Our Heroes!

Each year, the fourth graders at Asa Adams do a hero unit in Language Arts. In reading, we break into small groups and read one of the following books: Lost on a Mountain in Maine, The Courage of Sarah Noble, and Abbie Burgess. As we read, we answer questions in response journals and chose words to study for vocabulary.

The writing piece of this unit is a biography of a person that each student chooses as their hero. We have a wide variety of heroes that were chosen. Some are moms, dads, uncles, pastors, and grandparents. The students have been working very diligently and through their writing, it's obvious that they respect and admire their heroes. As a culmination activity, we will invite our heroes in for a special reading of the biographies that the students composed. The date for the presentation has not been set as we're still working very hard on writing.

As a lead up to our hero unit, we read books about and discussed heroes such as Nelson Mandela, Ruby Bridges, Martin Luther King Jr., and Amelia Earhart. Since we've also been reading stories from Greek mythology, we discussed heroes such as Odysseus, Perseus, and Heracles. The students had very interesting insights about heroes. They decided that some people are heroes, some people are noteworthy, and some are just famous. We discussed character traits of heroes, as well which many of the students have also included in their biography writing.

We are very much looking forward to celebrating our heroes and will keep everyone updated as to when this celebration will take place.

Care Buddies-Part 1

Care Buddies is a partnership between two classrooms, usually the older students acting as mentors to the younger students. Our fourth grade has had the pleasure of working with the four year olds in Mrs. Lynch's Pre-K program. During our first get-together, the four year olds chose books for their Care Buddies to read to them. It was hard to tell who was having the better time, the four year olds or the fourth graders!

                                                                            

Text Connections

In reading, we have been learning about how to make connections between books we're reading to other books we've read, to ourselves, and to the world around us.

Recently, we read "The Lorax" by Dr. Seuss and discussed how, even though it seems like a silly story, it has connections to the real world.  Here are some of the connections the students made:

"In this text the Once-ler dumped all of his glumpy stuff in the pond.  That is like the great oil spill which affected thousands of sea animals' lives." -C.K.

"In this text the Bar-ba-loots go hungry because the Once-ler is cutting down the trees.  That is like some animals go hungry because people cut down all their food, like plants or trees." -E.W.

"In this text, the Lorax said, 'Your factories are polluting the air.'  That is like on the news I heard that a certain bird species is dying mostly because the air is being polluted by factories." -T.M.

"In this text, they were filling the sky with funk so the wunk birds could not sing.  That is like big factories, cars, and buses are polluting the sky."  -S.H.

"In this text, they cut down all the trees.  It is sad for all the animals that needed them to stay alive.  That is like how pandas eat and use the bamboo for their homes but people cut it down to use it for a fence or home."  -S.W.

"In this text they were smoking up the sky.  That is like from the news, we should be fuel efficient." -X.L.

"In this text, the Once-ler didn't think what would happen if he cut down a tree until it was too late.  This is like in our world, we have to think before we do something or we might do something we don't mean to do."  -N.S.

"In this text, they cut down so many trees the little bears could not live.  That is like if they cut down too many trees it will affect the food chain so most things will die." -L.G.

"In this text, the Once-ler didn't listen to the Lorax's warning.  That is like people sometimes don't listen to warnings and ignore them, even when something is really important."  -E.W.

We were surprised to find that a book with silly words and rhymes had such a deep meaning!