The kids got a lot of practice typing this week, as we spent a whole lot of time on the Chromebooks. We did our character trait project in reading. The students typed up essays based on a character in a fiction book of their choice. They then created word clouds using the website www.wordclouds.com. They turned out really neat and I'm looking forward to hanging them up in the hallway. I had my homeroom in the afternoons this week, and we typed up our personal narratives. Our focus for this writing was strong beginnings for stories and showing rather than telling what's happening in the story. In comparison to their summer writings, the students have shown great improvement in both areas!

Below are a few pictures from the Harvest Festival that the school held on Thursday. There are also some pictures of my homeroom learning from some fifth graders. Miss Bougas, the 5th grade teacher, is a good friend of mine and invited us in to her classroom so that her students could present some writing strategies to us. They did a great job!

Our Bucket Fillers this week were Tommy and Shane. Tommy is such a nice kid. I have been looking forward to being his teacher for years now, since I was his older brother Daniel's teacher for two years. Tommy is always smiling and kind to his classmates; it must run in the family! Shane worked really hard on his personal narrative this week. He really tried to incorporate more details into his writing and took all my feedback seriously. Nice job boys!

It was a three day week for students...and I have zero pictures! I totally dropped the ball this week in the photography department. That's okay though. We spent Monday revising and reflecting on our fiction tests that we took last week. Students received their tests back with a score based on their revisions in their Friday folders. They're expected to review my feedback and bring them back in signed by a parent/guardian. On Wednesday we finished Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing and students were given an optional project due in a few weeks. There are a few choices of what they can do for the project; many students in the past have chosen to create a board game based on the book. Again, it is completely optional and worth up to three extra homework stars. On Wednesday I also introduced our culminating assignment for the fiction unit, which we started on Thursday. For this assignment students are writing an essay based on a character in a fiction book of their choice. They will then create a visual to represent their character using a program called Wordle. I've used the program before and I can't wait for the students to experiment with it.

Our Bucket Fillers of the week were Lydia and Laura. Both girls rocked the fiction test. They both worked really hard when we took the test, and then reviewed my feedback carefully to revise them and make them even stronger. I'm so proud of them!

What a week! Between our field trip on Monday and Heritage Week, it was very eventful. I had an awesome time on our field trip to the Tsongas Industrial History Center. Unfortunately we had to split into two groups, so I didn't get to spend much time with Mrs. O'Keefe's homeroom. For that reason, just about all my pictures from the field trip are of my homeroom. Our group's guide was named Hugh and he was great. We got to participate in an engineering challenge, ride on a trolley, and explore mills. I was so proud of my students. They were engaged, polite, and well-behaved. I can't wait to take them on more field trips! For Heritage Week, we decorated flags, shared about our cultures, and enjoyed food from different countries such as Brazil and Italy. Eleanor's mom came in to my homeroom to share pictures and stories about Scotland. One of the days, students were invited to dress up to represent their heritage. I wore a shirt with a big shamrock on it to represent Ireland. Check out the photo below of Ariana D. and Jessica. They look fabulous!

We took our first reading test on Thursday and Friday of this week. Our fiction unit isn't over, we still have about a week and a half left. But the test will give me an idea of where students are in the unit and what I need to reteach.

Our Bucket Fillers of the week were April and Isadora. It was April's birthday on the day of our field trip! I'm so glad her mom got to be one of the chaperones and spend the day with her. April worked really hard on her test this week, I was impressed. Isadora also has done a great job in our fiction unit. She has mastered character traits! Nice job ladies :)

Our first field trip is right around the corner! We are headed to the Tsongas Industrial History Center in Lowell for an exciting engineering program. I sent home a reminder in the students' Friday Folders. Students need to bring their lunch in a paper bag (unless they indicated they want school lunch) and should bring a jacket in case it rains. The forecast is looking better, so hopefully we'll avoid showers, but regardless most of the time will be spent indoors! Next week is also Diversity Week at the Kennedy. To kick off the week, we had an assembly where a bunch of students shared a little about their heritage. Our very own Bianca was one of those students, check out the photo below.

We started writing responses in our fiction unit. We're writing about characters and what traits we'd use to describe them. These responses include a central idea (a complete sentence with the title of the story, character's name, and traits), specific evidence from the text (what the character did, said, or thought that revealed the trait), and an explanation of how that evidence shows that trait. Our biggest hurdles have been differentiating between character traits and a character's feelings, expanding our character trait vocabulary, and explaining our evidence in our responses. We'll continue working on these areas over the next few weeks.

Our Bucket Fillers of the week were Ariana D. and Pedro. Ariana has really stepped it up in terms of homework and she's been trying hard in our character unit. Pedro is a great writer and reader, and has been having a successful year so far in ELA.

Another beautiful October week! I love it. In our fiction unit, we're reading Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing and exploring character traits. We're paying attention to what characters do, say, think, and feel, and what that reveals to us about the character. Luckily Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing has some really strong characters, so it's easy to apply this focus to the book. We'll start writing responses about characters next week, which will eventually lead us to a project on a character from a book of choice. In writing, we talked about writing hooks to start off our personal narrative in order to engage our readers. We looked at some samples of popular books and how authors hooked the reader using dialogue, onomatopoeia, vivid verbs, a question, etc. In social studies, we did more US geography practice and retook the states quiz from the beginning of the year. Everyone showed immense improvement! In a few weeks we'll start a road trip across the US project.

Our Bucket Fillers of the week were Bianca and James. Bianca is a pro at annotating texts. She also has such a positive attitude and works hard. James is a pro at the states...and capitals! We raced on one of the state capitals games on my website and he was able to get a faster time than me! Go James :)

We've been really taking advantage of the weather lately. I've brought the kids outside to the front lot for social studies, writers workshop, and a mindfulness activity. We did what's called a Rainbow Walk. We went for a walk around the school in a line in complete silence. As we walked, every 45 seconds or so I would say a color. The students had to direct their focus on finding things that were only that color, attempting to mentally block out the other colors and other thoughts. We then came back into the classroom and reflected on our experience. It was a cool idea that was very relaxing. I'm trying to incorporate mindfulness into my classroom a few times a week after lunch. Students can return from lunch and recess a little riled up, so it's important to calm ourselves down before getting some more work done in the afternoon.

Our Bucket Fillers for the week were Will and Ava C. Will has done a nice job adding description and details into his writing, as well as learning his states and capitals. Ava is such a pleasure to have in class. She gets along with everybody and works hard. Looking forward to having lunch with the two Avas tomorrow!

Spirit Week was a success! We decorated our door, reminisced on Kennedy memories, and dressed up in a variety of different themes. One day was Kennedy pride, another was crazy hat/sock day, Thursday was Patriots pride day, and Friday was wear your workout gear. Jayden and I wore the same shirt on Kennedy pride day, check out the photo below! :) Wednesday was a half day so we spent a large portion of the day doing a STEAM activity. This activity involved students working in groups to build a rollercoaster using card stock paper and masking tape. It was neat to see what the students came up with!

In ELA this week we started to explore figurative language and character traits. In social studies we continued learning the states. Some students have already learned the states and the capitals, which is amazing! We'll spend a few more weeks focused on the states and capitals, and then we'll move on to a "road trip across the U.S." project.

Our Bucket Fillers this week were Ronan and Henry. Ronan always makes me smile. He's worked hard on his homework this week and I'm really proud of him. Henry also does a great job on his homework. He's just such a nice kid and gets along with everyone. I love being their teacher!