Sunday
December 15, by Ashley
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
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 science. 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
Afterwards , me, Jena, Nina, and Caylee played extreme 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.
Tuesday
December 2, 2008
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
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.
Thursday
October 29, by Jashanda
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.
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.
October 28, by Tyler
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
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.
http://i.inhaps.com/frankenstein_painting.jpg
Friday
Jordyn's October trip to Hollywood
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.
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.
Image Credits:
October 9, 2008
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.
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
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
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".
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
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
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.
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.
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
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
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
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
Wednesday
September 8, 2008- by John
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.
Monday
September 4, 2008- by Katelyn
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.
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
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
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
To start our day, we did DOL and math. In DOL, we did correcting sentences and synonyms. In math, we started 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.
During 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