Our first day of Book Clubs was this past Wednesday, and I'm happy to report that it was a success! The kids seem really into their books, and they're doing a great job of assigning themselves a fair number of chapters to read by next Wednesday. It's awesome to see them excited about reading and talking about reading, and the breakfast treats definitely didn't hurt either...

We've shifted our focus to characters in fiction, and how we can infer character traits based on what a character says, does, and thinks. In past years, I've noticed that kids tend to use the same traits again and again--nice, mean, funny, brave. So this year, I'm trying something new: character trait of the day. So far, we've added the words imaginative, considerate, optimistic, pessimistic, and rational to our vocabulary. In addition, we've discussed the difference between character traits and physical traits, and this upcoming week, we'll differentiate between a character's traits and character's feelings. In writing, I introduced various strategies for starting off a narrative with an engaging lead, referred to as a 'hook'. We looked at some samples of popular books and how authors hooked the reader using dialogue, onomatopoeia, description, a question, etc., and students brainstormed a bunch of different hooks for their own writing.

It was a pleasure meeting so many parents during our Open House on Thursday. It was wonderful to hear some of the positive things kids are saying about their fourth grade experience thus far, and I'm hopeful that we'll get an even bigger turn out for conferences.

Our Bucket Fillers for the week were Julie and Lila. Julie is so bright. She's a great writer, and I love how she internalizes what we discuss in class. I can tell she's paying attention and soaking in the vocabulary words we cover, because she is able to naturally weave them into classroom discussions days later. Lila is also fabulous. She's such a sweet girl, always eager to help others when in need. I frequently notice her supporting her classmates, and I know that her motivation for doing so isn't getting recognition, but rather, she's just a genuinely kind girl. I love that!