Right Into the Swing of Things

We jumped right into our regular routine and got back into the swing of things now that we have a full week and no testing! Well, at least we don't have any standardized, bubble tests. Tomorrow we will all be doing our DIBELS check up, and today we took our spelling inventories. Mrs. Bair and the other teachers on our team will use this information to determine reading clinics for BEAR time and our word groups during Daily 5 time.

Our class started working on our first technology project today! We each drew a picture to show one way we can follow the Code of Conduct (did you know that Code of Conduct means promise of behavior?), and today Mrs. Bair recorded us sharing what our picture was about. Look for that video here on our blog later this week! The pictures are hanging on our cupboards to remind us about our promise.

One group brainstorming ideas for our pictures

After we finished our videos, we practice our Daily 5 and started talking about becoming professional writers although it was definitely a different start. Mrs. Bair had us try to put puzzles together, but our puzzles were missing pieces! Can you believe she would trick us like that? But she showed us how trying to put together a puzzle without all the pieces is like trying to write without all of the parts you need for a sentence. Tomorrow we're going to start learning more about those parts. This is us trying to put our puzzles together:

As if that wasn't exciting enough, we got together with Mrs. Towsen's class and continued to work on practicing our observation and inferencing skills. Did you know scientists have to use their senses and pay very close attention to details to try and figure things out? We're starting to realize that after we've spent two days working on some Mystery Boxes. Each box is wrapped, and we have no idea what's inside of it. We have to use our sight, smell, touch and hearing to figure out what we *think* is in the box. Mrs. Bair and Mrs. Towsen might reveal the contents on Thursday! Here are some pictures of us as scientists in action!

It was a busy and fun day! We can't wait to see what's in store for us tomorrow!

4-Sight Testing & Free Bear

If your child comes home tonight and tell you that we took a big test today, please don't panic! You didn't miss a homework assignment, and there was nothing to study at home. This morning we took our first 4-Sight test, a predictor test that tells us how we might expect a child to score on the PSSA. More importantly it tells us the focus areas your child needs to focus on to be successful in fourth grade. This is just one of the many measures that our team will be using to determine what skills to teach this year.

The great news is that everybody worked really hard, nobody got frustrated (which is awesome for a test like this on the 6th day of school!), and we saw some well-thought-out math strategies being used. The other great news is that after a long test we got to have our first Free Bear time today! Friends from our class tried out the foreign language club, played games in the gym, watched movies, played board games, had free choice on the computer, did crafts, and went on a nature walk around the school grounds. We all had a lot of fun, and we're excited to go next week! I am going to start using Class Dojo tomorrow so hopefully nobody will get three red marks and miss out next week!

One final note - thank you to everybody for returning your beginning of the year paperwork! The office appreciates that we all got our papers in before the due date! Please remember to bring back the blue and orange forms that were in your back to school folder. These papers will help me learn more about your child, and it also lets me know that you understand our discipline and homework policies.

Thanks again for a great first cycle! I am looking forward to MANY more!

First Week Recap

It was great to meet many of you last night at Parent Night. For those of you who weren't able to attend, I hope to be able to post the presentation here so you can at least look through the slideshow and let me know if you have any questions. Look for that sometime this weekend.

I look forward to learning about your child when you return the blue paper in your parent night folder. Also, please don't forget to return the Homework and Discipline policy, the orange paper, from that folder, too.

It has been a crazy, crazy first week! We had several stations where we learned about Bear Creek. These included stations about the school rules, the walking path, BEAR time, the cafeteria, and how to prevent bullying at Bear Creek. We also did a team building activity with our Guidance Counselors, and we've done many other team building activities to get to know each other and to start working together. These included name juggling and a make a fist game. Both of these got us thinking about how our actions affect others and how it helps to focus on words.

To make the connection between this week and next week, we started looking carefully at our Code of Conduct. We learned that means a promise of how we'll behave. Today we worked in groups to think about what each word in our Code of Conduct means. It was tricky because I wouldn't let the kids use the word NO on our posters! Next week we'll talk more about what the Code of Conduct means and create projects for the website and room.

A group talking about what it means to be responsible

Yesterday and today we switched for our first days of math! During math class we thought carefully about what we're good at and what we'd like to be better at. We also took a fact pretest, and we also did our first two spiral reviews. An important part of our first two reviews got us thinking about where people use math every day, including patterns and sizes, and strategies people can use. These are just a few of the ideas we came up with during our discussion.

We also had our first fire drill at the end of the day today. I'm sure you heard all about how LOUD our fire signal is! It definitely surprised us all!

Thank you for a wonderful first week! Enjoy your long weekend, and we will see everybody again on Tuesday! :)

A Whirlwind First Day

It was so amazing to get to meet all of my new friends today! While lockers were challenging and the building was overwhelming, everybody had a very positive attitude and did a great job. We already have some locker experts, and I think everybody will be able to do their lockers by the end of this week. :)

Each night you should look for your child's agenda and homework folder. There's no folder tonight because we didn't have any papers, but some of you will find your child's back to school paperwork in their backpack. Please make sure to complete and return those forms as soon as possible. Each child also has 10 minutes of reading homework tonight. This can be ANY type of reading: picture books, chapter books, comic books, comic strips, websites, magazines, reading with you or listening to you read, reading you the grocery list as you're shopping! Anything that gets your child reading is what we want them to read. We will talk more about this on Parent Night Wednesday evening.

I hope your child feels like they had a great first day today! I'm looking forward to meeting all of you Wednesday night.

Open House Visit

It was so great to meet our 13 friends who came to visit the classroom during Open House today. I can already tell that we are going to be a wonderful family! Here are the reasons why everybody thinks 4th grade will be amazing:

Here are a couple of notes that may be helpful for the first day of school.

• If you'd like bring a healthy snack (goldfish, pretzels, string cheese, fruit, etc.) to eat during snack time since we do not eat lunch until 12:40!
• You may bring your own pencil box, homework folder, and magnetic / non-permanent decorations for your lockers.
• You do not NEED to bring anything - we have all of the supplies you will need for the year so do not feel as though you need to go out and buy anything.

If you have any questions prior to the first day of school, please feel free to email me. I'm looking forward to seeing everybody on Monday morning!

A Look at the Bair's Den

By now you have had a tour of Bear Creek, and you may have even attended one of the orientation tours here at Bear Creek this summer. But you may still be wondering, "What's it REALLY like to be a  fourth grader in the Bair's Den?" Well, the students who were in my class last year have some answers for you! Check out the video below to get the scoop!

We hope you enjoyed the video! If you have any questions, please leave comments, and I will answer them for you!

Welcome & Special Schedule

Hi everybody, and welcome to The Bair's Den! I am looking forward to having each of you in my class, and I hope you are just as excited as I am to be starting a new adventure at Bear Creek School!

Please check back here every day, and you will be able to find out a little bit more about our classroom, see some pictures (and maybe even a video!), and find out more about what our days will be like in The Bair's Den!

All of our specials will be held from 11:25 - 12:10. Each day I will update our homework page to remind you which special we will have the following day so you can help your child remember their sneakers, recorders or library books if needed.

• Day 1 ~ Library 
• Day 2 ~ Health (students should always wear sneakers for Health)
• Day 3 ~ Music
• Day 4 ~ Art
• Day 5 ~ Phys Ed
• Day 6 ~ Technology

I'm hoping that all of you will be able to come and join me on Wednesday, August 21 from 2:30 - 3:30 for our Open House. Come and see the school, visit the classroom, make your name tag, pick your first book, and meet some new friends.

I cannot wait for our new year together to begin!