Greetings! My name is Mrs. Wilson and I am elated to teach fouth grade here at Saint Zachary! I graduated from N.I.U. with my B.S. in Education. I also earned my ESL/ELL endorsement through National Louis University. I started out teaching thrid grade and I began to subtitute teach while my boys were young. I also had the opportunity to work for a couple of years as a paraprofessional in a special education program. Then I had another son, and I continued to substitute teach. I had another opportunity to teach as a beginner Spanish teacher for the Catholic schools from preK-8th grade, which I did for a couple of years. Then I became a preK teacher, a 7th-8th grade science and social studies teacher, a 5th grade teacher, and finally, a 4th grade teacher.  I believe fourth grade is a pivotal year, not only because the academics get a bit more difficult, but it  also begins the transition to middle school. It is my hope that my students always stay curious and passionate about learning. A little more about me: I married my college sweetheart and we have been together for over 23 years. We have three sons together: Joey (21 years), Eddie (19 years), and Scottie (12 years).  My other love is our German Shepherd, Mina, who is 3 years old. She is such a sweet, family dog! 

Math: This past week we have focused on basic geometry like quadrilaterals and features of different types of triangles. We will take a quiz on Tuesday, May 30th. Over the summer, please have your child review reducing fractions and changing them from improper fractions to mixed numbers and vice versa. Don’t forget to review multiplication and division over the summer, too.

Reading/ELA:  We continued working in our reading groups, which are based on our i-Ready scores. Almost everyone is done reading one of the following chapter books: Hachiko Waits,  Charlotte’s Web, Full of Beans, or James and the Giant Peach.  We continued to play Quizlet Live to practice our Greek/Latin word roots and everyone still enjoys it! We also have daily rotations: journal writing, literacy centers, i-Ready, Epic, and parts of speech. 

Science: We continued with our unit on habitats and ecosystems. We discussed vocab like scavenger, omnivore, herbivore, and carnivore. We will take a final quiz this coming week on ecosystems. For lab, we did a Food Chain activity and some students made a food chain with 7 parts! 

Slime Recipe: 1/2 cup glue, 1/2 cup water, and a few drops of food coloring if you want. Mix well. Then add 1/2 tsp baking soda and mix again. Then add 2 TBSP of contact lense solution and mix again.  Knead in the bowl or on a table until it is not too sticky. If it is still too sticky, then add a little more contact solution. 

Quick Ice Cream recipe: 1/2 cup milk       1/4 tsp vanilla   1 TB of sugar       Put those ingredients in a 1 quart freezer bag     Mix well before putting it in the  1 gallon freezer bag half filled with ice    with   3TB of Rock Salt     Now have fun and SHAKE IT! After a few minutes the ice will melt and the bag gets really cold. Look to see if the ice cream starts to freeze: it will be like soft serve. Enjoy! Feel free to add chocolate sauce or sprinkles!

Social Studies:  We have been working on our final project: writing about a state. Students have been writing their paper on Google Classroom. When they finish, they will also be creating a slide show based on their state. Most of the class has finished their paper and of what I have seen so far, everyone is doing a great job! Please ask your child about their state and what they have learned so far!

Religion: We have been focused on the 10 commandments. We talked about the first commandment, which the focus of Chapter 9. We also talked about trusting in God to take care of us no matter what. We finished Chapter 9 and took our final test. We also watched a video about Mary and the Annunciation.