Monday, February 4th, 2019

We began the first full week in February with this being the last four days to prepare for JA Biztown, which is Friday.

In literacy, Mr. M guest taught both blocks for the first half of the lesson.  This week we are covering the standard RI 4.7.  RI stands for Reading Information, the 4 stands for the 4th grade and the 7 is the seventh standard for Reading Information.  What this means is that the focus is on taking visual, oral, and number-based (quantitative - think graphs and such) information and not only interpreting it, but also in understanding both the author's reason and purpose for its inclusion as well as seeing how this contributes to the overall understanding of the text.  

The first-and-foremost primary author's purpose is not to entertain, inform, or persuade.  Those are actually secondary purposes if you really think about it.  The main priority is for the reader to actually first understand the information that is being conveyed by the writer.  

The second half of the lesson was go introduce the Wax Museum biography research project.  I went over the basics such as what a biography is, and the requirements of the project. 

The main thing to go over is how the person chosen must have some significant contribution to the community, society, or of all of humanity. 

Second, this person needs to have enough information on him/her to have a complete biography.  There needs to be enough to research.  

Third, any person of interest can only have one student researching.  In other words, only one student in a class may research Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Fourth, each student's choice must be approved by me

Fifth, read the packet and be sure to follow its instructions; be mindful of the key due dates.