Fourth Grade

Click here for the supply list for students entering grade 4

The Fourth Grade Team provides a challenging and nurturing learning environment that allows all students to perform to their fullest potential.  As a team, we collaborate to design instruction that is differentiated to meet children’s needs both academically and socially. The fourth grade team values and supports strong home-school connections.

Curriculum

The Fourth Grade supports the Beecher Road School mission to provide a dynamic educational environment that challenges and empowers students to persevere as innovators and collaborators in preparation for their role as global citizens. 

Responsive Classroom

Responsive Classroom is an approach to teaching and learning that recognizes that the process of learning is as important as the content. A social curriculum is taught along with the academic curriculum. Children learn skills such as cooperation, assertion, responsibility, empathy, and self-control in order to promote successful interactions.  The Responsive Classroom philosophy encourages adults to model positive behaviors in school in order to help children learn them. Teachers, parents, and students work closely together to promote social and academic success.

Reading Workshop

Reader’s Workshop is a way to explicitly teach skills and strategies that good readers utilize to assist them in reading and comprehending books.  Reader’s Workshop begins with a mini-lesson on a skill or strategy. Students then have an opportunity to try it on their own during independent reading. 

IN READING OUR UNITS INCLUDE:

• Writing Workshop

• Realistic Fiction

• Biography Book Club

• Informational Reading

• Reading and Responding to Texts

• Fantasy Book Clubs

Writer’s Workshop is a teaching philosophy that explicitly teaches skills and strategies  good writers utilize to assist students in writing, including editing and revising. Writer’s Workshop begins with a mini-lesson, focusing on a specific skill or strategy.  Students then have an opportunity to try the new skill on their own during independent writing.  

IN WRITING OUR UNITS INCLUDE:

• Realistic Fiction

• Personal/Persuasive Essay

• Informational Essay (Social Studies/Science)

• Literary Essay

• Fantasy 

MATH WORKSHOP

Math Workshop mirrors the structure of Reader’s and Writer’s Workshop.  A skill or strategy is explicitly taught during a brief mini-lesson, followed by independent time when students practice the skill on their own.  This time also provides the opportunity for differentiation for all students in their mathematical learning. Additionally, workshop allows for children to engage in academic conversations and collaborate with their peers.  

IN MATH OUR UNITS INCLUDE:

• Place Value and Computing with Whole Numbers

• Factors and Multiples

• Multiplication of Large Numbers

• Division of Large Numbers

• Understanding and Computing with Fractions

• Understanding and Computing with Decimals

• Measurement

• Geometry 

Science

In fourth grade we are using The Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) to provide an enriching science experience that reflects how real-life scientists and engineers practice their craft. This means students learn by doing. Students will be engaged in STEM (Science-Technology-Engineering- Mathematics) lessons and activities that build knowledge and understanding through hands-on activities and experiential learning.

IN SCIENCE OUR UNITS INCLUDE:

• Human Machine

• Birth of Rocks

• Waves of Sound

• Energizing Everything

Social Studies

The fourth grade Social Studies curriculum provides students with the opportunity to deeply explore the themes, questions, and events of history in order to connect to the past, understand the present, and shape the future. Through the investigation of varied texts and media, we are committed to developing in students the habits of inquiry and critical skills necessary to become engaged, informed, responsible citizens in an increasingly diverse and interconnected world.

IN SOCIAL STUDIES OUR UNITS INCLUDE:

• Map Skills

• 5 Themes of Geography

• Regions of the US