Weekly Reflection 38

Hello Grade 4 Families,

This blog will be my final entry for the 2014/2015 school year. I cannot believe how quickly it has flown by!

I want to take this opportunity to thank you all for your support and participation this year!

Your children have been a pleasure to teach and at times learn from! They have grown so much and I am so so proud of all that they have achieved and feel privileged to have been their Grade 4 teacher. 

I hope you enjoy their musical theater performance tomorrow, which they created with Grades 5/6. 

Once again, thank-you very much and I look forward to seeing you over the weekend and  for student-led conferences. 

Have a safe and happy summer break!

- Miss Raciti

Listening test in Japanese

Grade4 students took listening test this week.
They were listening very carefully and trying to take some memos.
It was a review from the unit of taking notes in Japanese(Kikitori memo no kufuu).
They were so good at taking some important notes when they were learning about Maiko and Sumo wrestler.

They also enjoyed practicing the Japanese song for the year end performance.
They like singing while they hear the other chorus part and create beautiful harmony.

We made a surprise gift for this Sunday.

Friday Weekly Reflection 37

Hello Grade 4 Families, 

Hard to believe that there are only 5 days left of teaching and learning for this academic year!

This week Grades 4-6 have been tweaking the script for their original musical as well as rehearsing with commitment and enthusiasm. 

The group has also worked on city skyline collages. Each student chose a different city from around the world and re-created its city skyline using a variety of recycled materials. From this, Students began investigating the city and planning a 2 week holiday to that destination. With a budget of ￥1,000,000, each student researched flights, accommodation, attractions, weather, local maps, public transport and restaurants to create an itinerary for their 2 week adventure. Next week, they will share their itinerary with the rest of the class. 

A couple of end of year reminders for all families: 

- The Final Celebration of Learning will take place on Saturday, 27th June from 10:00am-12:00pm. There will be an after-party following the performances until 12:30pm. 

- Student-Led Conferences are scheduled for Monday, 29th June. 



Hope to see you next week!

- Miss Raciti

Friday Weekly Reflection 35 & 36

Hello Grade 4 Families, 

I hope you have had a terrific week.

Over the past 2 weeks Grade 4 has been working hard on their persuasive essays. The progress made by all students is truly wonderful. 

The movie afternoon fundraiser went extremely well and Grade 4 did an excellent job organizing the event. 

The students are collaborating with G5/6 to create a musical production for the final Celebration Of Learning on June 27th. I am so excited to see them begin rehearsals next week. 


That is all for this week, 

- Miss Raciti

Winter story in Summer time

Grade 4 students have been reading "Hatsuyuki no furu hi", the story about a girl and snow rabbits.

They were making a reading circle and helped each other how to read clearly.

After reading it, they categorized the words about weather, colors, shapes and expressions.

Friday Weekly Reflection 34

Hello Grade 4 Families, 

1 Sleep til Undokai!!!! 

Everyone is so excited for the big day and I'm sure the whole JIES/Jingumae Shogako community will enjoy viewing and participating in the day's events. 

Grade 4 has worked so hard to prepare for the day and also showed fantastic cooperation and communication with their Jingumae friends. 

I look forward to seeing you all there!

In other news, 
Grade 4 have been investigating new digital media for our unit of inquiry. The group watched a documentary about the future of digital communications and assessed the positive and negative aspects of relying on digital platforms for communication purposes. Each student then picked an area they want to explore further. Some chose to investigate the use of smartphones, some are looking into virtual reality and some decided to look more specifically at different social media applications and sites. 

We created a class Twitter account and have so far connected to the Uniters (grade 5/6) and the JIES account. The group are enjoying navigating their way around the site and it is a great investigation into our second line of inquiry- how digital media works. 

We have begun a mandala project, incorporating art and maths into the construction of individual pieces. I look forward to seeing the finished products.

Until next week (or hopefully tomorrow), 

- Miss Raciti

Complete Kotowaza book

Grade 4 students completed making their own proverb books.

They enjoyed reading their friends' proverbs and adding some comments.

JNL students also reviewed some Kanji they learned in Grade 3.

During Japanese class this week, the class practiced 3 songs for Undokai.

All of the students are really excited about Undokai and I see JAL students are trying to understand and talk to Jinsho teachers and students during the exchange practice.