By: Ian C.

5 years. 1 metric ton of awesomeness. Lots of friends and teachers. That sums up my career at Woodland. One of my favorite years here is my last: Fourth Grade. Not only have we done lots of fun stuff, but we are building a Rube Goldberg Machine. This is my favorite year.

1st Nine Weeks 

First Days  — The end of Summer Break, 2017. The first day of Fourth Grade. It’s all a blur, but I do remember that we didn’t have rotations for the first week. We also had a short day on the first two days. My teacher was, and still is, Mrs. Israel.

Project Base Learning —  The first two PBL projects we made were a chain made of paper and a tower of cups that we had to assemble without speaking or touching the cups. Then we did my favorite one to date: The Lost Colony of Roanoke. In it, we investigated what caused the colony to disappear, and I came to the conclusion that they went native.

We did a couple more, and then we got to the big part, which was a project when we made a colony. My group made the Dead Bay Colony, which was the renamed Massachusetts Bay Colony.

Math —  I had Mrs. Donald for math in the first 9 weeks. We did Zearn a lot. We were required to finish our Eureka Math worksheets before getting onto Zearn. Then we had to catch up on Zearn before we were allowed to be on Prodigy.

We then worked on our million-dollar project.  In it, we had a million dollars and had to use that to buy a car, a house, a vacation, and donate the rest to charity.

Language Arts —  We worked on realistic fiction writing.  I wrote about a dog whose owner leaves on vacation and the dog loves food and goes looking for his owner because he wants food.  On the way, he meets another dog and she helps him find his owner.  (They eventually have puppies.)

My book that I read for the first 9 weeks was “Old Yeller.” We did a lot of fun stuff in reading. If you are wondering what happened in Old Yeller (spoiler alert), a boy wants a horse and his dad leaves to go to town to earn money.  He finds a dog whom he adopts.  He family names the dog Old Yeller. You will have to read the book to see what happens next!

Chess Club  —  Chess Club is a club that some of us do after school on Mondays. In it, we play chess with our club mates and sometimes we go to tournaments. I have enjoyed learning the rules of the game and playing with my classmates and friends.

During the first quarter of school, we had planned to go to a tournament, but I ended up being sick that weekend. Bummer.

Solar Eclipse  —  Near the end of the first 9 weeks, we took a field trip to the Boys and Girls Club (I think) for the solar eclipse. We did a bunch of activities before going and when we got there, we used our eclipse glasses to look at the eclipse. It was awesome.

2nd Nine Weeks 

Wednesdays  — On Wednesdays we worked on various science projects, most notably, our science games.  My group did a chess inspired one on a six by six grid.  Our subjects for it were metamorphosis and cells. Another science project we started in this 9 weeks, while not exclusive to Wednesdays, was our science journals that we did on our computers.

Language Arts  —  In the second 9 weeks, my Language Arts teacher was still Mrs. Binder although she was my teacher for first rotation instead of second. We worked on our colonial America project. We worked in pairs to do these non-fiction books about something that either had an impact on the Revolutionary War or was part of the Revolutionary War. The non-fiction book that my partner Patrick and I wrote about was “George Washington and Valley Forge.”

We didn’t do much reading that didn’t have anything to do with colonial America. However, we were allowed a period of time to read our fiction books. The book I read was “The Phantom Tollbooth.” We also made arguments for our side (mine was the Patriots) and we used these arguments for a debate as to whether we should decide to separate from England or not. The people from 3rd grade decided that we should.

Math  — Miss Parker was my math teacher this 9 weeks. On the first day, we got onto Prodigy. We did math worksheets and Prodigy. It was awesome. We did a variety of subjects.

Chess Club  —  In Chess Club in the second 9 weeks, we did pretty much the same as we did in the first 9 weeks. But this time when we planned to go to a tournament, I was not sick for that tournament. It was quite a long day but it was also extremely fun. While I did not get a trophy, I really enjoyed it.

I only won one game because my opponent didn’t show up. It was quite boring. I would rather have my opponent show up and lose than my opponent not show up and win. For Christmas that year, I got my own chess set from my grandparents.

Colonial America —  On Colonial Day, we dressed up like we were from Colonia times and did a variety of activities. First, we did some craft projects, such as a tri-cornered hat and a quilt. Then, we went to Mrs. Callis’s room for a Boston Tea Party where we drank tea and ate some food.

       

Next, we went to the gym and did some colonial dances. These were the Chimes of Dunkirk and the Virginia Reel. We also went outside for recess and my classmates came up with some games that were inspired by the Revolutionary War.

  3rd Nine Weeks  

 Wednesdays  — In this nine weeks, we worked on our science games. We completed them and got to play them. The games that we made are awesome in my opinion.  My group was one of many groups in Mrs. Israel’s class that worked on this.

Language Arts  — This nine weeks we worked on our opinion writing. My first one was about why cats are better than dogs. My second one was about my hypothesis that the cryptid known as the Beast of Exmoor is actually a new species of big cat never before discovered. Unfortunately, I was unable to finish that writing.

Math  —  In math, we learned more about math subjects as fractions and continued using Prodigy. I believe that it was this nine weeks when we started doing Zearn in Mrs. Smith’s math class.  Ms. Parker got married.

Chess Club —  In Chess Club in the 3rd nine weeks, I continued playing chess games with my friends after school and we had a chess party in which there were people playing a chess game with big pieces and a big board.  Others of us like me played regular games of King Chess.

I went to a tournament during this nine weeks and while I was not able to play in the team chess because not enough players were there from our school, I was able to play individually.

 

4th Nine Weeks  

Wednesdays  –  In this nine weeks, we worked on a second science games project.  We also are working on a Rube Goldberg Machine, which is a contraption that uses a complex chain reaction of events to do something quite basic.

In between those we also worked on various STEM projects while we were doing TCAP testing. As of the time of the writing of this article, we are not yet finished with our Rube Goldberg Machine.

Language Arts  — This nine weeks, we are working on historical fiction writing. My story is going to be about a pack of Troodons (very intelligent dinosaurs that look like Velociraptors) trying to survive the asteroid that wiped out most of the dinosaurs.

Math  — This nine weeks, we did some tests, worked on Prodigy, didn’t work on Zearn, and are now working on a Taco Truck STEM project.  In this project, we will be building a Taco Truck after calculating all of the stuff involved. My Taco Truck company is called Shadow’s Tacos. Our slogan is “No One Out tacos the Shadow.”

TCAPs – Of course, we did TCAP testing.  First, we did the reading and writing/language arts part. Then we worked on math. The tests after this were on social studies and science. I am not allowed to talk about what was in the tests so I will leave it at that.

Go West  —  Our westward expansion project was a performance that we did quite recently. If you went to that performance, you will know about what happened in it. The dances were the Chimes of Dunkirk, the Virginia Reel, and Ole Brass Wagon. We practiced a lot in music class and the ones of us had speaking or singing parts practiced a little bit at home.

Newspaper Club  — If you are wondering what this is that is perfectly fine.  This club hasn’t been made yet. It may start in the next school year. It of course will be a club that will write newspaper articles and edit them for an eventual Woodland Elementary newspaper.  At least this is my idea that I hope the school will be able to make possible for the students next year.

I came up with his idea in third grade as a possibility for what my language arts class could write about for our persuasive writing project. Now, over a year later, the PTO and the school are discussing making this new club.

Chess Club — This nine weeks, I continued to play chess games with my friends and fellow club mates. In May, we will have a party celebrating chess club. That will be our last day of chess club for this school year.

 

4th Grade – How Is It Different?  

  If you are wondering how fourth grade is different from other grades, here are the ways it is:

  • Parents are not allowed to come into the classroom when dropping off their kid.
  • We do not just have math for rotations.  We also have English/language arts like third grade.
  • We have to be much more responsible in fourth grade than in other grades.
  • We get our own devices (computers).
  • Much more of our assignments are on our computers.

Conclusion 

 As you can see, fourth grade, while much different than the other grades, is still pretty fun. Of course, we take field trips such as the most recent and last one to Jefferson Middle School where many of us will be going to next school year.

Two of my teachers at Woodland will be teaching at Jefferson next year.  I hope you enjoyed reading about my experiences in 4th grade.

   Acknowledgments 

I learned to read at Woodland in Kindergarten. Today, I love to read a variety of novels.  Thanks to my teachers who taught me to love reading and learning.

All of my teachers at Woodland in every grade have taught me a lot and have gotten me ready for 4th grade this year and for middle school next year.  Thanks to Mrs. Binder, Mrs. Donald, Mrs. Israel, and Mrs. Parker-Smith. I also want to thank Mrs. Tiller and Mrs. Cuffman and Mrs. Clark from Kindergarten, Mrs. Spangler and Mrs. McDaniel from 1st Grade, Mr. Martin and Mrs. Howard in 2nd Grade, Mr. Martin and Ms. Little in 3rd Grade. Thanks also to the special areas teachers – Mrs. Callis, Mrs. Carden, Coach Carringer, Mrs. Martin, Mrs. Chin, Mr. Mull, Mrs. Chinn, and Mrs. Bradshaw. Thanks also to the principal and vice principal, school staff, and substitutes who also helped along the way.

Thanks also to my friends and family, my animal friends, and most of all, my Mom and Dad, whom without, I wouldn’t be here. Without all of them, this wouldn’t have happened. Thank you.