Mrs. Drzayich's Class: Week 24

Here's what we did this week:

F.E.V.E.R. Not as in I'm running a temperature, but as in I've got the social skills fever! F.E.V.E.R. is an acronym we've used to help us remember "Body Basics" - what to do with our bodies while we're talking to someone in order to communicate effectively.

         F - face the person
         E - eye contact
         V - voice: not too loud, not too quiet
         E - expression: the look on our face should match what we're saying or feeling
         R - relax: our posture should be nice and relaxed.

Here are some videos of our students trying it out:

Rock on! We're continuing our science unit on rocks and minerals. We've learned about igneous, sedimentary and metamorphic rocks and the rock cycle. Next week we'll compare different rocks we see and try to categorize them.

Is it real? We've continued our fiction focus, with an emphasis on fantasy vs. realistic fiction. We've focused a bit on retelling stories, making sure we talk about the events in order. We've also discussed characters, setting, problems, solutions - this is perfect for a lot of goals for all students in our class. My orange group 4th graders - don't forget that your book report is due next Friday!

Some Spanish guitar. Although we do music somewhat irregularly, this week we actually did it. We are focusing this year on how music is different in different parts of the world. This week we talked about Spain. We learned where it was on the map, talked about how their famous for their guitar music and even listened to some Spanish guitar music. Then we had kids try to replicate the songs on our nifty GarageBand App.

A little catch and throw. In P.E. we're continuing a unit on catching. This is great because, in order for us to practice our catching, someone needs to be practicing their throwing, too! Try practicing this with your students at home.

What makes purple? On Valentine's Day last week we did a fun following directions worksheet that brought something tragic to my attention--I discovered that many students in our class did not know how to combine primary colors to make secondary colors. So today in art we did just that. We each used finger paints to create our own color wheel. Mixing the paints together helped them see how yellow and blue work together to make green. Then we got really tricky and I asked them questions like, Name an animal that is the color of red and yellow combined. They caught on really quickly. I think we will spend a few more art projects working on this though before we move on to something else.

Just a note:

I know around Christmas I said I was going to create an electronic giving tree of sorts. Unfortunately, I didn't. But there are a few items we could use in our classroom if any of you have some you'd be willing to donate:

snacks

dry erase markers

kleenex

band-aids

You all do so much to support us and keep our classroom running - I can't thank you all enough.

Homework Heroes: