Miss Michael's Fourth Grade Class at Fiske

      During Writer's Workshop we've been delving into the genre of persuasive writing.  The students have learned about the elements of an effective persuasive piece, and the importance of knowing both sides of the issue by addressing the pros and cons.  The students are working to develop a five paragraph essay with a powerful and engaging introduction, three paragraphs featuring main reasons/claims along with supporting evidence, and a conclusion that leaves a lasting impression in the form of a call to action, a now or never statement, or a reinforcement of their most significant claim. 

     As persuasive writing is a more structured genre, the students have been utilizing various graphic organizers to plan.  Band wagon techniques, purposeful language, and the importance of data, statistics, expert testimony, and facts are being stressed as a means to share their point of view and perhaps change someone else's through the power of their writing.  As a result, it's important for the students to have a clear understanding of their audience to achieve their goal.
 

Social Studies                                                                          

     The students recently viewed a DVD series on North American regions in which they traveled across the United States learning about the Northeast, Southeast, Midwest, Southwest, and West.  These engaging DVDs shared the physical landforms, history, culture, climate, and states of each region.  The students worked in their interactive notebooks to take notes on each region and responded to their learning by creating postcards, T-shirt designs, cartoons, etc. 

    Recently, the students worked in small groups to create giant big maps of North America on foam boards.  Each group's map features different information such as rainfall, population, growing season, physical, natural resources, and land use.  The students have been painting their maps and creating symbols to identify important features particular to their group's map.  We will be using these giant maps to compare and contrast regions of North America and observe and discuss how landforms, climate, rainfall, and growing seasons of North America impact land use and population.