News articles forSocial Studies summer assignmentPaterson Packs Special-session AgendaNew York State is still without a budget.  Will this be resolved before we return to school?

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Today, July 20th, is Moon Day -- the day that celebrates the first Moon landing that happened forty-one years ago.  Check out the site below for an interactive recreation of the mission called "We Choose the Moon". 
Summer is officially here!
Enjoy!

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Social Studies 'Summer Activities'I hope you've all been keeping up with the news.  There have been so many interesting things happening so far this summer and it's only July 13th!I read an article in the newpaper this morning that I thought would be of particular interest to the students entering 5th grade this fall.Since the article doesn't appear in lohud.com - it's only in the newspaper, I have copied it below.  Click on the link to connect to a printable PDF.Iroquois might miss out on WLCIf you open the link and print this article, you may write a summary and then give your opinion.  Think about it - If the Iroquois Nation is truly a sovereign nation - a separate country from the U. S. - why would they also need a U.S. passport?

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(click on above image to enlarge) The oil is still spilling into the Gulf of Mexico - but is there an end in sight?  I hope you are still following the situation that we covered almost daily in 4th grade.  Check the link below for the latest on the leak. Capping the oil leak 

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If you're going to be in the Washington D. C. area on Friday, July 16th - stop in at the National Air and Space Museum to celebrate 'Mars Day'
Check out the link below:Mars Day 

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Thank you so much for the generous class gift.  This fourth grade class was one of the best classes I've ever taught.  I'm so glad to have the opportunity to be your teacher again next year in Social Studies.

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Our Author CelebrationHere's our published book.  Each author signed all the books on their special page.
We had 26 books times 19 authors -- unfortunately Leo was absent, so he'll be signing all the books in September.
And we're still signing. . .
Being an author is hard work.
It took a long time, but we finally had them all signed.
Our families came for the celebration.
The room filled up quickly.
Parents and older siblings attended.
Younger siblings came, too.
Mrs. Browne was eager to attend to hear students read their personal page and see the finished book.
We began our reading with "The Algonquians".
Next was "The Iroquois Daily Life".
Then "The Six Nations of the Iroquois".
After the Native Americans we moved on to "The Daily Lives of the Dutch".
Then we heard about the first governor of New Amsterdam, "Peter Minuit".
Next was the best known governor of New Amsterdam, "Peter Stuyvesant".
Then we heard about "The Settlements of New Netherland".
Of course the Dutch would never have had a colony here without "Henry Hudson".
We learned about "The Four New York Governors that Became President".  Do you know all four of them?
"New York City" is one of the most important places in New York State and according to this author, the most fun place to go.
We learned a lot about "The Statue of Liberty" from this author.  Did you know her shoe size is 879?
Of course, what book about New York State would be complete without "The Hudson River"?
Then we move to central New York to hear about "The Finger Lakes".
 We're back to the Hudson Valley to hear about "West Point".  Leo was absent for our celebration, but he wrote about "The Revolutionary War".
Next we went back north and west to "Lake Ontario".  Zegy had to leave early, but he wrote about "Lake Champlain" and the monster of the lake known as 'Champ'.
Still in western New York, we hear about "Niagara Falls".
We conclude our book on New York State with "Governor David Paterson".
We presented Mrs. Browne, our principal with a special autographed copy.  We also donated an autographed copy for our CTK library.  Mrs. Browne has done so much to encourage special projects like our book that make learning fun.  At Christ the King School we learn much more than just what's in a textbook.
 Thank you to our families and friends for being such a great audience!
We loved reading our special book to you!
Have a great summer!

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The End of an Era

The space shuttle program is ending.  In fourth grade we decided to celebrate the end of the program by creating an exhibition on the shuttle.

Here on the wall outside our room is the pair of rocket boosters, the external fuel tank, the shuttle, the cargo hold, and several shuttle astronauts.

In the cargo hold you can see some of the equipment used in space.  The index cards all around our exhibit contain 'fun facts' about the shuttles and the shuttle program.

Our astronauts are wearing some of the different things they would wear on lift-off and while working on the shuttle or space station while in space.

Be sure to check out the last two flights of the shuttle program. The fourth grade will have our picture on one of the final shuttles.  We are participating in NASA's 'Fly Your Face in Space' program. Mrs. Burke sent our class photo to NASA.  We will receive a certificate when the shuttle carrying our 'faces' returns to earth stating that our faces were in space!

Contact me

Mrs. Kathryn Burke 

at:

grade4@

christthekingyonkers.com

(If the above link does not open your email, copy and paste the address)

Supply List for Middle School

2010-2011

glue stick

loose leaf

crayons (48 box is fine)

tissues (2 boxes)

pencils

mechanical pencils

pens (blue, black, red for editing)

ruler (centimeter)

highlighters (two colors)

stapler

8 pocket folder

colored pencils

scissors

pencil sharpener

magic markers

6 marble notebooks

1 large spiral notebook

book(s) for silent reading

graph paper

binder atlas

book covers/book sox

dictionary/thesaurus

pencil case

index cards

seat sack

erasers

*Supplies must be replenished as needed throughout the year.

Summer Work

Only one book is required reading for students entering 5th grade.  Be sure to keep a journal of your thoughts about your reading.

The math packet has fun activities to do.  Choose from the activites. 

It is not necessary to do all of them.

Social Studies - go to icivics.org

All students entering 5th grade have used this site in the computer lab - and enjoyed it.

For parents - check out the site, in particular the 'news' section that has a variety of news articles that discuss video games - and this site.  It's an excellent, fun, challenging site and kids will learn a lot from it.  It's a great way to spend some time on a rainy day.

In addition, students should find a minimum of three articles related to civics.  I found three reading the paper yesterday.  The U.S. Senate and Elena Kagan make for interesting articles as they try to determine if she should be appointed to the Supreme Court. 

Include a brief summary of the article and the student's opinion - with each article.  It's not a lot of work, but should encourage children to keep up with what's happening in the world around them. 

Summer is a wonderful time to learn -- Helping your child to see that learning is fun is so important to whether or not your child will take the initiative to be the best they can be.

Our Trip to West Point

Here we are on the steps of the Cadet Chapel.  The view is beautiful behind us, but unfortunately isn't visible in the rain.

We listened intently to our guide as she told us all about the chapel.

In this famous military chapel even the prayer books and Bibles are lined up.

Duty, honor, country is the motto of West Point and is imbedded 3 places in the altar area.

It's now pouring rain, but we are all still interested in hearing all about life at West Point.  We also learn about the different buildings, statues and stories about famous people who graduated from West Point.

This is the Civil War monument for the Union forces.  It's umbrellas up for the photo.

Here we are at the Great Chain with some of the eighth graders who came on the trip with us.  This chain was part of a chain that was hung across the Hudson to prevent British ships from sailing up the river.  It was never challenged.

Can you see the 'million dollar view'?  We had trouble due to the rain, but the Hudson River always looks amazing.

It was another great trip.  Thanks to Mrs. Fleming and Mrs. Dronzek for coming with us!

Multicultural Festival

We began our multicultural experience watching some West African dancers.

The Music was great.  It was hard to sit still.

So everyone got up and danced!

Next stop was the birds.

The owl seemed to prefer sitting to flying.

This man had some huge yoyos.  We also watched a Chinese acrobat do some amazing handstands.

After eating lunch we headed over to the Native Americans.  We also pet bunnies, turtles, lizards, frogs, hedgehogs, and other interesting creatures.

We ended the day with some Native American games.  A child from our class was the winner in the musical hoops game.

It was especially fun to join with our PreK buddies and Mrs. DiNapoli in our final dance.

Can you find us in this crowd?

Here's more of our buddies.