WINTER CONCERT

Come one, come all!

Please join us for the Winter Concert for students in grades 3-5 on Tuesday, December 20.  The concert begins at 8:30 am and will end by around 9:15.

Each and every student participates in this performance!  The fourth graders will be on the left side of the stage (as you are facing it).

Attire for the concert is as follows:
• Split top uniform, skort, jumper, or gray pants
• Dark green or gray tights or knee socks (no leggings or white socks)
• White long sleeve turtleneck or polo shirt (no sweaters – the girls will be warm enough under the bright lights!)

See you there!

Art_Finished Worlds

The girls have finished their collages and their "I Am" poems. Here's a sneak peak of their work. They will be on display this week in the administration building gallery.  

Action!

The girls continue to work on their amazing designs of small containers.  We are now in the action phase of the Thinking and Learning Design Process.  They have learned how to use several tools in the Creation Station!  Once the prototypes are finished, students will reflect on their work and the work of classmates.  

4th Grade Loves Magnets!

We have been studying magnets this fall in science. It was fun to learn that opposite poles attract and like poles repel each other.

Different materials were tested to determine which were attracted to a magnet and which ones magnetic force would travel through.

Putting magnets under dishes with iron filings meant that we could see how the filings lined up in the magnetic fields.

Levitating magnets by putting like poles together was fun! We measured to see which combination of magnets would levitate the highest.

And....we created our own original magnet games and then presented them to the class!

At the end of the unit, we made our own magnetically levitated (mag-lev) train cars. Balancing them so that they would travel down the magnetic track was a challenge, but we persisted and were successful! After testing the mag-lev cars to see what could be done to make them travel farther, we prepared for the final race, using the knowledge we had gained from our experiments!

From the Library

Fourth graders started the year by reading an assortment of great, but maybe lesser known books in Library. Anne Isaac's Meanwhile Back at the Ranch reminded students of Riding Freedom which they read in third grade last year. The Bathing Costume or The Worst Vacation of My Life by Charlotte Moundlic was a story of a French boy who spends the summer with his grandparents in the country. Kate Coombs' The Secret Keeper led to an interesting discussion about listening and keeping secrets. The Cloud Spinner by Michael Catchpool, beautifully and amusingly illustrated, inspired conversation about greed and need and their impact on the environment.

From there we moved into World War II stories. I Will Come Back for You, in which a grandmother uses her charm bracelet to explain her childhood in Italy; Rose Blanche, in which a young girl smuggles food to children in a camp outside her German town; and Otto, the Autobiography of a Teddy Bear, in which a bear starts in 1930s Germany, saves the life of an American GI, and ends up in New York where he is recognized in an antique store and reunited with his childhood friends, now old men.

Art_I Am The World

Fourth grade has been deep into metaphors and meaning with a piece called, "I Am the World". They made lists of things that make up the world: cultures, languages, landforms, bodies of water, animals, plants, weather, communities, etc. Then, they personalized their list by adding their world experiences, interests, and passions. They also wrote an "I Am" poem that prompted great visuals.  Then, they collected imagery that represented their ideas and morphed them together using juxtaposition and other surrealist techniques. They are turning their marker drafts into collages and revising their poems for display later this fall. 

Surrealism is a cultural movement in the 1920s that emphasized the relationship between writing and visual arts. Artists juxtaposed ideas to create new meaning and to represent dreams, the unconscious and illogical worlds. As soon as you think you have figured out the meaning of a work or symbol, you see it another way.  

This project helps the girls consider their own perspective and cultures and prepares them for thinking about other people, places and cultures in the world with awe and wonder. 

 

Social Studies

In social studies, the girls are currently learning to accurately identify the countries that make up the continent of Europe.  They have made their own set of flashcards and used the Geotouch app on their ipads to learn 20 - 40 European countries.  It has been fun as well as educational!

Here are some pictures of the girls practicing together using Geotouch:

UNICEF

Trick or Treat for UNICEF!

During the last week of October and the first week of November, the fourth grade girls are spearheading a drive for UNICEF, the United Nations Children's Fund.  For sixty years, there has been a Halloween tradition of kids helping other kids by raising money for food, medicine, clean drinking water, and education in support of children all over the world.  After Friday's assembly, each Lower School girl received a UNICEF box that she may try to fill in any way possible - raising funds, asking for participation, or donating allowance.  After November 4, the 4th grade girls will count the money and send the donation to UNICEF on behalf of the Bryn Mawr Lower School. This annual Halloween tradition has raised over 175 million dollars since 1950!  Our small donations can add up to make very positive changes in children's lives around the world.  For example, just $30.00 can provide vaccines for 100 children to protect them from contracting measles.  Thank you for your help in making the world a better place!  

For more information, please visit trickortreatforunicef.org.

The Design Process

In the Creation Station, 4th graders have been working through the Design Process to create a small coin purse.  The challenge was to create a small case that could help students carry money or other small items to school.  Students began by learning about the Design Process.
1.  Exploration: research various ideas
2.  Ideation:  imagine different ideas
3.  Cultivation: decide on one idea
4.  Action: create a prototype
5.  Reflection: assess your work and revise as needed
6.  Production:  create a final product
7.  Presentation: share your work with the class

Students have completed the exploration, ideation, and cultivation phases and are in the action phase.

French: Elle achète des croissants à la boulangerie.

The girls are learning about places, actions, foods, and sports. We are discussing playing, eating, drinking, and buying various items/sports at the bakery, school, home, café, and park.

Recently, we put all of the vocabulary together to basically play one giant game of charades. I set up stations with props around the room. For example, a bouquet of flowers represented au parc and girls found a soccer ball and des beignets in that particular location. First, volunteers pantomimed various activities and the class identified in French what was happening and where. Next, the girls split into small groups and rotated from station to station, acting out and describing what they saw in French at each one.

Look at the pictures below and see if you can guess what is happening. (Bonus points for anyone who can say it in French!)

Art_Around the World

Fourth graders will travel the world in art this year! They will look at art exemplars, media and methods from Africa, Latin America, and Asia.  One of their first activities was to draw a world map from memory, what they knew or though they knew. Here are some examples: 

Their first major project is called "I Am the World" where they express themselves (as individuals, members of different groups, and citizens of the world) using imagery.  They made a chart to help them collect imagery, they looked up images up on CC Search and explored an app called "Beautiful Planet".  They also wrote a draft of an "I am" poem. 

The girls also started a list of things they are passionate about. All this ideation will turn into a collage of imagery that represents their worlds - a great starting point from which to travel beyond!