One Last Lesson Before Thanksgiving…
News from the 4th Grade classroom
The Fourth Grade class tries to put the United States back together again.
This week the Fourth Grade was working hard on the first drafts of their new epics! The week started with a detailed, in-depth analysis of the typical structure of most plots. From the opening conflict, through to the death and rebirth and the triumphant resolution, Fourth Grade took a long, deep look at stories and their flow.
Sonya explains how ‘Wolf Brother,’ a novel we read as a class, fits into our Plot Structure Diagram.
In the pictures above and below, you see examples of plot and story structure for epic tales. These structures start out with a clear protagonist, a clear antagonist, and a clear conflict that ultimately leads to a climactic final confrontation and resolution.
In the plot structure diagrams below, Fourth Graders attempted to fit their own stories into the plot structure diagrams, finessing their stories in a way that assured they would be fully fleshed out.
As you can see, there’s an awful lot of work that goes into these plot structure diagrams. Events and details often have to be jumbled around in order to create a compelling narrative.
But it wasn’t all about narratives, and Fourth Grade also took a look at the Water Cycle — the cycle by which water flows around the planet…
And a little bit of Social Science…
In Social Studies and Science, students learned that water evaporates from the surface of the oceans and other bodies of water, and then condenses in the sky. While trapped in the clouds, water is transported around the surface of the Earth until enough of it condenses and it returns to the Earth in the form of rain — which joins rivers, seas and oceans.
Then, the whole cycle starts over again! A simple, everyday example of this happens in our bathrooms when we take a shower! Water, in the form of steam, rises to the ceiling and can collect. If enough of it accumulates, it forms water droplets that ‘rain’ down the walls or drip from the ceiling.
In the photos below, students check out the amount of condensation on the inside of a window in winter versus the amount of condensation on the outside… can you guess what the difference was?
HAPPY THANKSGIVING!
Pacific Northern Academy will be CLOSED for Thanksgiving Week! Safe travels and enjoy the holiday! See you when we get back!
