A+look+at+a+Fourth+Grade+Classroom

A Look at the Miss Clyne’s Fourth Grade Classroom

Tony Painter is in Miss Clyne’s first grade. It’s Monday morning. He enters the classroom and goes to the filing cabinet where he moves a magnet with his name on it from the left side to the right, indicating that he is in school today. Tony then sits down at a small round table with three other students who comprise his group. Amy, a team member of his, has already gotten laptops for the group. Tony is already logged in and opens his folder and pulls out the “getting started” activity that was dropped into his folder by Miss Clyne: “Tell me the best part of having a birthday!” Each day, Miss Clyne puts an activity in each student’s folder. Today is Tony’s birthday so she asked him to write about it and drop it in her Teacher folder on the Network. On Friday, Tony’s task was a sheet of math story problems to practice his addition. It’s 9:00 and Tony knows that it is time for the class meeting because he set an alarm on his online calendar. He closes his laptop and takes a seat on the carpet near Miss Clyne’s chair. On the Smart Board is a letter written to the class from Miss Clyne. Each day Miss Clyne writes the class a letter to tell them about the day on her blog and then reads the letter with them. They can then comment on the letter at any point during the school day or when they go home. Today they are continuing with their theme, “Roots Make Us Strong!” Miss Clyne reminds them to check their plants, enter the data into their spreadsheet, compare them to last week, and write about the differences in the classes wiki. Each group planted four different types of seeds between two plexiglass panes to see how the root structures grow. She tells them they are going to do a I-movie on seeds. They also have to work on their cultural heritage projects. Tony interviewed his parents to learn more about his background. He is Italian and Irish, and he is writing a book about his heritage. The students will be printing the books and put them in the classroom library. Miss Clyne also talks about the importance of knowing number facts as the roots that help their math skills grow. Each day the students are to practice their math facts. They can do a worksheet; they can take an assessment online that tracks their progress; or they can quiz each other After Miss Clyne goes over the activities for the day, Tony and his classmates return to their seats to plan the day.

Tony, Amy, Sasha, and Michael take out their laptop and go into their online calendar to plan the day (They talk about when they want to do each of the activities on the sheet and fill in their schedules. Different students have math lessons at different times, so they plan around that. They can see these in Ms. Clyne’s online calendar. Ms. Clyne has an egg timer that sounds every half an hour to remind them to look at the clock and check their schedule. Some activities have to be done today. Others are choices that they’ll do throughout the week. Miss Clyne comes around to help them as they plan and ask them to explain why they make the choices they make. The group decides to do individual work first. Sasha decides to start the day working on her math facts on the computer and Amy decides to read silently. Tony works on his “My Roots” book. Tony is writing about Italian food today. His computer has clip art for Tony to use in his book. While he is working, Miss Clyne comes by to ask Tony how he is doing. She asks him to read some of what’s he’s written. He does and he shows her some of the books he used for the information. She asks him how Italian food is different from Irish food and they talk a little more. Then she moves on to see how a group is doing working on the plant project. Tony is almost finished his first draft. He will then edit it and have his writing partner edit it as well., all within MS Word.