4th Grade

4th Grade Curriculum

This guide is designed to give parents an outline of the main objectives their children will be taught during the upcoming year.  It would be difficult to list everything that will be taught, but these pages will provide an overview of the most significant aspects of the curriculum for fourth grade students.

The philosophy of instruction at the elementary level provides for a personalized and individualized approach to learning.  In the integrated language arts program, a core of children’s literature is used with other materials to help teachers emphasize lifelong reading, comprehension, and critical thinking as primary goals.  A variety of assessment strategies are emphasized to determine a student’s instructional needs and academic progress.  These subjects are taught using a wide variety of materials and methods with emphasis on problem-solving and an understanding of basic concepts.

It should be noted that the objectives listed below are merely samples from the various subject areas.  They are taught in an integrated-thematic program so that students can see the relationship of school subjects to their lives.  Most children master what is outlined on these pages.  Some children will learn more quickly than other.  Enrichment is provided for students progressing at a faster pace, while special help is available for those who are experiencing difficulty.

Forth Grade marks a subtle change in the learning process.  It is the time when children begin applying the skills developed in the primary grades to acquire further knowledge and insight into the content areas of the curriculum.  Students are given more long-range assignments such as projects and reports.  Teachers help them learn the responsibility needed to complete larger assignments over a longer period of time.  There is also a focus on how to study and prepare for tests.  In general, there is an increased emphasis on homework and on learning and using specific knowledge related to the various subject areas.

Language

Communication

  • Clearly express ideas.
  • Demonstrate effective participation in conversation.
  • Describe experiences and events.
  • Participate in creative, dramatic activities.
  • Choose and prepare poems or stories for performance.
  • Develop and use specific vocabulary in different contexts.
  • Learn to summarize and communicate the main points in a presentation.
  • Actively participate, listen, and respond in group discussions.

Reading

  • Develop key skills in the areas of comprehension, vocabulary, decoding, and study skills.
  • Comprehend literature at different levels:  literal, interpretive, critical.
  • Expand on the understanding of reading in the content area.
  • Develop interpretive reading habits.
  • Reading unfamiliar texts independently and in front of peers.

Language and Writing

  • Select and develop a wide range of descriptive vocabulary during writing.
  • Writing narratives (including beginning, middle, and end) along with non-narrative texts.
  • Become more proficient in oral and written communication skills.
  • Develop writing skills through a variety of techniques including process writing.
  • Use portfolios to show student growth over time.

Drama

  • Accepting a dramatic context and creating roles within it.
  • Explore character, using voice and the body to create characters
  • Using the imagination to explore dramatic context
  • Using the voice and the body of tools for expression

Music

Performance arts, such as opera, operetta, musical theatre, chamber music, etc are practiced.  Students perform from several different genres while exploring difference performance techniques from breath support for speaking and articulation to immersing oneself in a character.  The voice development, breath technique and performance practice skills they have been developing throughout their VES career culminates in several performances including a fourth grade play performed and technically executed by only the fourth grade.

Spelling

  • To know rules, strategies, and patterns for common English spelling conventions.
  • To learn to spell important words in other subject areas.
  • Spell less frequently used words, independently.

Grammar

  • To recognize and use properly sentence structure and grammar.

Science

Focus:  Children have now developed a considerable body of knowledge and experience upon which to construct further understanding of the natural world.  Their cognitive abilities are now advanced enough to be able to make more sophisticated comparisons, construct richer organizing schemes and begin to plan and conduct simple experiments.  Active engagement in classroom activities, collaborative work in teams with other students, and discussions will lead to increased understanding of the following concepts:

Life Science

  • Plants and animals go through predictable life cycles.
  • Using sunlight, green plants can make their own food from air and water.
  • All organisms effect change in the environment where they live.

Physical Science

  • Objects have many observable properties, such as size, weight, shape and color, which can be used to describe, group, or classify them.
  • Heat can be produced in many ways and can move from one object to another.
  • Sound is produced by vibrating objects.  The pitch of sound can be varied by changing the rate of vibration.

Earth and Space Science

  • All water on earth is part of a continual recycling, critical to life.
  • Weather occurs in a daily repeating pattern, but things such as temperature and precipitation show annual rhythms particular to a geographic area.

Processes of Science

  • Develop skills of careful observation and comparison.
  • Continue to ask questions about their observations, such as, “What would happen if? How can I make it happen? What makes it happen?”
  • Make predictions based on prior experience and experimental data.
  • Conduct simple investigations knowing what is to be compared or looked for.
  • Use mathematics and tools of technology to gather data and construct explanations.
  • Communicate observations and explanations through writing, discussions, drawings and simple graphs.
  • Work collaboratively with other students and listen to their explanations.

Deutsch

Die Schwerpunkte der 4. Klasse sind:

  • 6 wichtige Aufsatzgattungen: Personenbeschreibung, Bildgeschichte, Reizwortgeschichte, Nacherzählung, Fantasiegeschichte, Erlebnisaufsatz
  • unregelmäßige Verben
  • 4 Fälle und Satzglieder bestimmen
  • Rechtschreibregeln sichern
  • Förderung der individuellen Rechtschreibung (eigene Lernwörterkartei)
  • Referate: 1. Semester: österreichisches Bundesland, 2. Semester: EU-Land
  • extra Leseförderung durch Lesepass und Büchereibesuche

Lesen

  • Förderung und Festigung guter Lesegewohnheiten, individuelle Leseinteressen ausweiten und bilden
  • Steigerung der Lesefertigkeit
  • Vorbereitung und Übung textgerechten Vorlesens und Vortragens

Verfassen von Texten

  • Wichtiges von weniger Wichtigem bzw. Unwichtigem unterscheiden
  • Gedanken ordnen und damit Möglichkeiten des Textaufbaus erkennen und finden
  • Gedanken möglichst klar, genau, anschaulich und folgerichtig sprachlich darstellen
  • Merkmale der sechs wichtigen Textgattungen kennenlernen und eigenständig Texte dazu verfassen (Personenbeschreibung, Bildgeschichte, Reizwortgeschichte, Nacherzählung, Fantasiegeschichte, Erlebnisaufsatz)

Rechtschreiben

  • Erarbeitung und Sicherung eines begrenzten Wortschatzes
  • Wortschreibungen festigen, Schreibstrategien bewusst anwenden
  • Vertiefung von rechtschreibmäßig gesicherten Wörtern zur Schreibung anderer Wortformen bzw. anderer Wörter gelangen
  • Besonderheiten der Rechtschreibung (Groß- und Kleinschreibung, Interpunktion)
  • individuelle Arbeit mit dem eigenen Wortschatz

Sprachbetrachtung

  • die Stellung des Zeitwortes in verschiedenen Satzarten
  • Verfahren zur Ermittlung von Satzgliedern (Umstellprobe)
  • die vier Fälle bestimmen
  • Satzteile (Subjekt und Prädikat)
  • die wichtigsten Fachausdrücke kennen (Nominativ, Verb, Perfekt, Pronomen …)

Mathematik

Die Schwerpunkte der 4. Klasse sind:

  • Umkehraufgaben von Rechteck und Umfang
  • Zahlenraum 10 000, 100 000, 1 000 000
  • zweistelliges Multiplizieren und Dividieren
  • Flächen berechnen
  • Zeitmaße
  • Brüche

Aufbau der natürlichen Zahlen

  • Erweitern und Vertiefen des Zahlenverständnisses
  • Ausbauen des Zahlenraumes bis zu 1000000 (Erarbeiten des neuen Zahlenraumes bis 100 000 über Grobstrukturen zur Feinstruktur)
  • Lesen und Schreiben von Zahlen, Unterscheiden von Ziffer und Stellenwert der Ziffer

Rechenoperationen

  • Durchführung der Rechenoperationen im Zahlenraum 100 000
  • Erweitern der multiplikativen Rechenoperationen (zweistelliges Multiplizieren und Dividieren)
  • Erweitern der schriftlichen Verfahren (Addieren und Subtrahieren mehrstelliger Zahlen)
  • Abschätzen von Ergebnissen (überschlagendes Rechnen – runden)
  • Durchschnittswerte berechnen
  • Lösen von Sachproblemen (Diskutieren der dargestellten Sachverhalte)
  • spielerisches Umgehen mit Zahlen und Operationen

Bruchzahlen

  • Entwickeln des Bruchzahlenbegriffs (bildhaftes Darstellen)
  • Erfassen, dass die Größe der Bruchteile von der Bezugsgröße abhängig ist
  • Lesen und Schreiben von Bruchzahlen
  • Vergleichen von Bruchzahlen
  • Arbeiten mit Bruchzahlen in Sachaufgaben

Größen

  • Weiterentwickeln von Vorstellungen zu Größen
  • Einführung neuer Maßeinheiten und Herstellen von Maßbeziehungen (Quadratkilometer bis Quadratmillimeter)
  • Anwenden von Größen in Sachaufgaben

Geometrie

  • Beschreiben von Wegen, auch mit Hilfe von Plänen
  • vertiefendes Untersuchen der bisher behandelten Körper (Benennen und Beschreiben von Körpern und deren Eigenschaften)
  • zusammengesetzte Flächen ausrechnen und miteinander vergleichen
  • Entwickeln des Begriffs Flächeninhalt (Auslegen, Ausmalen)
  • Flächeninhalte vergleichen
  • Berechnen des Flächeninhalts von Rechteck und Quadrat
  • Arbeiten mit Größen (Rauminhalte hantierend vergleichen)
  • Hantieren mit Zeichengeräten (Lineal und Geodreieck)