Birthdays Galore!

Happy Birthday to Liam and Casasha this week! Two in one week, can you say sugar high! :0) Liam started us off this week with delicious donuts and Casasha raked in the money selling cupcakes and juice. I hope they both had a grLieat birthday at school!



I put a list of upcoming events off to the right of the blog. Please take a minute to update your calendar. The recorder concert date was changed at some time. I can't remember what I told you last. This is the for sure one though.

Thanks for finding those baby pictures. They are adorable! This will be a fun game. I had to look on a couple of them myself. I will send them back home as soon as I finish scanning them into the slideshow. :0)

Thanks also for sending in the $7 for the field trip. If you didn't, no worries. Just send it in anytime before we go.

There is no homework tonight. Play outside. :0)

Tomorrow is our last day of school for the week. There is no school on Friday. Even teacher's get the day off. Yay! Finally a day to sleep and get better. Only alternate spellers have a test tomorrow.

Some kids didn't finish their reading assignment in class. It was board work to go with Ch. 4. So, here is a picture of it if they need to finish up.



Library books are due back tomorrow if they are done with them.

It was so nice having lunch with all the volunteers today. As I have said a million times before, WOW! This school is so supported and it makes a HUGE difference!

Have a wonderful evening. I will be spending mine in a doctors office. I am pretty sure I have added walking pneumonia to my list of sicknesses this week. Good grief. Just want to get better. Soon, soon, soon. :0) I refuse to take a day off to sit home. As long as I am not contagious…I am here. :0) Crazy Ms. Erickson!

Happy Days!

Hello there. Day two without a voice…yuck! It is funny how the kids want me to continue to read the Riding Freedom book out loud to them though, even though I sound horrible! Love it. (By the way, kids are telling on you for reading ahead! Ha Ha!) Just make sure you keep a lid on the events that come up. It is a great book and it moves very fast. Kids feel as if every chapter is a cliffhanger!

Tuesday Folders came home tonight. They are packed with stuff. Things for this summer, PTA news, and their upcoming field trip permission form. I am pretty excited about this field trip as it will be new to me as well. Love when I get to learn too. Please empty and return signed folders and permission slips tomorrow. Please have the $7 turned in starting tomorrow, but not due till the day we go. This trip will not have a fake money buy in cost with it. Everyone will be invited to go. Thanks.

PTA is asking for people to step up for next year. Mr. Pertuit and I have agreed to take on the Back to School Night. When working together, we find it is very easy to organize a fun event for kids. Please consider taking on an event so that it doesn't have to be cancelled. :0( Halloween….NOOOOOOO! You just can't allow them to cancel my birthday! :0) See the green sheet in the Tuesday folder for details.

Homework tonight is to find a baby picture of themselves. We need these for egg day next week on Friday, but I need time to put them into a slideshow. So, I would like them tomorrow. Please have kids send them in a sealed envelope with their name on it to keep them a secret. We will all try to guess who is who on that day. Shhhhhh. :0) Taylor brought hers in today so she has no homework tonight. Yay.

Haylee used her show n tell coupon today. She shared her cheer competition video with us. How fun to see her in action. Yesterday, Tyler also shared his passion with us. He is a Judo champion! We watched his matches on youtube in class as well. How cool! Thank you so much for sharing kid's lives with me!
I am looking forward to Nicolas's piano recital and Casasha's dance performances coming up soon. Keep inviting me. If I can swing it, I will be there. Love, love, love it!

With so many after school activities now, I have had a few kids say that they just no longer have time for homework. My response to them is, "I am so sorry to hear that. " Kids that can't do their homework at home will have plenty of time to catch up on them when they are sitting at school instead of going to the Ranch or Pompey's Pillar. Homework is and has never been optional, and there is always a standard $50 fine. If kids can't fit in a half hour to devote to their homework, then it may be time to rethink the activities that start right after school and don't end until bed time. I have a feeling that there is time, but it is not being used wisely. I find this odd, as part of homework is to learn how to prioritize and organize one's time. Please encourage kids to put their studies first and to find time right after school to finish up their homework. I also talked to the class about this one, so they know the consequences as well.  Thanks for your support on this one.

Speaking of class discussions, I had a parent call last night. Apparently there is a boyfriend girlfriend issue going on. I have not seen this with my own eyes, but that doesn't mean it is not happening. We had a pretty serious talk about what age we should start to think about this. It is NOT at age 10 or anywhere near that! It is inappropriate to be thinking, talking, or writing about specific boys at this age. Right now, it is all about friendships. Please make sure that kids are not writing this stuff in journals or on notebooks at home. I advised them to throw it away if they are. There brains need to focus on school and having fun with friends right now. People are now living to be 90 or 100 years old. They should not be worry about this stuff when they have 80 to 90 years left to do so. Please follow up at home with a quick talk about what 10 year old and 11 year olds and so on are supposed to be focussed on and why. If you do write, TALK in the planner for $50 tomorrow. As I tell my Emma and Beau all the time, I will find two giant bricks and tape them to their heads in order to slow their lives down! They just grow up faster and faster each day, don't they?

On that note, I think that is about it. Have a wonderful evening.
Ms. Erickson

The beautiful thing about learning is that no one can take it away from you. B.B. King

Hi there. Well, I should not have left home today without my blow horn. Teaching without a voice is a little more difficult than normal. The kids were pretty empathetic towards me though. Hoping that I have my voice back tomorrow.

Mr. Carter, the school counselor, will be coming in tomorrow to finish reading a book on bullying to the kids. He started it awhile ago. I have to zip over to Beau's classroom for his learning lunch. We get to eat Wendy's and play math games. Fun! I will be back before the kids return from lunch.

Today, kids bought into their two field trips: the Grewell Ranch and Pompey's Pillar. All but three were able to buy into both. That is awesome! Great character in here! Those that didn't still have time. I am sure everyone will be able to go, but it is up to them.

Today, we also had our last reward coupon buy in. Kids that were able to buy into the field trips were offered this reward.

We will have egg day coming up soon, and that costs a pretty penny for some. What is egg day??? In Honor of Mother's Day and Father's Day, I have the kids do a lesson of empathy. They have to take care of a hard boiled egg for a day. They are offered medical insurance in the morning. Each bandaid will cost them fake money. If they have insurance, then the price is lower. They have to take their child with them wherever they go. This teaches them that moms and dads have to give up doing a lot of stuff they want to do because they have kids. So, they don't get to play what they want to at recess, because they might crack their egg. If they leave their child on their desk, it can get kidnapped by me. They then have to pay the ransom fee to get it back. The number one lesson they learn from this, is that being a mom or a dad is costly! The second is that having kids limits their abilities to do things. It is always one of my favorite days. Kids know to start looking around home for something that they can put on their desk that could work as a crib. A little box works really well. Please help them limit it to no larger than a check box size. This activity is optional. Kids that have not bought into the field trips may want to pass on this one. Accidents happen, and this can be costly at times. :0)

Part of this day is also a fun activity done with each child's baby picture. Please send in one picture of your child from when they were a baby or toddler. Baby is best. Please put it in sealed envelope with their name on the front. We will try to guess who is who. Both this and egg day will be not this Friday but next. That is May 9th. Pictures may come in starting tomorrow. Cribs need to wait for that day.

Spring pictures were given out last week. Many kids have yet to return them. If your child brought home individual pictures, they need to either return them or bring in money to buy them. If this is your child, I wrote a note in the planner tonight. Please take care of this as soon as possible. Thanks.

Thanks for letting your kids check your car fluids. It was fun to hear their stories of this at CC Meeting this morning. Love it!

Homework tonight is Accelerated Math. Everyone needs to be ready to scan in the morning. Please help them if they need help, or encourage them to come in early if they need help from me. I am usually here by 7:45.

In our novel, Riding Freedom, we moved on to Chapter 2 today. This is a fantastic book. Ask your child what their favorite part was today. This author is famous for moving very fast in her writing. In two chapters, so many things have already happened. If your child discusses this with you tonight, write FREEDOM in the planner tonight for $10.

Lastly, if you received a letter from Mrs. Hetland in the mail today or last week for extended studies testing, please return it ASAP. There were many from this class that had NWEA test scores that qualified them for this test. Please check the mail and return right away. Thanks!

Have a fantastic evening. Try not to blow away!
Ms. Erickson

Spring is in the Air!

Make your own digital slideshow

Hi there. I hope your weekend was better than mine. Seems my last weekend fever has expanded to something worse. I am now on medication though so I should be good as new by tomorrow. However, I didn't have much of a voice yesterday or today, so I may sound weird to the kiddos. I know that I probably for sure creeped out Haylee as I watched her AMAZING cheerleading competition. That is the perfect sport for her. She was so animated and so into it. I was so proud of her! Well done Miss Haylee! 

Last Friday, we did a fun little CC Meeting. We were talking about how we can help others out and pay it forward. I shared that when they get a little older, especially the boys, they may be asked to help out on some car work. So, I turned a little life lesson into an inquiry one. Our question? How do you check and and add windshield washer fluid and oil to a car. We took a field trip out to my car. After many, many, many attempts on finding the little latch to open the hood, I ended up showing them. Too funny! Then, we took it one step at a time. Everyone that wanted to help, got to. Now, it is there turn at home. We talked about how every car is different, and that they absolutely need to have you out there with them, but if they could check the fluids in your car that would be so awesome for them! If they do, write FLUID in the planner for $50 on Monday! 

The temperature outside is rising. It is getting warmer and warmer. Kids seem to be needing more and more water now. Please make sure that they have a filled water bottle  every day. In our class, the Apricot Lane water bottles seem to be all the rage right now. Owning one myself, I can say they are pretty cool. They are glass and surrounded by a cool wrap. Many kids wanted to know where they can get one. You can get them at Apricot Lane in the old West Park Plaza next to the new Lucky's Food. Awesome store owned locally…like Arrowhead locally. :0) 

This is the last week for Fitness Club. If your child participated in it, it would be great if they could create a thank you card for Mr. Pertuit. He does this all on his own time and loves every minute of it. What a blessing to have in our school! 

Miss Abi was our star of the week this week. My favorite part of her sharing was her picture of her family ranch. It was so beautiful. We also enjoyed her pictures of Carrie Underwood. :0)

It is another short week. There is no school on Friday. Everyone is on vacation. Therefore, we will have our alternate spelling test on Thursday. There is no book test this week as it is a review week. We will be doing book work all week.

Lastly, I leave you with our picture from Neon Day. Thank you so much for the support given to the spirit day cause. Way to go Team Erickson!

Have a wonderful weekend!
Ms. Erickson

Wear that NEON tomorrow!

Hi there! What a difference having NO wind makes. The classroom just seems calmer, as does my hair. :0)

Thank you for sending in the parent homework this morning. We were cracking up all through CC meeting reading them. What amazing kids from the get go! We look forward to hearing Nolan, Max, and Spencer's tomorrow morning!

We read on in the story today. I LOVE novels! The kids are glued to the book the entire time. Kids that like to read on their own, were allowed to go in the back room and do so. Those that are auditory learners stayed with me and I read aloud. Today, they worked on Character Analysis. As we were reading, we were pulling out character traits about each character we met. It was fun to meet the mean ole frog looking cook, Mrs. Boyle, Mean old Mr. Millshark that ran the orphanage Charlotte is in, and William the bully. We also met Charlotte's best friend Hayward and Vern. Vern takes care of the horses, and horses are what Charlotte loves most in life. The chapter left us with a cliffhanger. It said the bell was ringing. At the orphanage, that meant that the boys all needed to line up and someone is about to be adopted. Oh my! Who will it be??? Ask your child which character they dislike the most in the book thus far. Write who they say in the planner for $10. We will use this data in class to make a graph tomorrow.

In math today, we practiced adding and subtracting units of time. I noticed many of them got this problem incorrect on their review sheet yesterday. So, we did an online quiz whole group today. We took it one problem at a time. It is difficult for them to understand that when they nee to regroup from an hour, they have to convert it to 60 minutes. It does not just come over as a group of ten as regular regrouping does. By the end, they had it. They even successfully did two story problems as well!

Spelling tests are tomorrow. Please help kids study one last time tonight.

Gym and library is tomorrow. Please help kids return books and wear their tennis shoes. They are running their 800 run. They did this at the beginning of the year and now they see if they can beat their time. The strategy taught is an idiom. It is...slow and steady wins the race. Discuss this with your kiddo, telling them it is not good to start out really fast and use up all their energy. They want to pick a steady pace they can keep up all the way through. Then, save a little burst for the very end to finish up strong (another idiom). If you discuss this tonight, write IDIOM in the planner for $10 more.

Homework is a color sheet that we will need soon in MT History. I don't want to give class time to color it, so it would be helpful to just have it done for when we need it. Easy peasy!

Pictures came in today. If your child ordered a class picture, it came home with them today. If you wrote that you DID NOT want an individual picture taken of your child child, they did not come home with another packet. If they did, then they came home with a packet that you need to view. If you want to purchase them, please send in money. You can buy them all, or just what you want. Pricing is inside. If you don't want any, please just return he full packet. Thanks.

Tomorrow is wear NEON day. Please consider donating a dollar or more to United Luv foundation. This is an organization that gives iPads to cancer patients during their treatments. It helps to take their minds off the treatment for awhile. After their treatments are complete, they get to take their iPad home to keep. How awesome is that!!!! What a great way to pay it forward. Wearing NEON signifies that Arrowhead is united in helping others in our community. Be proud to wear those bright colors. :0)

Please mark May 5th on your calendar. At 8:30 that morning, we will perform for you a lovely concert on the recorders in the gym. All 4th graders have been working so hard on all their songs. Please plan to attend and you may want to come early for seating.

Lastly, yet another fantastic field trip opportunity has come our way. Mrs. Auch has invited us to go to the Big Horn Museum in Hardin, MT on May 15th. They have a one day event, History Day, for kids to experience things that happened in the past. For example, they will get to play some Native American games, put up a teepee, go to school in a one room school house, churn some butter and much, much more. How can you pass that up. A permission slip will be coming home in the Tuesday folders next week. It will cost $7 per child and they will need a sack lunch that day. Electronics will be allowed on the bus ride up since it is a lengthy one. Chaperones are needed. Please let me know if this date works for you to ride along. We will be gone all day.

The Grewell Ranch field trip is scheduled for May 22nd. It will be all day. I already have chaperones for this trip, which is awesome! There will be no cost for this one. Electronics are also approved for this one.

Cameras are not allowed on either trip. Kids tend to get all into taking pictures and miss the learning. I will take mine and they can take screen shots off the blog if wanted.

Have a fantastic evening!
Ms. Erickson

Don’t just teach your kids to read, teach them to question what they read. Teach them to question everything! George Carlin

Hello there. Minus the wind, what a great day!

Altana Bank was in the house today. They taught us three very important words, that started with the letter S, that they they can do with their money. Your child is supposed to share those with you. If they do, write the $ sign in the planner for $10 tomorrow. They should tell you…save, spend, and share.

Speaking of sharing money... This Friday is an Arrowhead spirt day. It is wear NEON day. Kids should come dressed to go hunting, do road construction, or something :0) Too funny how neon has circled back. I remember wearing it to high school and being cool. :0)

Homework tonight is two-fold, and you play a part in it. The kids started our new novel today. It is called Riding Freedom. The kids have a skill sheet dealing with quotations and sequencing events. They need to use their books. They know and have promised that they will NOT read ahead. It is an AWESOME book. We read the prologue today. Feel free to read along with us. This is the book that goes along with part of the field trip to the ranch. Your part is a retell event from their lives from birth to age two. We will share these with the class tomorrow.

In Science today, kids did an Earth clean up. This was great as we didn't get a chance to do it yesterday. Tons of trash blowing around today!

Please continue to check the online grade book. There are some missing assignments out there that are bringing grades down. Remind kids that they are almost 5th graders now, and they need to be responsible and get these in. Thanks.

Today in class, we were looking at the author's name of our novel. It is Pam Munoz Ryan. There is a mark over the n in Munoz that looks like this: ~. No one knew what that was called. They did know that is had to do with the Spanish language. So…for $50 tomorrow, write the name of the mark in the planner after they do some google research. Happy exploring. (PS, they should probably need to know how to say it too.)

Have a blustery day!
Ms. Erickson

“Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.” —Albert Einstein

First things first…Welcome back Mr. Nolan! Besides a bad sunburn he had an amazing time in Disney World, Florida. :0) Sooooooo Jealous Nolan. We are soooo glad you are back. We missed you buddy!

Happy Earth Day! We started the day off with a little youtube that told us about the history of Earth Day. What year did it start? Ask your child. If they can tell you what year the first Earth Day began write in the planner for  $10 tomorrow.

We read the book, Bad Ideas, at CC Meeting this morning. We then compiled a second version called Bad Ideas for the Earth. They were very cute!

In math today, we took a circle (a rice cake) and divided it into fractions as low as 1/8. We took a look at how much space in the entire world we have actually for just humans, plants, and animals. It turns out, unless you live in the water, life is pretty limited here. Kids covered 75% of their rice cake (3/4 in fractions) with jelly. This representing our water on Earth. We then read on to discover that only 1% of all this water is drinkable by humans. Wow! The leftover 1/4 is land. We covered this with peanut butter. We then had to divided the land section into halves creating two 1/8 pieces of Earth. On one half we placed marshmallows for glaciers and chocolate chips for rocky regions. This land was deemed uninhabitable. That meant that only 1/8 of our Earth is meant for land life. We represented this with grapes. It was really interesting to see how we are such a small section, yet humans have the ability to destroy an entire planet if make negative choices. It was also interesting to see how many kids balked at the idea of me putting leftover breakfast garbage on their jelly (throwing trash into our waters). I asked them to think about that when they feel the urge to litter on land or in the water.



In reading, we listened to the story, The Great Kapok Tree. It is all about animals saving their environment from humans. Habitat distraction is the number one reason many animals are going extinct. They create it, and we ruin it. We do it for good causes, but it really does effect more life than our own. Good for them to ponder over. They then made a 5 literal question quiz, exchanged it with a friends, took the other person's quiz, and then gave it back to grade. Pretty cool to see what they thought was most important to take away from the story.

Finally, we created our Earth Day craft. Kids used a compass to create a circle with a 3 inch radius. If you watch the slideshow below, you will see and hear how this was done. After making their Earth model, I asked them to write down five facts that they didn't know before learning it today. It will make a fun hall display soon.

Make a slideshow

Speaking of hall displays, here is the one I promised you this weekend. We have received many compliments on this project. They loved all the different varieties and the American Indian tie-in. Awesome job Team Erickson!



Homework tonight is Mrs. Derrig's Secretary's Day cards. They came home with thank you cards. We talked in length about possibly adding in a personal story of a time that Mrs. Derrig helped them. If your child reads their's to you, please write DERRIG in the planner for $50 tomorrow. She is worth it! They know NOT to seal the envelopes. Please feel free to add your own message to the card as well.

I think that about covers it. Enjoy the calm before the storm!
Ms. Erickson

Welcome Back!

Well hello there. It feels like forever since I have blogged to all of you. I hope that you had a wonderful and blessed break. Mine was spent making memories with my kids and family. We added onto our family here at the ranch with two baby lambs, Sam and Buddy. Buddy is five days old now, and Sam is about a week and a half. With every four hour bottle feedings, we stayed close to home during the break. They sure are cute, cute, cute though. They will still be little and cute when we come to the ranch at the end of May. We will hold a ticket drawing to see who will get to bottle feed them. :0)



Tomorrow is Earth Day! We will be taking an in depth look at what this holiday is all about, including who started it and why. We will do a fun art project, writing project, and make a food circle graph in math. We will also go outside and pick up our playground. If your child has gardening gloves they may want to bring them for this.

As you know, tomorrow is also my sister's birthday. It is so funny how she was born on Earth Day. Kristy absolutely loved the Earth. She was a biologist and became a teacher to high school students. She had a passion for environmental studies and for saving the Earth. When she passed away, her son and my older sister adopted a highway for her. Many times a year, they go and clean up the roadside in her honor. Rhett is such a great kid. I think there comes a time when the sting of death wears off and you can just enjoy the memories. I look to Rhett to do this. I see so much of my sister in him. Children are such a blessing in our lives and on our Earth. We need to always make sure we protect both. :0)



I have posted the correct spelling words off to the side. My mind must have been already been in vacation last week. I had the wrong words up and I guess I left the wrong alternate test for the sub. Oh my goodness. No worries though. We will get it all back to normal once again this week. I apologize for the mix ups. :0)

This Wednesday, we have Altana Bank coming in to do a real world money lesson with the kids. This will be 4th grade appropriate, and fit perfectly with our class money system. This Wednesday is also Secretary's Day. Tomorrow's Homework will be to make Mrs. Derrig a card. She does so much to make our school run perfectly. With the new buzz in door, her job has been ten times more trying. When I am up there, there is always 15 million things going on at one time. It takes a special kind of person to do that and not lose their patience. That perfect person is Mrs. Derrig! Please encourage kids to put some thought and effort into these cards tomorrow.

This Friday, will be our last reward coupon buy in. I want the kids to have enough time to use them.

Last week, we had our big Taxes are Due Day. What an eye opener for kids! Kids counted up their money and then multiplied it by 10%. Here were the results…
Liam-$260, Tyler-$133, Taylor-$121, Caden-$200, Spencer-$160, Trevor-$100, Chase-$260, Max-$230, Coewyn-$140, Riley-$190, McLean-$100, Nicolas-$190, Abi-$310, Jen-$210, Ty-$70, Haylee-$200, Amanda-$240, Taryn-$300, Emily-$30, Adelaide-$160, and Casasha-$570.
As you can see, it was a bad day to be rich. :0) It wasn't 100% accurate, but it was real world enough.

We will do another real world activity on Mother's Day as well. More to come on that one later. :0)

With only 38 days left of school (Wow!), the cafeteria is asking that kids do not make anymore charges to their accounts. Please make sure your kiddo has the lunch money they need to make it through the year. Balances will be transferred over to their 5th grade accounts. Thanks!

Last week, we finished up our star quilts in math. It was amazing what the kids all did with just a ruler, protractor, and a rhombus. They all turned out so differently. I will post a picture of the final project tomorrow, but here are the individual ones. Amazing!


Well, I think this about catches us up. I can't wait to see all the kids tomorrow. I have missed them. Have a great Monday night!

Ms. Erickson