Welcome 2015! So Glad You're Here!

 

Celebrations have been taking place all over the world.  Everyone's excited to see the brand new "baby" year be born.  Check out some of their celebrations in all our different time zones starting with Aukland, New Zealand.  They saw 2015 first!

Everyone wants to make a difference in the new year and all of the 4th graders at Oakland will be doing just that as we finish up our Action Plans to make the world a better place.  All Action Plans are due next Friday, January 9th.  Remember we will be writing it up in class, but you need to bring your documentation (logs, photos, planning sheets, videos, etc.) as soon as you finish up at home.

Exciting things will be happening when we get back to school, that's for sure!  We will start a brand new Poetry Unit with a creative new way to write poetry called BLACKOUT Poetry.  Austin Kleon is introducing you to his idea on this video that we will watch on Monday.  It is too cool...you steal words in a newspaper article and turn them into your own original, free-verse poem! Although we will start with free verse we will study 10 different types of poetry, make a poetry notebook and have a Poetry Slam.

 

In Science we will be designing and building electric circuits.  You will be working on two types series and parallel.  Can you tell the difference? Bill Nye will get you started on a few basics here...I love Bill Nye, don't you?

 

The very first thing we will do on Monday is count our steps for the Winter Reading Challenge!  It's not too late to get with your parents and have them sign your logs for the past two weeks.  Remember we want to be the best class in 4th grade and leave Mrs. Gault's class in the dust! 68 lines per student was our goal for the 17 days of Winter Break. How close will YOU come??