Fourth Grade

List of 5 items.

• Language Arts

  There are many aspects of All Saints’ fourth grade language arts studies. In reading groups, the students develop comprehension skills through discussions, workbook exercises, learning and using new vocabulary, and an assortment of writing activities. Research skills are taught through library lessons. Grammar studies and weekly spelling exercises help prepare for work in a variety of compositional forms. The students enjoy fine literature books and write book reports, reference reports, poetry, and stories.

   

• Mathematics

  The fourth grade focus is on reviewing and renewing retention of place value, rounding numbers, addition, and subtraction as the year begins. The students learn multiplication tables and learn to solve problems with double digit multipliers and divisors. Other areas covered are fractions, decimals, measurements, data and graphs, geometry, perimeter and area. All units covered include word problems and logic lessons.

   

• Science

  Fourth grade science curriculum encompasses the physics of sound, environments and ecosystems, the physical properties of water and the water cycle; animals, pets and California sea otters; the five senses; a health unit covering alcohol, tobacco and drugs; and a unit on personal safety, with emphasis on bullying and personal harassment. Particular focus is on incorporating STEAM (science, technology, engineering, art, mathematics) activities.

  Skills involved include: observing, communicating, comparing, organizing, note taking, research reports, partner work, group work, discerning facts vs. opinions, collecting data and making graphs. Students perform experiments; incorporate art work, poetry, research reports, story writing, and oral reports; take field trips and have guest speakers who enrich our program with their expertise.

• World Languages

  Students are enrolled in either Spanish or French, beginning in the first grade. Class instruction is held in the target language. The focus in lower grades is placed on developing oral communication and conversation skills. Songs, stories, games, poems, and props are used to encourage children to participate actively in speaking the language. T.P.R. (Total Physical Response) Storytelling, a method that permits immediate comprehension of the input as students listen to and mimic the phrases in the target language, is used in grades 1 - 5. Students enact dialogues and readings, focus on conversational skills and expand their knowledge of Hispanic or Francophone countries through poetry, songs, and readings.

   

  In fourth grade world language, students review and expand the language skills developed in ECC through third grades. The total physical response storytelling (TPRS) method is used more extensively.

   

• Social Studies

  The goal of the fourth grade history/social studies curriculum is to “teach students the story of their home state, unique in American history, in terms of its vast and varied geography, its many waves of immigration, its continuous diversity, economic energy, and rapid growth,” as outlined in The California History Social Science Content standards for California Public schools.

  There are six major curricular units: California Native Americans; Spanish exploration and control; Mexican governmental decisions and rancho days; Americanization with westward expansion, the gold rush and its effects on statehood; and transportation changes that led to more modern times.