“I Hear Fourth Grade Singing” inspired by Walt Whitman and Langston Hughes

Does anyone remember in second grade when we read parts of “Crossing Brooklyn Ferry,” by Walt Whitman during our Brooklyn Bridge study? And then in fourth grade we came back to Mr. Whitman during our Lower East Side immigration unit while reading “I Hear America Singing?” And then even more recently, we re-discovered another poet from second grade, Langston Hughes, who had a response to Whitman’s poem which he called, “I, Too, Sing America,”

What a pleasure to revisit poetry over the years with you…. and how lucky we are to have poetry to help us along.

So here we go, today, we are going to channel Whitman in an attempt to paint a little scene of fourth graders….picture this….

I Hear Fourth Grade Singing

d: I hear Ben singing as he gets into character for a social studies simulation…a society man in coat tails and top hat at the Jacob Riis Tea Party, or a recent immigrant in a crowded tenement looking for a space in which to sleep…

j: I hear Colette singing as she wields her pen and paintbrush creating for us another way to look at our experience at the farm, of meticulous morning glories or of a scene of migrants traveling on a train north

d: I hear Cooper singing, really singing, in beat box mode, again the farm inspires….
I wake up every morning and I talk to my friends

j: I hear Dora singing as she secretly plans another double Jake day, gathering provisions and decorating t-shirts.

d: Each singing what belongs to them and everyone else

j: I hear Eli singing as he shares his thinking and how he checked his work during math poster presentations, “How many milliliters in a case?”

d: I hear Emily singing as she creates many graphic novel panels instead of one – just because her ideas cannot be contained in one panel…no way.

j: I hear Freddie singing as he gets up the nerve to speak in front of the lower school at our first lower school gathering of the year and by the last one in May, he is a pro.

d: I hear Gus singing as he builds our red bench ….. and as he comes up with precise summations of our social studies themes and explorations.

j: Each singing what belongs to them and everyone else

d: I hear Jack singing as he describes our field trip experiences in thank you notes, to Richard Serra, your sculpture “felt like a huge game of hide and seek” or to the judge of the Naturalization Ceremony, “I noticed that everyone (in the courtroom) had a huge smile on their face.”

j: I hear Johnny singing as he helps his classmates who are stuck poking computer keyboard buttons to no avail, singing as he solves their google drive and blog problems, singing as he asks big philosophical scientific questions.

d: I hear Kate singing as she stands before an audience, arm raised as a member of the mink brigade, poised, delivering her lines with perfect pitch and timing.

j: I hear Lila singing as she sits proudly and bravely on a stool at lower school gathering singing a song from Pippin or as she boldly takes on the role of Jacob Riis in our year-end play.

d: I hear Margaret singing as she leads the way in our math challenge sessions, and singing as she works wonders in partnerships encouraging her peers to work more, think again, do it again, better this time.

j: I hear Meadow singing as she channels Barack Obama loud and clear, singing as she aims her strong voice into the microphone on the Brian Lehrer Show.

Each singing what belongs to them and everyone else

d: I hear Olivia Bagan singing as she makes deep connections between work at school and discoveries in the bigger world.

j: I hear Olivia Propp singing the praises of hard work and determination in her editorial on child labor, singing again in her mastery of multiplication combinations.

d: The day what belongs to day – at night the homework creations of Oni, carefully rendered, providing us all with inspiration for what to do next in our curriculum.

j: I hear Piper singing as she quietly turns in a reading or writing response which is not quiet at all but full of big ideas that need to be shared.

d: I hear Polly singing as she emcees at Lower School Gathering, singing as she plays the role of a factory inspector or and really singing as she shares her special projects and handmade games.

j: I hear Tilda singing as she goes into the character of her immigrant personna and recreates the exact gestures seen in Augustus Sherman’s original photograph.

d: I hear Zach singing, as he says what we all are thinking in ways we could not have imagined conjuring up ourselves

j: Singing with open mouths…

d: When is snack?

j: And their strong melodious songs

d: Inside voices please.

j: Singing with open mouths

d: We are hungry to learn!

j: And their strong melodious songs

d: We have many ways to show you what we have learned!

j: Just look at our poems, our paintings, our journals, our blog posts, our dances, our movements, our math posters… listen to our discussions

d: Hear our sighs…sometimes learning is a strenuous song,

j: See our smiles…..

d: Watch our spontaneous conga line!

j: Sing on into middle school all you writers, artists, readers, mathematicians, poets, musicians, humorists, and good friends.

d and j: Sing on !!!!!……

Little Buddies!

By Lila Nelson

We all got little buddies! We have had them all year. We played all these games. Once we had a free time and we played with play-doh. Another example of fun time with our buddies is that we read to them. They pick out the book and we read it. One last example is that we do arts and crafts with them. The last day we saw them they made us cards! They were AWESOME!!! Also on the last day we saw them we were all so sad! I even gave my buddie a chocolate chip cookie!

My little buddy is named Elodie! She is the best! Here are the other pairs.

Livy-Ben
Elodie-Lila
Seb-Freddie
Maggie-Cooper
Simon-Emily
Palma-Dora
Adrian-Zach
Macy-Oni
Quinn-Polly
Alejandro-Olivia B.
Eric-Jack
Cece-Meadow
Hudson-Olivia B.
Gaby-Colette
Dorsy-Tilda
Bayo-Eli
Giselle-Piper
Thomas-Gus
Sonia-Margaret
Gabriela-Kate
Nazir-Johnny

I interviewed some of our buddies; here are some of their quotes. Adrian Zach’s buddy said, “I liked having buddies because he makes me stuff.” Sebastian Freddie’s buddy said, “I liked having buddies because he was nice to me.” Sonia Margaret’s buddy said, “I liked having buddies because my buddy reads to me.” Finally, Gabriela Kate’s little buddy said, “ I liked having buddies because I liked drawing with her.”

On Friday June 6 we saw our little buddies for the last time!! It was so sad!! We all will miss them since we won’t have any little buddies next year! We had a lot of fun with them all year! We will miss them a whole lot. We will never forget them!

By Polly And Emily.

Hawthorne Valley farm is a diversified, Biodynamic farm in upstate New York. Our farm spans 400 acres of woodlands and rolling hills, open fields and meadows, and flowing creeks and streams .

 A while back, the 4th grade went on a trip to a place called Hawthorne Valley farm. They went to the farm because some of the fourth graders needed some time away from school. They  were with their friends and had fun, but had no school work to worry about. But really they were learning about working and helping as much as they can.

There was a lot of chores to do that kept them busy and occupied. One of the jobs was yucky, poopy clean-up. It was deadly. We also herded the cows and the one bull. We ride horses some people knew how to ride on there own but you were not allowed.So back to morning chores. It wasn’t the best for some people they didn’t like the cows chickens and all of the other animals so they would try not to do anything..

We were sleeping soundly until it was time for morning chores. A black figure took some kids away. It was all nonsense after that. People got zipped into their sleeping bags then the fun began. First we did standing races.  We also did worm races. After that, it was too crazy to explain. Anyway it was too squishy to move in the worm races.

At Hawthorne Valley Farm there were four rooms. There was the front dorm, and the ice house. These were boy rooms. There was the pink room and the yellow room.  The yellow room was called the Sunshine cabin because the room was yellow. The pink cabin called the Pink Piggies because the cabin was pink.Sleeping was a big part of the farm trip.
At breakfast lunch and diner, we would sing a song about how lucky we are to be here and just have the lives we have. The food we had was really good to some people. One of the chores was making food  for breakfast Lunch and dinner. Different people Do it on different days.

Gus: “In the 4s, my mom had brought in wood to make small boats and that inspired us to all want to make things out of wood. So two days later I went down with Seth to the woodshop and got wood. I saw older kids making things with chisels and I thought, ‘Wow, when will I get to do that?’”

Olivia P: “4s K: I remember at rest time I would always sleep with my Hello Kitty blanket and my special BunBun.”

Dora: “I remember in the 4s I did not know how to speak English so Lily, this girl, translated what I said since she spoke French.”

Freddie: “I remember in kindergarten that we would build with the blocks and one time I went inside it and hid from the teachers. Then when Louise wanted me, I popped up and said, “Here I am!”

Ben: I remember in kindergarten Jack and I would yell whenever we could “blue and green make aquamarine.”

Zach: “I remember when we first got big buddies in kindergarten I had my brother as a buddy and he kept on hitting me until the teacher saw both our last names and then we got separated.”

Emily: “I remember when we were little buddies in kindergarten and all of us had 4th grade buddies. To me I thought they were 15 years old. Now I am one of those big kids.

Piper: “In first grade, I remember when everyone was sad because we didn’t have a class pet and the next day we got “Cutie!”

Cooper: In first grade, I remember when we got fish and my name won and the name was “Blackal” because the fish was black.

Tilda: “I remember making the playground in first grade. Colette and I did ‘relaxation.’ I remember that we needed help with relaxation because there were only two people. ‘Nature’ combined with us and we became ‘relaxature.’”

Colette: “I think 2nd grade was really fun. I loved going on all of the field trips and I remember on one field trip we saw this turkey walking around and we saw a man dressed up as The Statue of Liberty. I think we got to do a lot of fun things in second grade.”

Jack: “In second grade, I met Zach and we became amazing friends, and still are.”

Lila: “I loved the field trip when we walked across the Brooklyn Bridge and we were so scared that it was going to fall because one of the towers was not on bedrock!”

Kate: “I remember when I was in second grade I was about to be a sister. A couple of months before my mom gave birth to Henry I took in pictures of Henry in my mom’s stomach and I told the class how much I wanted him. My mom even still tells everyone how every night I would tell god to please give me a baby brother and my mom said she was too old but a year or two after she did. Now I am asking for a sister named Elizabeth and my parents are like, “Nooo!” But it could happen.”

Johnny: “I remember in afterschool in third grade we tried to write googolplex. Jake said it was impossible but we kept trying.”

Margaret: “I remember in third grade everyone would speak super quietly so Rich would tell us to speak like Meadow. We would laugh and speak more like Meadow. I remember that in kindergarten there was only one day where there were only six people and I was one of those six people. Everyone else was sick. I have to admit that day was pretty fun.”

Meadow: “On the farm trip in third grade I went into the forest by myself on a hike. I felt so brave. It was a lot of fun being alone. Up on the hill when everything was still. No sound. Just air blowing on the trees. So peaceful, like I was the only person alive. Then I heard the bell ring and I ran back to the farm. I almost tripped. I will never forget that memory.”

Olivia B: “I remember when Rachel said, “Make this line lineer during the PE walk and then she wrote a story that had a bunch of typos in it and she said, “What’s wrong with this story?” and I said, “Make this story lineer!”

Oni: “I remember in third grade, we got to have frogs and we had to order them four times then on the 5th time we got them one frog finally survived. The one that survived eventually escaped over spring break and dried out.”

Eli: “…on the farm trip in fourth grade, Cooper got stuck between the bunkbed and the wall and right before he got out I went to get Celeste and when we came back, he was on his bed. And when Celeste left he kept on doing it…”

Polly: “In 4th grade we got to be an emcee. I went 2 times. The first time was about New Year’s Eve, and the second time was about Star Wars and I love Star Wars!”

by Olivia Bagan and Piper Jassem

Over the last few weeks our 4th grade classes have been learning about the middle school and how it works. We got tours and the student reps and teachers came in to tell us about middle school and what we are going to learn about. Also the parents had a meeting about what to expect in 5th grade and middle school. In our class (DJ4) there are 16 people who are excited for middle school and 2 people are scared for middle school.

So many things are changing for us from the transition from lower school to middle school. For example, you get to do a lot more by yourself and you get to go from class to class by walking. You need to buy your own supplies. You have assignments for during summer break. You have a homeroom with a core teacher who teaches you social studies and reading. You have an advisor who helps you all throughout the school year but helps you out the most during the beginning of the year. You can join different clubs and teams. Some of them are, The Middle School Newspaper, the soccer team, the basketball team, the robotics team, etc.

3 people from DJ4 are leaving. Lila, Kate M., and Polly. We want to say a special goodbye to them because we are going to miss them so much! We all hope they have a great time in Middle School and we wish them good luck!

by Kate and Cooper

In September 2013 Deborah and Jake’s fourth grade class took a field trip to Prospect Park in Brooklyn. They saw this bird  and then had lunch. After lunch they all went under a big weeping willow and the weeping willow’s

branches were down to the ground. When Deborah’s class was leaving they stood next to a tree and took a photo of themselves.

Alot of kids were more familiar with Central Park because they live near there so it was nice to learn about Prospect Park and to just get out and see nature and get out and play. At the end there was extra time to go to the playground and have some run around time to get the silliness out of our bodies.

Over all most of the class liked the field trip! Some people in the class who hated bugs and nature but loved video games ended up enjoying themselves and wanting more field trips like that one!

by Colette Leong and Dora Bremond

This is for 2nd Graders to read!

During Double Jake Day, Jake and Jacob play Double Jake day tag and wear the same t-shirt. On the shirt it says: “WASH IT WEAR IT WASH IT”. Dora, Colette and Olivia P. made up Double Jake Day. They give out candy at the end of Double Jake Day. Deborah and Jake’s class love the candy that we give out. Jake and Jacob play Double Jake Day tag but they get lots, and lots of rests.

Jake and Jacob prefer Kickball and Red Light Green Light. They have excuses for not playing tag, like “I am so full, it was taco day” or “My shoes are not right for this” but we do not care. They gotta do what they gotta do on Double Jake day. The world isn’t always a happy family. We would do this for other teachers but Jake and Jacob are the only ones who have the same name and go to recess on the same day. This Double Jake Day only happens once a week but it is not fun until the candy part, well that’s what we think. Sometimes it is fun, for example, the first Double Jake Day was really fun! Double Jake Day is on Friday. Once on a Double Jake Day we made a presentation for Double Jake Day. We Included a baby saying “it’s friday!” In our presentation. You should make up games like Double Jake Day – Dora and Colette

P. S

2nd graders, Since Jake and Jacob are both teaching 3rd grade you should do Double Jake Day or make up a different thing, but we suggest you do something like Double Jake Day. One of you has to volunteer to bring candy, or maybe 3 of you!

Over the year, the blog just has been a thought in the back of our heads. We had no idea that we would be posting on the blog. Now we use it almost every day. We post book reviews and our thoughts about what we are learning. In fact, Cooper did not know what it was before the teacher told us that we can post on it. Everything that we post on the blog is the latest and most interesting topics (most of the time). What Zach likes to write about the most is the field trips we take and what we are thinking about the things we learn. The blog has always been a helpful tool for the 4th graders to inform the teachers and parents about what we have learned and have been doing. I hope it has been as helpful for you as it has for us.

By Zach and Gus

One day, Debra the math teacher came into Deborah and Jake’s fourth grade and told the fourth graders about a project they were going to work on. Debra called it “the bottle project”. Debra said that you could come up with your own question and solve it with a partner. The brand of the bottles was called NuPure. There was a video and all of the fourth graders watched it, that is how they came up with their questions.

First the fourth graders looked at the video about three times. Some fourth graders would pause the video to count how many bottles are in a case. After they solved the answers to what they need to know they had to figure out how much you need to multiply to get another answer you need. Most of the fourth graders asked how many bottles are in a pallet. The answer was 1,872 because there was 24 bottles in a case and there are 13 packs in a flat and 24×13=312 and then there are 6 flats in a pallet so 312×6=1,872. Some fourth graders had really big questions like two partners named Olivia and Olivia did a question how many bottles are in a wall? They still haven’t got their exact answer yet. They had to solve 1,872×36 they got a different answer than the calculator, the calculator got 67,392 and they got 63,792 or I think 63,972. A lot of fourth graders liked this project.

After the fourth graders finished their projects they showed their posters to the whole class. Another woman came in to the class and videotaped all of us showing our posters. It was fun showing our posters to the whole class. Olivia P hopes we get projects like this one in fifth grade too!

By Olivia Propp

By Freddie and Benjamin

Being in fourth grade is a full time responsibility, you are a role model for the Lower School. All of the other kids look up to you. Some fourth graders are excited for middle school because you get dessert sometimes and chocolate milk during lunch. Some are worried because there’s more homework.

10 people in Deborah and Jake’s class are excited for middle school, 2 are worried, and 2 feel differently. Jake, one of the teachers is excited for the fourth graders to go to middle school because he’s excited for the next step in the fourth graders lives.

To some people middle school is a whole different life.  People are literally doing everything different.  You do not have to walk with your class, you have to do homework over the weekend and things like that.

Middle school can be a big scary place, but if you like homework you’ve got no problem! So you should start to like homework and try your hardest.

In middle school it is like you are not the oldest and not the youngest so that means you have to work really hard but not to hard.  You also have to be ready to be only a big buddy and to get ready for the second stage in your life.