos for lunch with a crunch. then Nalani went to go by snack so me and Ashly went up top for recess by the time we got up to Mrs.Betty blow the whistle and said it's time to line up Nalani came two minutes later me and Ashley thought that Nalani was going to be late when Mr.Kootman got to the top of the hill he said that I think you guy's are getting better at lining up.

Well everybody was happy that it was time for Science which is taught by Mrs.Moore. She promised us that we would get to watch a movie today because last weak it got deleted from her computer it was really funny because it was a magic school bus movie. Mrs.Moore said that you cant talk during the movie but you can whisper the movie was mostly about plant's and how they get there food and the process is called photosynthesis. it is the way plants make there food we learned that animal's cant make there food. so there called consumers did you now that people are consumers and plants are the producers. By the time Mrs.Moore said that it was time to go are classroom.

Mr.Kootman said that we need to take out our Social Studies book. He said that we were going to watch a movie about the famous sailor Juan Cabrillo. We learned that he died on the ship but his crew came back safe.

Now the day has ended and there's only one thing to say see you tomorrow.
Image credits:

October 28, by Tyler

SSSHHHH!!!!!!whew...No more fires! Today is October 28, 2008(Two days until Halloween)and this morning the class did DOL. D.O.L stands for daily oral language. We have to do five problems they are mostly easy multiplication problems.The class also did math 8.4; it was hard.

Then we read "Elias Sifuentes Restaurateur." For Halloween I am going to be a Young Marine OOOHHHRRRAAA! The class had to do a cursive worksheet on R,s & P,s.then we had a test prep. on the new over head (its called a document camera; so awesome!!!!! but it costs a lot of $$$$$$$$$$).Then we did chapter 8 lesson 5 (8.5)it was on variables like if you have 5+a=10 so a=5.

Then the class had rotations with Ms. Barone and played a game on simple sentences and compound sentences.

After that, we had LUNCH and I got a HUGE Pb&j uncrustible. Next we had recess where me and a few friends played wall ball. Wall ball is like a self ping pong table and the players are the paddles. We play against a wall and if you drop the ball or you get hit with the ball (even the most weird places like the toe NO EXCEPTIONS)then you have to touch the wall before somebody throws the ball. If the ball hits the wall and the umpire(the last out of five players) can call safe or an out if a out is called the person called out is the umpire.

Image credits:
http://www.iraqwarnews.net/11-04-07j.jpg
http://files.leagueathletics.com/Images/Club/1295/Wall%20Ball%202.JPG

Wednesday

October 22, by Chris

Ah man! Guess what? Its school today,At 8:45 we,start the morning with D.O.L., which stands for daily oral language. During D.O.L.,we corrected sentences and had to check for punctuation. I had some mistakes too.

Afterwards, we started our math book called ''Daily Routines and Problem Solving''. The class learned to do division. When we finished, we were a bit too loud and had our marbles taken away. Our marbles are in a jar in the classroom and if we get over the line we get thirteen drawings and three Brainpop movies. Today, we made it over the line and got to see Frankenstein. We learned that story came from a bigger book written by Mary Shelly. In the movie, a scientist named Drake Frankenstein, was obsessed with the secrets of nature to create a monster of human life. He intends for it to be beautiful, but it turns out ugly and the villagers mistreat him. When that was over, some went to recess and some went outside to work. Everybody wanted some of my Top Roman noodles.

Following recess, we read our Open Court book story ''Starting a Business ''. I, A.K.A hot shot, forgot my book. Then I had to share with my friend, Jesus.

Once we finished, we switched to Mrs. Barone's class. There we practiced writing a letter. When my class got back it was time for lunch. I had chicken, because my mom requested that I get it.

When we finished lunch, we went to science class. We leaned how plants make sugar. Then we went into social studies. We learned about a Spanish explorer named Jaun Cabrillo. We learned he was the first to explore San Diego. Then, we took a test. We had questions such as, "Name three dangers of sailing the California coast."

Then, we read our class story Room One by Andrew Clements. Room One is about a girl named April. Her mother Alexis, her brother and her had a man following them. Afterwards, we went into math mode. We did a lot of division and I had to go outside. Finally, we went home.

Friday

Jordyn's October trip to Hollywood

Lights! Camera! Action!
I'm going to HOLLYWOOD! Ya! I got a whole week of school off. But, before we pack up the car I have to do a big piece of math, my mom gave me a choice of to do the 3 times tables or daily routines 6.1 - 6.5. I chose 6.1 -6.5. It was mostly multiplication and division...BORING! I think during your recess I was setting up my car, BUMMER. Well at least my sister got to take care of Alaina (my other sister) Peeu!

After I'm done with my homework we went to Hollywood. When we passed the back gate my mom looked back at me and said why don't you do algebra. I went into shock when she gave me algebra; she did something like 35.x =280 but much larger.

On the way to Hollywood I saw a tar hole that had a fake elephant. Wow, what do you know? There was a tar museum. My mom and dad were surprised that military was free! We first saw a saber tooth cat that turned alive and dead. Did you know that saber tooth cats are not lions?

In the museum there was a glass that filled with tar and there were some strong, metal handles we got to see how tough it was to escape from a tar pit. It was so cool because there was a saber tooth cat attacking a land sloth that had sound affects. There was a clear room that had museum worker working on a thigh of a land sloth and it was gigantic thigh bone compared to mine. Finally we got to the end of the museum. When we got outside my sister (Jenna) saw that there were saber tooth cat footprints on the sidewalk.

YES!!!!!! We finally we arrived at Hollywood! My dad put 4 quarters in the parking meter which was 1 hour to see all the stars. We walked a long way to see Walt Disney's star, Harry Potter's and his friends hand prints as well as Shirley Temple's too. We got to see Spiderman, Darth Vader, and the Pirates of the Caribbean crew. Thank you for reading my blog.

Image Credits:

October 9, 2008

Oh no there is a fire help! Help! Anyway I'm at my school, Mary Fay Pendleton. My name is Myleigh.

Is that a science test? Oh no who likes tests? Boohoo for us because we did not do reading, however, we did go to writing with Mrs. Barone. In writing, we did charades. I think it was so much fun because, we were doing good and not talking. We were not talking during charades because when you play, you can't talk so you just move your body to act out the words instead of talking.
After writing, we went to lunch and then to recess, it was pretty fun. Do you like recess?

When we got inside we did S.S. We had a quiz to help us with our big test. The quiz was about-the regions of California. The four regions are, desert, coast, valley and mountains. I think everyone did really well because they all had big smiles on their face and bragged about their test. Most cheerrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrd and, yipped, and screamed it was a wonderful day. Now it's time to go home and we will be back tomorrow to start a new day.

Image credits:
http://imet.csus.edu/imet7/womack/sunwomanwebquest/Photos/CaRegionMapbig.jpg

Tuesday

September 30, 2008- by Andrew

Today was pretty good because we got off to a good start. Sometimes we have to go back outside if we are too loud. We started to get out our homework so that the homework checkers could check our homework. As soon as we were done getting out our homework we took out our d.o.l(daily oral language)as quick as lighting. After that we got out our daily routines book (math book) well mostly because Mr. Kootman turns off the projector so we can't see the d.o.l. We also got out our homework book.

When we were done with those books we went to our hard cover math book. We learned how to do expressions with parentheses (5+7)-4=8. After we were done with that we went outside for recess. When we got back in from recess we started reading in our Open Court book. The story was called Two Tickets To Freedom.

As soon we were done with our book we went over to Miss.Barone's class room which is writing class. When we were done with that we went to class but we had some difficulty getting out the door because everyone was talking. But we finally got out the door and got into the cafeteria and ate some NACHOS!!!and BEAN and CHEESE BURRITOS!!!

When we were done with lunch we went to Miss. Moore's classroom for science which is pretty interesting, to me. When we where done with science we went to our home room with Mr.Kootman for social studies to learn the terms urban area,suburban area and rural area. Urban area is a place to where there are a whole bunch of tower's big buildings with homes inside it. Suburban area is an area just outside a city. Rural area is an area with farms and houses. Here is a photo of a rural area.

Image Credits:

http://mylittlehomepage.net/images/amerika_peru_landwirtschaft.jpg

Monday

September 25, 2008- by Ashley

Happy birthday Jodie! How old are you today?

We started the day off with some D.O.L.Then we did Daily Routines lesson 4.4. Daily Routines is review in one of our math workbooks.Then, we went to the hard cover math book.The lesson that the whole class learned was Subtracting Across Zeros. This is when you get a problem that looks like this: 1000- 525. You have to regroup from another column.

RECESS!!!!I had some Cheetos, Doritos, Popcorn, and a piece of Wonka chocolate.YUM!!!!! When we came back inside, we read Mae Jemison a biography by Gail Sakurai. After that, we went to Miss.Barone's class. While we were in Miss.Barone's we took a quiz about time and order words. Some examples of time and order are: today, then, first, before, after that and finally. LUNCH!!!! For lunch I had Little Cesar's pizza, grapes, and milk. LUNCH RECESS!!! Me,Nalani,and Katelyn played "I Spy Myleigh".


Science time!!!! Today in science we (the class) did some things on the back of our homework sheet like: the class drew a flower on the back of our homework sheet.Then, we named all the important jobs that the following parts of the plants provide.For example,the stem helps the plant stand up right. Next,there's the roots which collect the nutrients from the soil. Finally,there's the leaf which produces chlorophyll from sunlight.

Next,we had to go to our own classroom again. When we went back to our class, we did social studies. In social studies we learned how settlers decided where to live. BELL RING!!!! Time to go home!!!! After school I have to go to a program called MCCS. Me, Nalani, Ariel, and Lorenzo go to MCCS to play,eat and do homework there. Sometimes it's fun there sometimes it's not!

Tuesday

September 23, 2008- by Joshua

Today was great because we went to an assembly and the person who was talking to us said we(the 4th, 5th and 6th students) can fund raise,to get more:soccerballs,footballs,and other fun stuff. We started the day by doing Daily Oral Language and Daily Routines.The Daily Oral Language is the classes morning work that has 5 problems and the Daily Routines is also morning work that has at least ten problems. To me they're not very hard.

After recess, the class learned how to round when the problem asks you to round where there isn't a number, like this one: "Round to the thousands place: 947" so when that happens, you have to realize there is really a zero in the thousands place. You'll have to see if the number to the right is 5 or more or 4 or less.

After math, we rotated to writing and we started to order sentences for a long period of time. Then we finished early so our writing teacher Miss.Barone let us play charades. I found out that my friend was trying to act out as a person from a movie called "Men in Black". After writing class we went to lunch resses and the class got there late. After we ate we played "You Cant Touch the Ground Tag.

Today we reviewed a science test and I think I did pretty good although I don't know yet, but on Friday I will know how I did.

Image Credits:
http://wyoming5.21publish.com/pub/wyoming5/betagolec/help3.gif

Thursday

September 17, by Nalani

FIRE ALARM BEEP!!!!! We started off by getting our homework. Then we got out our D.O.L. That means Daily Oral Language. D.O.L helps you with with writing and reading. I like D.O.L because I like writing. Next is my favorite subject in school, MATH. Daily Routines 3.3 was easy for me. It is very fun too.

In math we also did Lesson 3, "Estimating Sums and Rounding." Estimating sums is when you add numbers together: 501 + 62 then round it to any digit. 501 becomes 500 and 62 becomes 100 if you round to the hundreds.

Reading is fun. What we're doing is reading in our Open Court Reading book. "Escape" is the story we read. Its from a bigger book called Charlotte's Web. Escape is about a pig that lives in a little pen; the pig's name is Wilbur. He is a small pig that has no one to play with. Next, we went to recess. For recess I had a PB and J sandwich.

After that there was a BEEP!!! A fire alarm went off, but don't worry it was not a real fire. I was scared because the fire alarm was very loud.
Today for lunch there was popcorn chicken and teriaki chicken with rice. For a drink there was milk and chocolate milk too. We were the first ones to get lunch.

After the bell rang we came inside and read the book Escape. We usually do science with Mrs.Moore and we do social studies with Mr.Kootman. But, we did not do science or social studies today because it was a short day.
I was not here after lunch because I was at chorus and band.The music teacher is Ms.Stephan. I play the clarinet which is long and black too.

image credits:
http://tn3-2.deviantart.com/fs11/300W/i/2006/169/e/7/Chocolate_Milk_by_ync. hhttp://static.howstuffworks.com/gif/recipes/100370160_pb-j-sandwich-cake-recipe.jpg ttp://ec1.images-amazon.com/images/P/B000J3FBP2.01._SS500_SCLZZZZZZZ_V36353101_.jpg,
http://ec1.images-amazon.com/images/P/B000J3FBP2.01._SS500_SCLZZZZZZZ_V36353101_.jpg

Tuesday

September 15, 2008- by Hunter

Do you know what a clues chart is? Read on to find out. In math we did rounding to the hundreds place. In reading we did vocabulary and definitions and we did our clues chart. A clues chart is a hand where you have to find the title,genre,author,key vocab and picture clues. The purpose of making a clues chart is prereading. This helps us to get some good background about the story.
In writing we did the four main things in a sentence like capitalization and punctuation. It also has to make sense and has to have a subject and a predicate and if it has less then six words it could be a sentence or it could not be a sentence.

For recess I played basketball,the score was 6-4. I played really well because I ate a good snack and I made all the baskets. But, at lunch recess Kaylee, Teion, Lucky and I all were beat by 7 six graders.

In science we had to write our four science vocabulary words, pictures and definitions. In social studies we did line of longitude, line of latitude, Equator and the Prime Meridian. For lunch I had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. The reason I had to get peanut butter and jelly was because I owed lunch money. My lunch was really good, it was so Yummy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! At the end of the day we did page 10 of our CLAS book (our comprehension and language arts skills book). Today we did not get to read our class chapter book Room One.

Mr. Kootman is a really fun teacher. If you think 4th grade is easy, well its not. It is sometimes challenging because all of those subjects I just told you about like social studies, math, writing, science and reading all get more difficult in 4th grade.

I hope you like Mr.Kootman if you get him as a teacher. Mr.Kootman has above the line chart and below the line chart. The chart makes you a better student and if you are below the chart you are not responsible. If you are above the line you are not a bad student. Mr.Kootman has a chart that says "If you don't have time to do it right,you must have time to do it over!"

Image Credits:
http://tbn0.google.com/images?q=tbn:WR8c8qgSnKBwXM:http://www.edwardsheerien

http://www.phase1sports.com/siteadmin/video/basketball3va.jpg

Monday

September 11, 2008- by Lorenzo

A moment of silence please.... It's Sept 11 2008! Once we got into the class we took our homework out. After a while we stood up for silence for the people who died for us during acts of terrorism. Then we had Marines do a flag presentation and we walked around the neighborhood.

After that, we did math and we leaned how to round to the millions. For example step 1 find the place you round to, then underline it. Step 2 look to the right of the underlined digit and draw an arrow. Step 3 Five or more raise the score, four or less down is best. Step 4 fill in the rest. that's how to round.

After math, it was time for recess. At recess I played in the sandbox with my friend Diego, we built a sand castle. This sand castle was the best castle because me and my best friend Diego made it. Before we knew it, it was time to line up and go inside. When we got inside we went to the awesome book fair. I didn't buy anything because I didn't see anything I liked there. After that we went back to the classroom and got back to work right away.

When we got back, we started to read Sarah Plain and Tall. This book is about a girl that's mother dies and her dad puts an ad into the newspaper for a new wife. Then a woman replies and writes letters to them telling them about herself and what she can do around the house. So she comes for 1 month to visit. We didn't have time to read the rest because we had to go to lunch. I brought a lunch from home and, I had a ham sandwich with Kool-Aid for a drink. That's all I had for lunch. yum!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! That was a great lunch.

When we were done everyone went to lunch recess. For that recess I played in the sandbox again with Diego. We made a mini fort with our hands. That was very fun! The bell was about to ring so went to line and Mr. Kootman came to pick us up. When we got back to the classroom we finished Sarah Plain and Tall. Today we didn't do science, writing, and social studies because it was back to school night. The day is now over bye.

Image credits:
http://www.irvinehousingblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/06/kool_aid_man_waving.jpg

http://www.campbellsville.edu/news/2008/images/ColorsAZ_000.jpg

September 9, 2008- by Kiara

It is the fourth week of school!!!!!!!The first thing we did was DOL. DOL is something that you have to look at the spelling to see if the spelling is right. DOL also helps our with our speech. It helps learn what adverb and adjective mean.

In math we did rounding to the nearest hundred thousand we also learned how to round to the nearest million.
Next, we did reading. We read Sarah,Plain and Tall. The book is about a boy and a girl who have no mom.The mom had died after she had the little boy.

In Mrs.Barone's class we did writing. We did an autobiography. An autobiography is when you write about yourself like if you went to a different school last year.

In Mrs. Moore's class we learned about how plants get air. They get carbon dioxide by taking it in and the air flow's though the whole plant.

In social studies we learned about the sun and the moon. We also learned about how the Earth spins on its axis.
At lunch I ate a peanut butter jelly sandwich with whole bread and a bottle of water.

Then at recess , Sii, Brianna,and I did a cheer off (Sii is in Mrs. Barone's).

We did not get to read the class chapter book because we had P.A.T time instead. P.A.T time is when you get to mostly do whatever you want, as long as we are learning.

The last thing we did was that we went home. BOO HOO!!!!

image credits:
http://www.uncommonindustries.com/images/pbj_pop_37.jpg,
http://varsity-cheerleading.stafford.northhigh.schoolfusion.us/modules/groups/homepagefiles/group_webpage/133871-398480-169.jpg
http://www.theflowerexpert.com/media/images/mostpopularflowers/roses/assorted-roses.jpg

Wednesday

September 8, 2008- by John

The weekend is over and it's a brand new week. First, we did morning work which was D.O.L. and Daily Routines chapter 2, lesson 3. Homework checkers looked at everyones homework during that time. After, we went over our morning work; we did our morning math. We learned how to round whole numbers for example: 832,743 the number 7 stays as 7 while the numbers on the right turn into 0's, but the numbers on the left stay the same. Then, we took two colum notes about rounding whole numbers.

Next, we did our spelling pretest which is 20 words long. The words that the most people missed were measles and yield. When we finished we checked our own pretest.
Afterwords, we got our homework and started on it. What you don't finish in class becomes homework like math, spelling, and vocab. Some people finish all their homework in class and there are some people that don't.

When that was done, we went to recess and played around. Some students played on the playground, some just sat around and talked to their friends, and some played different sports. When recess ended we went inside and started reading our class chapter book. Our book is called Room One. In chapter 12, Ted made a promise with April, but when Mrs. Mitchell asks what Ted was doing at the Anderson's old house Ted had made a promise with April but, April wouldn't know if Ted make a promise with his teacher that she wouldn't tell anyone so he makes a promise with his teacher that if he told her she wouldn't tell anyone and so they shook on it.

When that was over, we started getting ready to switch to Ms.Barone's writing rotation. In her class we finished our Autobiography's and drawing are portraits of us. When we got out of Ms.Barones we went straight to lunch. For lunch we had hot dogs, PB&J, and breaded cheese sticks. When that was over we went up top to the playground and started to play football with each other.

When the bell rang we lined up and waited for Mr.Kootman to take us back to the room. Afterwords, we went straight to Mrs. Moore's for our science rotation. Our subject was on What Plants are. We also did two column notes on our subject.

Next we went back to our home room and started on social studies. We learned about Latitude, Longitude, and the Equator. The Equator is what splits the earth in half. Once that was done we started collecting our homework and packing up. Before we left we got our clues chart and vocab ready so we can take it home. We can't do our clues chart without our Open Court text book. Finally, we lined up and walked to the front and we all went home.

Image Credits: http://inkeehong.com/articles/image/Clements_Room_One_2006_HC.jpg , http://strick4life.files.wordpress.com/2006/10/superstock_106-580a_bhands-holding-football-with-blue-background-posters.jpg , http://www.learner.org/jnorth/images/graphics/mclass/Lat.gif

Monday

September 4, 2008- by Katelyn

It took us two times to start our Thursday on the right foot. Because we were being seriously loud which caused an effect, which is Mr.Kootman told us to go outside,line up QUIETLY ,and go back into the classroom. When that process was over we started our DOL which is our daily oral language. This is usually, capitalizatiom, punctuation and spelling practice. Afterwards, we started a new subject, math. For today's math we did pages: 25-27, "Order Whole Numbers.''

After a while of learning we went to morning recess, which was like fifteen minutes long. Following, Mr.Kootman read, Room One by: Andrew Clements. The chapter that we listened to was about how Ted brought more food to April and April introduced her family to Ted. She gives him the opportunity to see the inside of the suspicious house April lived in. Next, we switched classes to Mrs.Barone's (she usually will teach us about writing) and she helped us do our own autobiographys to hang up in our classroom for next week's open house .

Later we came back to class and read our Open Court Reading book. Our story for this week is called,"Toto." Toto is about a boy named Suku and a young elephant, Toto. Toto always wanted to see where the river ends and so he goes past where his mother told him where they do not want to go ever. Toto ends up in a poachers trap and his foot gets stuck. On to Suku; his mother tells him to go get reeds from the river but on the way there he finds Toto stuck in the snare so Suku helps Toto. Suku takes him back to Toto's herd but on the way there they run into a lion. They are startled. Until Toto gets in the "getting ready to attack mode " and he trumpets. Next thing you know Toto's herd is there to rescue him and Suku's family arrives to rescue him. Everything in the story is now where it belongs.

After reading Toto it was time for lunch! Everyone was hungry! The choice for lunch was: macaroni & cheese or BBQ rib sandwich! Yum! I of course choose macaroni! When we were dismissed we went to recess! Most of the girls in our class and a lot of other girls in other classes played "Little Sally Walker" which is a certain dancing game. A while later we came back to the classroom and got ready to switch classes again. We switched to Mrs.Moore's. When we got to her class she taught us about leaves. We got to describe and touch different leaves. We all got to touch: soft , waxy, bumpy, and thorny leaves! That was fun.


Next we returned to class and Mr. Kootman taught us some social studies. After social studies we watched a Brain Pop movie about antonyms. Then Mr.Kootman did quite a lot of raffles! Finally it was time to go home.

Image Credits: http://www.logoi.com/pastimages/img/lion_4.jpg , http://greergardens.com/images/Ferns/2005Ferns.jpg , http://www.greenexpander.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/10/african-bush-elephant.jpg

Friday

September 3, 2008- by Monique




It is the second week of school, and everything is going great. In writing we learned about Analogies. An Analogy is something like this: Blue is to ocean as brown is to mud. They get easier when you get the hang of them. We also did our D.O.L, which stands for Daily Oral Language. Afterwards, we switched to Math. We learned about Place Value, Expanded Notation, and we had a Math Test, which had only 20 problems. It was divided into four pages, which probably intimidated some people in the room. When we are done with our Math Test, Mr.Kootman lets us get a book from his library, which has a lot of classic choices. We corrected our Math Test after everybody was finished, and almost EVERYBODY had some mistakes in their seemingly corrected test. It was pretty funny. A few minutes later, we went to recess. Some of us went to the picnic tables to eat, while some of us went up to the blacktop to run around. However, we only got 15 minutes. All of us rushed to our lines as fast a rabbit could run. Mr.Kootman picked us up at the blacktop where we were quietly waiting for him.

When we entered the room, Mr.Kootman told us to take out our reading books to talk about and read the story, "Toto." The story was about a boy and a baby elephant named Toto. Toto had lost his mom by wandering off too far. A trap caught Toto's foot, and the boy frees him. However, Toto does not leave the boy alone, so the boy had to lead Toto back to his habitat. The whole thing took place in the grassy plains in Africa. We talked about it for so long that we only heard 47 seconds of the story. Then it was time for lunch. The whole class lined up on the railing, and the WHOLE line took up almost half of the elevated concrete, and it was confusing to find what side the end was.

The cafeteria was very crowded, and loud too. It was as if we were being crammed into a box with a bunch of barking dogs. The benches were small as well, it was hard to find a spot, but everybody found one, eventually. After about 15 minutes, our table was dismissed, and we went to Lunch Recess. I spent my time just walking around, but the others, they ran and played on the swings; they went everywhere. Time just flew by without us knowing. The bell rang, and we had to go back to our lines. As soon as we sat down at our desks, we finished off "Toto", then read a chapter of Room One. Ted brought food to April, who has no money, and lives with her mom and brother. Ted had bought a ton of bizarre food to give to them. We couldn't see why they would want to eat that daily. Mr.Kootman closed the book, and turned on the projector, which showed a Brainpop page. He clicked on the hand, and the video froze. He had to restart the computer ALL over again. It took quite a while to get it working right.

The first video we saw on Brainpop was about Presidential Elections. We learned that every four years we pick a new president to be in charge of our country. You have to be at least 18 to vote, and you have to be at least 35 to run for president, you also have to be naturally born in the United States to run. There are two Major Political Parties: The Democratic Party, and the Republican party. Each Political party has their own symbol to represent them. For the Democrats, they have a Donkey as their symbol, and the Republicans have an Elephant as their symbol. These are known as the Democratic Donkey and the Republican Elephant. There are lesser parties, but they never win Presidential Elections. They may win Mayor, though. The race starts with tons of people who want to be president. The people who win move on, but the others lose. Then it all comes down to two candidates. One Republican, and one Democrat. The two candidates battle it out in a series of speeches. The one who wins that struggle gets to be president. Voting can be hard for some people because its hard to choose between the candidates. Some people are nervous to see how it turns out, while some people are confident in the people they voted for.

The second video we saw was about Synonyms, Homonyms, and Antonyms. A Synonym is a word that means the same thing. For example: Beautiful=Pretty. The list goes on. A Homonym is a word that is spelled the same as another, but means something else. An Antonym is a word that is the opposite of a word. For example: Up=Down. At the end of the day we had drawings. About half of us won something. Finally, we took a Spelling Pretest, and then we went home.

Image Credits: http://www.wordgames.de/Bilder/advanced/synonyms.jpg,
http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/staticfiles/NGS/Shared/StaticFiles/animals/images/primary/african-elephant2.jpg

Wednesday

August 30, 2008 by Kaylee



WOW!!!!!!! It's already the 4th day of school in 4th grade!!! Today we started off with math 1.5. That is problem solving on expanded notation and place value. We also did a review test. Some of it was hard while other poroblems were very easy. But, since I like math for me it was easy!!!! But some of the questions were a little hard.

After that it was already recess. At recess I played with Miranda,Jodie, and Jaclyn. We all played tag, but during the game I never got tagged.
When the bell rang, it was time to line up and go back to class. When we came back,we started to read Mrs.Frisby and the Crow in our OPpen Court book. In the story, Mrs.Frisby goes out to find Timothy (her son) some medicine. On her way back to where she lives she finds a crow that is tied to a fence and is pecking at a string constantly. She decided to help him and they esccaped from the sharp-toothed cat.

By the time we were almost done, it was time for lunch. For lunch I had a sandwich, juice and a couple of Oreos. At lunch recess I played with just Jodie. All we did was walk around. The bell rang so we went to the line and went back to work when we got to class.

We had no time to read our class chapter book, so we finished up the Open Court Reading book. For the rest of the day we learned all of the nouns and described all of them. A noun is a person, place, thing or idea. The bell rang so it was time to pack up and go home. And that was the great 4th day of school.

Photo credits:
http://www.freewebs.com/nimhster/C_0689710682.jpg http://www.enchantedlearning.com/math/decimals/placevalue/gifs/ex.GIF

Friday

August 29, 2008

Today we met our new student teacher, Miss Kepley, for the first time. She said she will be here once every Thursday for eight weeks and then every day for eight weeks after that.
To start our day, we did DOL and math. In DOL, we did correcting sentences and synonyms. In math, we star
ted with our Daily Routines, which is just review work.

After our morning work, we opened our math book to lesson 1.4, which was on expanded notation. Expanded notation is when you take a number like 10,523 and make it 10,000 + 500 + 20 + 3.

Throughout the day, we took notes for this blog. This is the prewriting stage of the writing process. Mr. Kootman says that the better the notes you take, the easier it is to write the blog the next day.

D
uring lunch, Tyler got hurt and went home. Boo hoo! After lunch, we read Room One. In this chapter, Ted brought food to April, who is homeless and has little money.

Then, we learned about SLANT, which reminds us to sit up, listen, and focus on the teacher. Lastly, we learned how to properly throw a tennis ball. One thing we have to remember is to face sideways from where we want to throw, also we need to lean back and shift our weight. Mr.
Kootman challenged us to hit him from far away and two of us did! That was the end of our fourth day of fourth grade.

image credits:
http://pro.corbis.com/images/RF243349.jpg?size=572&uid=%7B9EEB98A6-8010-4D2A-8A7F-643AE22C01B7%7D
http://www.kwiznet.com/images/questions/grade4/expanded_notation.gif