4th Grade Parent Guide
- English Language Arts
- Recommended Books
- Social Studies
- Mathematics
- Science
- Recommended STEM
- Special Education
- English as a New Language
- Library and Media Center
- Physical Education
- Visual Arts
- Music Education
- Educational Links
English Language Arts
In fourth grade, we aim to create a well-rounded learning environment that balances literature and informational texts, encouraging engagement with diverse topics through various activities like read-alouds, discussions, and independent reading. By using both printed and visual texts, our focus is on developing children's understanding of how meaning is conveyed through reading and writing, enabling them to tackle increasingly complex material. Throughout the year, students will read and comprehend texts at or above grade level. We recognize that while some texts may be challenging for one student, they might be accessible to another due to their unique skills and backgrounds. Hence, our educators provide necessary support and scaffolding to ensure all students can access and engage with complex texts, differentiating between texts for word reading fluency and those that contribute to expanding language and knowledge. Our goal is to foster an inclusive learning environment that supports each child's growth as a reader and a thinker.
A Parent’s Guide to the NYS Next Generation ELA and Math Learning Standards
Recommended Books
- Imagine by Juan Felipe Herrera
- Love by Matt de la Peña
- We Are Grateful by Traci Sorell
- Out of Wonder: Poems Celebrating Poets by Kwame Alexander, Colderley, and Marjory Wentworth
- Pass Go and Collect $200: The Real Story of How Monopoly Was Invented by Tanya Lee Stone
- Between the Lines: How Ernie Barnes Went from the Football Field to the Art Gallery by Sandra Neil Wallace
- Bat Citizens: Defending the Ninjas of the Night by Rob Laidlaw
- The Girl Who Drew Butterflies: How Maria Merian’s Art Changed Science by Joyce Sidman
- Two Truths and Lie books by Ammi-Joan Paquette
- Life Hacks for Kids by Sunny Keller
- When Mischief Came to Town by Katrina Nannestad
- Jake the Fake Keeps It Real by Craig Robinson & Adam Mansbach
- Enginerds by Jarrett Lerner
- How to (Almost) Ruin Your Summer by Taryn Souders
- The Cardboard Kingdom by Chad Sell
- Sanity and Tallulah by Molly Brooks
- Step Up to the Plate, Maria Singh by Uma Krishnaswami
- Front Desk by Kelly Yang
- The (Fairly) True Tales by Liesl Shurtliff
- Odd and the Frost Giants by Neil Gaiman
- Amina’s Voice by Hena Khan
- The Someday Birds by Sally J. Pla
- The Ethan I Was Before by Ali Standish
- Orphan Island by Laurel Snyder
- Moo by Sharon Creech
- The Littlest Bigfoot by Jennifer Weiner
- The Parker Inheritance by Varian Johnson
- The Playbook: 52 Rules to Aim, Shoot, and Score in This Game Called Life by Kwame Alexander
- Code 7: Cracking the Code for an Epic Life by Bryan R. Johnson
- Sweep: The Story of a Girl and Her Monster by Jonathan Auxier
Social Studies
Social Studies is intended to promote civic competence through the integrated study of the social sciences and humanities. The primary purpose of Social Studies is to help young people to develop the ability to make informed and reasoned decisions for the public good as citizens of a culturally diverse, democratic society in an interdependent world. Students will explore these six practices via the overarching theme of New York State History and Government.
As a result of their schooling, students will be able to:
Gathering, Interpreting and Using Evidence
- Develop questions about New York State and its history, geography, economics, and government
- Recognize, use, and analyze different forms of evidence to make meaning in social studies
Chronological Reasoning and Causation
- Recognize dynamics of historical continuity and change over periods of time
- Use periods of time, such as decades and centuries to put events in chronological order
Comparison and Contextualization
- Recognize the relationship between geography, economics, and history in social studies
- Describe historical developments in New York State with specific details, including time and place
Geographic Reasoning
- Use location terms and geographic representations, such as maps and photographs to describe where places are in relation to each other
- Identify how environments affect human activities and how human activities affect physical environments
Economics an Economic Systems
- Explain how scarcity necessitates decision making
- Describe the natural resources required to produce goods and services
Civic Participation
- Show respect in issues involving difference and conflict
- Participate in negotiating and compromising in the resolution of differences and conflict
Mathematics
Mathematics is a language we use to identify, describe, and investigate the patterns and challenges of everyday living. It deals with numbers, quantities, shapes, and data, as well as numerical relationships and operations. Mathematics is a way of approaching new challenges through investigating, reasoning, visualizing, and problem solving with the goal of communicating the relationships observed and problems solved to others.
As a result of their schooling, students will be able to:
Operations and Algebraic Thinking
- Multiply or divide to solve multi step word problems
- Solve for the unknown using letters to represent the unknown quantity
- Assess the reasonableness of answers using mental math and estimation strategies
- Find all factor pairs for whole numbers in a range from 1-100
- Generate a number or shape pattern that follows a given rule
Numbers and Operations in Base 10
- Recognize moving to the left, on a place value chart, represents ten times what it represents to the right
- Read and write multi-digit whole numbers in written and expanded form
- Compare two multi-digit numbers
- Round multi-digit whole numbers less than one million
- Fluently add and subtract multi-digit whole numbers
- Multiply and divide 4 digit x 1 digit numbers with and without remainders
Number and Operations Fractions
- Explain why equivalent fractions are equivalent
- Compare two fractions with different numerators and denominators
- Understand addition and subtraction of fractions
- Decompose a fraction into a sum of fractions with the same denominator in more than one way
- Add and subtract mixed numbers with like denominators
- Solve word problems involving addition, subtraction, multiplication and division of fractions
- Multiply a whole number by a fraction
- Express a fraction with denominator 10 as an equal fraction with denominator of 100
- Use decimal notation for fractions with denominators of 10 and 100
- Compare 2 decimals to hundredths
Measurement and Data
- Know relative sizes of measurement in both standard and metric units
- Know the conversion factor and use it to convert measurements from larger to smaller units: kilograms to grams, pounds to ounces, liters to milliliters
- Use the four operations to solve word problems involving distances, time, liquid volumes, mass and money
- Solve problems involving fractions or decimals in terms of larger to smaller unit
- Represent measurement quantities using diagrams that feature a scale such as number lines.
- Apply area and perimeter formulas for rectangles
- Able to make a line plot to display a data set of measurements in fractions
- Recognize angles and geometric shapes
A Parent’s Guide to the NYS Next Generation ELA and Math Learning Standards
Science
In fourth grade, students engage with performance expectations that guide them in addressing questions related to various scientific concepts. They explore the nature of waves, their patterns in terms of amplitude and wavelength, and their ability to cause object movement. Fourth-grade performance expectations encompass Disciplinary Core Ideas in physical science, life science, earth and space sciences, and engineering and technology. Students understand the effects of weathering and erosion by natural processes and generate multiple solutions to mitigate their impacts on humans. Analyzing data from maps, students describe patterns of Earth's features. They develop an understanding that plants and animals have internal and external structures supporting survival, growth, behavior, and reproduction. Using models, they explain how objects become visible through reflected light entering the eye. Students construct explanations regarding the relationship between object speed and energy. They also understand energy transfer through sound, light, heat, and electric currents, applying this knowledge to design devices converting energy from one form to another. Crosscutting concepts such as patterns, cause and effect, energy and matter, systems and system models, interdependence of science, engineering, and technology, and influence of engineering, technology, and science on society and the natural world serve as organizing principles. Fourth-grade students are expected to demonstrate grade-appropriate proficiency in scientific practices, including asking questions, developing and using models, planning and conducting investigations, analyzing and interpreting data, constructing explanations and solutions, engaging in argumentation from evidence, and obtaining, evaluating, and communicating information to showcase their understanding of core scientific ideas.
Energy
- Use evidence to construct an explanation relating the speed of an object to the energy of that object.
- Make observations to provide evidence that energy can be transferred from place to place by sound, light, heat, and electric currents.
- Ask questions and predict outcomes about the changes in energy that occur when objects collide
- Apply scientific ideas to design, test, and refine a device that converts energy from one form to another.
Waves and their Applications in Technologies for Information Transfer
- Develop a model of waves to describe patterns in terms of amplitude and wavelength and that waves can cause objects to move.
- Develop a model to describe that light reflecting from objects and entering the eye allows objects to be seen.
- Generate and compare multiple solutions that use patterns to transfer information.
From Molecules to Organisms: Structures and Processes
- Construct an argument that plants and animals have internal and external structures that function to support survival, growth, behavior, and reproduction.
- Use a model to describe that animals receive different types of information through their senses, process the information in their brain, and respond to the information in different ways.
- Earth’s Place in the Universe
- Identify evidence from patterns in rock formations and fossils in rock layers to support an explanation for changes in a landscape over time
- Earth’s Systems
- Make observations and/or measurements to provide evidence of the effects of weathering or the rate of erosion by water, ice, wind, or vegetation.
- Analyze and interpret data from maps to describe patterns of Earth’s features.
Earth and Human Activity
- Obtain and combine information to describe that energy and fuels are derived from natural resources and their uses affect the environment
- Generate and compare multiple solutions to reduce the impacts of natural Earth processes on humans.
Engineering Design
- Define a simple design problem reflecting a need or a want that includes specified criteria for success and constraints on materials, time, or cost.
- Generate and compare multiple possible solutions to a problem based on how well each is likely to meet the criteria and constraints of the problem.
- Plan and carry out fair tests in which variables are controlled and failure points are considered to identify aspects of a model or prototype that can be improved.
Recommended STEM
Special Education
Special Education Programs
A unique education program means specially designed individualized or group instruction to address student’s academic goals in reading, writing, and math. The Committee on Special Education will determine appropriate program recommendations based on the continuum of services and students’ progress.
Related Services
Related services are supportive services required to assist a student with a disability and include speech-language pathology, hearing services, vision services, physical therapy, occupational therapy, counseling services, and parent counseling and training. A student’s need, identified through an evaluation, will provide the basis for written annual goals and appropriate provision of services.
Resource Room & Consultant Teacher
Resource Room is a special education program where students require specialized supplementary instruction in a small group setting outside the classroom for a portion of the school day. Resource Room is capped at five students per group. Consultant Teacher, another special education program, is for students who require additional specially designed individualized or group instruction within regular education classes.
Integrated Co-Teaching, or “Inclusion”
Integrated Co-Teaching (ICT) is a special education program where students required specially designed instruction in an individualized or small group setting for multiple subjects within regular education classes. A general education teacher and a special education teacher jointly provide instruction to a class that includes both students with and students without disabilities to meet the diverse learning needs of all students in a class. ICT is capped at 12 students with a disability.
Special Class
Special Class is a special education program where students with disabilities have been grouped together with similar individual needs and academic goals for the purpose of being provided specially designed instruction in a small-sized class without general education students. Students in a special class are exposed to the general education curriculum and are on a Regents pathway to graduation.
Supplementary Aids and Services
Supplementary aids and services are other supports (i.e., additional personnel, assistive technology, instructional modifications) that are provided in regular education classes, Specials, and in extracurricular and nonacademic settings to enable students with disabilities to be educated with nondisabled students to the maximum extent appropriate in accordance with the least restrictive environment.
English as a New Language
English as a New Language Services and Programs:
The district offers two programs for eligible and identified English Language Learners (ELLs).
ENL: In an English as a New Language (ENL) program, English Language Arts and content-area instruction are taught in English using specific ENL instructional strategies by a NYS certified ESOL teacher. This program typically serves ELL students from many different home/primary language backgrounds whose only common language is English and therefore cannot participate in a bilingual program. In an ENL program, there are two components to deliver instructional services, Stand-Alone and Integrated ENL services.
Stand-Alone: Stand Alone ENL is a separate time devoted to English language acquisition and English language development. The required amount of stand-alone ENL instruction depends on the English proficiency level of each student.
Integrated: In an integrated ENL class, an ESOL certified teacher provides services during the students' content area classes alongside their classroom teacher. Some content area classes that are integrated include English Language Arts, Social Studies, Science, and/or Mathematics. Students receive core content area and English language development instruction, including the use of the home/primary language as support as well as appropriate ELL instructional supports to enrich comprehension.
Transitional Bilingual Education Program: Bilingual education uses the student’s native language (Spanish) as a tool of instruction while they begin learning English. This model is for English language learners who speak the same language.
The language goal of the program is for English language learners to learn English as quickly as possible and achieve success in their current academic placement and in the future.
For more information on our Bilingual & English as a New Language Related Services please visit our Bilingual, ENL & World Languages Department Webpage.
Library and Media Center
Information literacy is a skill necessary for today’s world of rapidly increasing information. Students will have to assimilate more information than has appeared in the last 150 years.
As a result of their schooling, students will be able to...
Information Literacy
- Continue to search the library computer catalog to identify and locate materials for individual interests and research needs
- Explore print and online reference sources: dictionary, encyclopedia, atlas, and thesaurus
- Explore the virtual reference collection
- Continue to explore various literary genres within fiction and nonfiction
- Explore chapter books by noted authors, including state and national award nominees and winners
- Discuss elements of a story: characters, plot, setting, theme
- Continue to use a simple research process, learn how to evaluate a variety of resources, and summarize findings in students’ own words
Technology: Computers
- Introduce the effects of cyber-bullying
- Demonstrate the ability to use basic operation commands (opening and closing programs, save, log-on)
- Prepare documents that include a variety of media
- Determine correct keywords to use when conducting Internet research
- Introduce students to the idea of “fake news” and how to make sure their source is reliable
- Work collaboratively with a team using information technology resources
- Adhere to safety and security policies
- Identify personal information that should not be shared
- Introduce proper input techniques
Physical Education
Physical Education Programs offer students the opportunity to enhance their minds and bodies.
As a result of their schooling, students will be able to:
Physical Skills
- Students will focus on the acquisition and refinement of sport specific motor skills, fundamental strategic play, decision making, and sportsmanship through a variety of modified activities.
Knowledge
- The goal for each student is to gain the necessary knowledge and skills to establish and maintain personal fitness, perform basic motor and manipulative skills in a variety of activities in a safe and healthy environment.
Physical Activity
- Students will focus on physical fitness, as well as skill acquisition and development through various fitness and sport-related activities
Intrinsic Value
- Each student will participate with the desire to succeed with confidence, and ultimately have fun, in a safe and nurturing environment; while developing the love of living a healthy lifestyle.
Visual Arts
The elementary art curriculum focuses on integrating aesthetics, studio art, collaboration, connections to literature and art history in an engaging, creative and imaginative environment with an emphasis on the Elements of Art and Principles of Design.
Art skills/fine motor skills are taught as scaffolded skills based on appropriate development of the young artist and accommodations are made for students to reach their individual goals.
- Exploring Materials: Students will begin to recognize and learn to use positive/negative space, form, value and color in two and three dimensional art. They will also expand their ability to use a variety of art materials and tools, and practice proper maintenance.
- Use of Principles of Design and Elements of Art: Students will identify value and color and create art that will allow students to explore color mixing, tints, and shades. They will work on form and create a 2D/3D dimensional artwork that will support value, principles of design and elements of art.
- Cultural Connections: Students will continue to observe art made by various cultures and master artists and sculptors. Students will create artworks inspired by the artists and their techniques.
- Cross Curriculum Connections: Students will continue to integrate literature, mathematics, history and science into various art lessons.
- Reflections: Students will continue to be able to critique their own creations and continue to constructively critique their classmate’s artwork. They will continue to expand their knowledge of art vocabulary that helps support the creative process, elements of art and principles of design.
Music Education
Our art and music programs help our students build perseverance and achievement, teach responsibility, expose students to history and culture, help improve coordination, reading, math, and social skills, as well as nurture self-expression and creativity. The arts connect us to the world and open our eyes to new ways of seeing.
Elementary Music Department Benchmarks & Skills
Music Appreciation
- Students will learn about history and genre throughout their experiences, building knowledge of key musical terms, analyzing melody and harmony, rhythm, and form. Students will learn to read, write, and compose music as well
Movement
- Reinforcing body awareness with various movement activities
Improvisation
- Exploring creativity through movement, rhythm, and pitch
Performance
- Giving opportunities for students to learn to sing, as well as use the recorder, ukulele, and world drumming, as a foundation to performing within an ensemble
Central Islip K-12 Full Music Curriculum
Educational Links
Language Landing
Fact or Opinion (Quiz)
Comprehension Challenge
Homophones, Homonyms, Synonyms, Antonyms .. Have fun!
Word Confusion (a homophone game)
Same/Different (activity with synonyms and antonyms)
Marvelous Math
Mental Math Drills (+,-, /, and x)
Math Libs FUN GAME!