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  "And above all, watch with glittering eyes the whole world around you because the greatest secrets are always hidden in the most unlikely places. Those who don't believe in magic will never find it." -Roald Dahl ----------------------------------------------------- "Do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as you ever can." -John Wesley

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Someone once said that a picture was worth a thousand words. That person didn’t know me. When I look at this picture, millions of memories, small moments in time, pass through my mind. And I look upon the faces of the students with pride, joy, and excitement.
While our school will continue no longer, please remember [...]

Friday was a very special day for us. We were able to shower our mothers with love and presents! Muffins for Mom was a wonderful way to celebrate Mother’s Day.
             

Students in fourth and fifth grades participated in a science fair yesterday. They were able to design their own topics and research experiments. We were all very impressed with the caliber of work they completed! I think we have some future scientists on our hands! Kendall’s project involved seeing whether or not her dog would [...]

Two of Mrs. Self’s fourth graders were recently selected for the A.R.M.E.S program at the Fine Arts Center. A.R.M.E.S stands for Arts Reaching Middle and Elementary Schools. Mrs. Self nominated Cassidy for the dance program and Eli for the music program.  Cassidy arrived at school with a huge smile on her face as she proudly [...]

Last Thursday, students from Palmetto Prep participated in a performance entitled “Destination America.” They showed off their dancing and singing skills as they impressed friends and family.
       

Today, Darby showed us his new fiddle.  It was very cool. Thanks for sharing, Darbs! We can’t wait for you to learn how to play.
         

This past weekend, Kendall visited Mrs. Self’s hometown.  Mrs. Self grew up in Jacksonville, and loves everything about the city. Anyway, Kendall visited Mrs. Self’s middle and high school, went to her favorite stores, and even bought her chocolate covered popcorn from Peterbrooke (Mrs. Self’s favorite chocolate bakery)! What a thoughtful gift. To top it [...]

Last week to supplement and extend our lesson on percents, students looked through non-fiction texts.  During this process, they picked a particular page that had both texts and pictures / photographs. They were charged with calculating what percentage of the page was taken up by photos, and to analyze whether or not that contributed positively [...]

Yesterday, Mrs. Amy and Mr. Clint were pleased to announce that Palmetto Prep would be adding a new Chinese foreign language program to our curriculum.  Students and families will have the option of enrolling in either Spanish or Chinese for the school year! Mrs. Self has been working with the Confucius Institute at Presbyterian College [...]

I wanted to showcase one of our student’s graphing projects.  Each student was responsible for creating his/her own graphing question (three different questions, to be exact), identifying a survey population, comparing sub-groups within their survey-population, and creating three different graphs to represent their findings.
     

Here are pictures from last week’s NFF. The kids are always so excited about investigating non-fiction texts….and trying their own hands at writing in the NFF format. It’s cool to see what interesting facts they learn each week.
   

The other week, fourth and fifth graders were able to visit Roper Mountain Science Center. We learned about the circulatory and respiratory systems….and were able to construct models of our lungs! It was awesome. We even got to touch the lungs of a pig, which was disgusting (but the kids thought it was great!).
    [...]

Students have been working on creating maps that outline the events leading up to the Revolutionary War.  Instead of making timelines, students are encouraged to make maps, with different events being “exits” off of the roads. It has been neat to see how different each map is, and how it reflects the students’ personalities.
      [...]

Today we had a lot of fun working with frequently confused homophones. After we identified the correct meanings and contexts in which these words should be used, we then use the words to create a game of “Memory”. Students practiced flipping the cards over and matching them to their homophone partners.
   

Fourth grade students have been working tirelessly to find out the answers to three questions. They were challenged to design their own questions, come up with a survey population, identify a comparison group, and create three types of graphs. I was very impressed with the high caliber of work they presented! Excellent job!
      [...]

Last night, Mr. Clint and I went to see Cassidy at the Bi-Lo Invention Convention awards ceremony. We were so proud of her! She won a special “Young Einstein” award especially from us and some flowers, too! We were VERY proud of all her hard work and dedication. She is a very, very special inventor!
  [...]

Today in WW, we discussed three important elements in writing: choice, voice, and description. We reviewed what we have learned about each, and how each affects how people interpret what we write. I will post student samples soon!
         

Today our students experimented with a Declaration of Independence puzzle. They sorted the words, and learned where to place them appropriately. It was very fun!
 

I am pleased to announce that our first reading spider webs have been hung from the ceiling in our room! Once they are all complete, we will share with each other how we have been able to personally connect with what we read. We will also analyze how our schema affects our interpretation of events, [...]

Cassidy entered the Bi-Lo Invention Convention this year.  She designed a portable student desk. What a great idea! We are so proud of her hard work and ingenuity. We love you, Cassidy!
   

Good readers are like…..spiders?!
Ew! Gross!
But really, they are! Just as spiders spin their webs, connecting each thread to another…good readers connect the threads in their minds when they read. They take what they are reading, and weave a web with what they have stored in their schema. This week, we have begun spinning our reading [...]

Every Friday, first graders pair up with fourth and fifth grade students for reading buddy time. The “big buddies” enjoy modeling fluency and comprehension strategies for the “small buddies,” and the “small buddies” enjoy showing off their developing reading skills. It makes for a very enjoyable time!
 

One of our friends makes us laugh all the time. His name is Darby. We always find ourselves saying, “Oh, Darby!” Well, today as we were completing our morning work, I look up and see the following:
 
…anyway, we thank Darby for all of the joy he brings into our classroom! Sometimes people just need [...]

Our super sleuth readers have been working on some amazing reading-skeletons! Each student was challenged to fin the “Just Right” mystery book…then they read their books and used what we have learned about plot, characters, setting, and many other things to create a fun display! Sorry the picture is a little bit dark. The flash [...]

Today we tried our hand at re-creating blue and white Chinese art.  It was so awesome! We practiced painting rainbow bridges, pagodas, dragons, and other Chinese symbols. We will be pairing up with Mrs. Ross’ kindergarten this week to finish our Ming Dynasty vases. Stay tuned!

One of our reading lessons involved something really unusual: shoes. Mrs. Self compared her boot to Gray’s sneaker. She then asked the class to take notes on how the shoes were similar and different. Everyone came up with different (and interesting!) responses!
We learned that readers’ schemas are a lot like the shoes we wear. We [...]

For our unit of study on China, we paired up with Mrs. Ross’ kindergarten class one day. We taught the little kids that the Chinese invented porcelain, and while we aren’t able to make porcelain at school (that would be a little bit dangerous!)….we mimicked the look by using paper mache. Once our vases dry, [...]

The past two days have had the fourth grade students beginning their new Core Knowledge unit: Chinese Dynasties and Chinese Culture. It is a fascinating unit of study! We began by brainstorming what we already (thought) we knew about China, and watching a very cool movie that introduced us to the idea of Chinese culture.
Today, [...]

After about 2.5 months of excuses, Mrs. Self finally paid up. She got us pizza for lunch. She owed us pizza because last fall we had a vocabulary challenge. We all mastered our vocabulary words!!!! So, she ordered three pizzas….and yes, they were delicious!
 
 
 

 

Today in reading, Mrs. Self started off by being her usual crazy self. (No pun intended! Haha! Self, self!). Anyway, she started off by having us watch her and take notes / observe as she randomly started throwing an inflated globe around the room. She then asked us to share with her what we thought [...]

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