4S Language

Grammar Improvement

2007-01-28T05:40:00.000-08:00

This site is excellent for improving your grammar. Get better at:

Using adverbs
Using apostrophes
Writing interesting sentences
Getting tenses right
Describing people, places and things

Character Trading Cards

2007-01-15T17:40:00.000-08:00

Improve your understanding of characters in the stories you read. Fill out the planning sheet first, then go online and create the trading cards. Here's the link to the cards... click here

Holiday Reading - Contracts

2006-12-12T18:43:00.000-08:00

The kids have chosen a book to read over the holiday, and signed a contract stating that they will finish the book before we come back to school in January. Parents have been asked to read with their kids in order to help them. Here's the books they've chosen:

Matilda by Roald Dahl - Tanhaz and Farisha
Operation Terror by Margaret Mahy - Safwan
The Big Goal by Rob Childs - Shuvo
Goosebumps Deep Trouble by R. L. Stine - Albab
Left Behind: The Kids by Jerry B. Jenkins and Tim LaHaye - Ashiana
The Big Win by Rob Childs - Rafsan
The Mighty Skink by Paul Shipton - Mankanwar
Funny Stories chosen by Michael Rosen - Jaju
Wilmot and Chips by Alex Shearer - Saahir
Great Save by Rob Childs - Aniket

Jigsawing With Non-Fiction Books About Our Bodies

2006-12-11T21:15:00.000-08:00

Each student read one of five books about the human body independently.

They then got together in groups with people who had read the same book. I gave them some thought-provoking questions to consider when discussing the book together.

After ten minutes of in-depth conversation, they got into groups of people who had all read different books. they took it in turns to tell the group about what they had read and to share the most interesting or important information they had found.

This technique is a great way for students to pick up knowledge very quickly, and to get a good idea about what a book is about and how it may help them with research in the future.

Cinqains

2006-12-09T19:28:00.000-08:00

We're writing Cinqain poems to develop our "human body" vocabulary. We're concentrating on human movement, sports and physical activity. We wrote a poem together on the whiteboard to learn about the form of Cinqains. It's about Mr. Sherratt's favourite sport, Surfing, and here it is:

Surfers Line 1: Subject
Brave, balanced Line 2: Two describing words
Paddling, aiming, controlling Line 3: -ing words about the subject
They tame the wild waves Line 4: A sentence about the subject
Drifters Line 5: Another name for the subject

Look out for Cinquains by the students of 4S!

Poetry in Motion

2006-12-05T22:03:00.000-08:00

I found a plan for 5 lessons about Poetry in Motion on the Internet and thought it would be a great way to do some poetry writing while we learn more about the human body. You can click here to see all the plans, just in case you want to work on some of the steps at home!!!

Click on these links to read some sports poetry by other people:

Link One
Link Two - this one includes some activities based on the poems
Link Three

Homework - Acrostic Poems

2006-11-29T23:40:00.000-08:00

you have probably done lots of Acrostic Poems in school before. However, you might not know how useful they can be for brainstorming, working on your voacbulary and being creative.

http://www.readwritethink.org/materials/acrostic/

Your opinions about Bangladesh

2006-11-13T17:26:00.000-08:00

Read the piece of writing about Bangladesh by Kefayeth Hussain (click here). She has written about her opinions about Bangladesh, and has included some interesting information about the country. It is a mixture of fact and opinion. Can you find the facts? Can you find the opinions?

Kefayeth has organised her writing very well by using paragraphs - each paragraph is about a particular topic. It could be possible to give each paragraph a heading - what headings would you give each paragraph?

What do you think about what Kefayeth has written? Do you agree with her opinions? Is there more information about Bangladesh that you think she could have included? How is Bangladesh different at the moment?

Write your own piece of writing about Bangladesh. Include facts (you can find facts on the Country Profile page) and opinions. Organise your writing by using paragraphs the way Kefayeth has done.

If you're really happy with what you've written, we could submit it to the BBC, just like Kefayeth did!

What is Safwan reading?

2006-11-12T19:05:00.000-08:00

Dangerous Trainers Susan Gates

There were two brothers they use to fight alot.
The big brother bought new trainers and the
trainers were big, purple and had soles as
thick as tractor tyres. The mother always
scolds the big brother all the time, even when
he goes to sleep.
when he climbs the staires he makes horrible noise.
Then he use to go to his couch and jump on it and
put his stinky foot beside his brothers nose.

Safwan

What is Hyuk reading?

2006-11-12T18:43:00.000-08:00

In this book Sammy wanted a pet dog and a cat.
But his mom did not agree.
Then he wanted a talking parrot so his mom bought him a parrot.
But it did not talk.
The next day he saw another parrot in the cage and cats in his room. And the other day he saw a group of pirates in his room.
He realised that they were escaping from there old captain red beard the rotten. Suddenly red beard the rotten came into Sammy's room.
What do you think, will Sammy and the pirates be safe? Read this book and find out.

Hyuk

What are we reading right now?

2006-05-30T19:21:00.000-07:00

Rushmila

I am reading "Harry the poisonous centipede" by Lynne Reid Banks. In this story the main character is Harry. So far I've read that Harry was a very poisionous centipede. He was a baby centipede. His mother,Belinda, was eight inches tall. You will never be able to talk centipedish like Harry. In centipedish, Harry's name would be Hxzltl. Its very hard.

Rhythma

I am reading ''Explorers on the moon'' its a book about Tintin.He goes on the moon with Captian Haddock, Snowy, Proffessor Calculus, engineer Farnk Wollf and the two detectives.Tintin and Captian Haddock were going be flat because there was a meteorite heading towards them but it fell a bit far from them.

Writing an Informative Text

2006-05-08T20:56:00.000-07:00

We have read lots of informative texts about Ancient Civilisations. While reading them, we have been identifying the features of informative texts. Here are some examples we found:

Title, pictures with caption, sub heading, paragragh, non-fiction, interesting boxes, facts, easy to understand, set it nicely, staying in the subject, no repetition, simple.

Giving our Literature Circles More Direction

2006-04-02T21:01:00.000-07:00

In order to give our Literature Circle sessions more focus, we are all concentrating on the main character(s) in our chosen books. We thought of ways in which we could study them, learn more about them and possibly develop them.

1. Portraits
2. Biographies
3. Interviews
4. Hot-seating
5. Continue the story
6. Put the character into a new story
7. Change the story

Look out for some examples of what we come up with!

What do we mean by the "setting" of a story?

2006-03-11T20:48:00.000-08:00

In our literature circles, we have been discussing the setting of the books we're reading. Here are some examples:

The River Runs to End of Time by Frances Usher

This story is set in January, 1645, in England. The Civil War was going on for two years. It was winter. The main setting took place in a little cottage in the countryside beside a river.

By: Zahra, Zaima, Armaan, Moin

The Treasure In The Mud by Gillian Cross

The people in this story live in a house beside a river.
It happened in London at the year of 1856.
By: FaRsHeD, LuBaNa, SoHeL and YaMaN.

Ocean Adventure
The story starts on 24th April 1895in Boston USA.The rest of the story is in a boat called the Spray.
Aurthor:Paul May
By:Rushmila,Verkha, Zahin and Saqlain.

Another photo for adjectives

2006-02-19T23:29:00.000-08:00

Well done to you guys who found some adjectives to describe my photograph of the building on the airport road. I thought it was a mosque, but Zahra says it's an orphanage, which is very interesting. See if you can find out some more information about it.

Here's another one of my photographs for you to find some adjectives for.

The Power of Adjectives

2006-02-18T18:14:00.000-08:00

Adjectives are words that describe a noun or a pronoun. Here is an example from the dictionary:

The young boy bought a big book.

The 4S students found adjectives in the books they're reading at the moment:

Poisonous, hard-working, useless, rubbish, old, small, smelly, rubber feet, glossy, dirty, clean, lousy, shiny, beautiful, little, loose, watery, ordinary, rusty-looking, transparent, ancient, haunted.

Now... think of adjectives to describe the picture above. Type them in as comments.

The New Reading Buddies in Action

2006-02-04T19:05:00.000-08:00

Book Review - Space Dog to the Rescue by Vivian French

2006-01-24T18:25:00.000-08:00

Lubana and I read a book called Space Dog To The Rescue. Space Dog is a dog that rescues space. The Beepers are in trouble. Their moon won’t stop dropping cheese. Space Dog goes to rescue the space. We think Space Dog is a risk-taker and a caring dog. We think the book wasn’t so interesting but it was good because it had little funny parts. It was also a bit boring because it was all about beeper family and a beeper moon that cried and dropped green cheese. We feel good about the book because it kind of explains that Space Dog is a space hero and it is understandable. In this story Space Dog is a hero of the beeper moon and the beeper family. We think everyone should try reading it. You can get the book from the I.S.D library. The code is FRE. The authors name is Vivian French. We hope you enjoy reading the book.

By: Lubana and Henrica

Quote of the week

2005-12-20T01:59:00.000-08:00

"The world is full of willing people, some willing to work, the rest willing to let them."

Robert Frost
US poet (1874 - 1963)
What does it mean?

Ancient Man of the Ice by Maggie Blake

2005-12-17T18:23:00.000-08:00

The ancient man of the ice lived around the earth 5000 years ago.
Ancient man of the ice was discovered in 19th, september 1991.
For pets they kept cows, sheep, pigs, goats and dogs. But dogs were
not really their pets, the meat they used to eat was dog. Scientists
tried to paint the man's face by looking at his skull. Scientists believed that the man was a shepherd, who was really short.The ancient man went to sleep, while he was sleeping a huge snowball hit him and he froze to death. Scientists were even able to find out what he ate for his meal- berries and meat.

The book is very interesting , it gives you a lot of information. It was published by Applecross Ltd and written by Maggie Blake. It is one of the books from Sunshine Books. This book was published on 1996. The book's level is 11.

By Rawan and Afif.

Translation of the Bangladeshi National Anthem

2005-12-14T18:26:00.000-08:00

My golden Bengal, I love you.
Everyday your sky, your breeze in my heart,
O mother in my heart a flute plays
Golden Bengal, I love you

Oh mother in spring your mango jungle's smell makes me mad
i die, with your beautiful smell of your mango forest in spring.
Oh mother in automn your what I saw in your full rice field,
What I saw smile of honey, golden Bengal I love you my golden
Bengal I love.

Quote of the week

2005-12-12T21:21:00.000-08:00

During our Unit of Inquiry about how our bodies work, I'm going to be putting quotations on this page that are about our bodies or minds. I would like you to make a comment, explaining what your understanding of each quote is.

Here is the first quote:

"You are born to this world to do some good and not to pass your days in idleness. If you are useless then you are a burden to this world. You must always think of rising higher in goodness and wisdom. Man is the noblest living being. You will be abusing the privilege you have attained if you are not worthy of the cause for which your merits have given you this high place."
Buddha

What does it mean???

Words that end with 'nning'

2005-12-04T00:35:00.000-08:00

We've come across a few words that end with 'nning' recently, and found that many of us are not sure when it should be 'ning' and when it should be 'nning'. We're going to find lots of 'nning' words first, and then we're going to see if there are any rules for speeling words with 'nning' and not 'ning'.

Here's some to start with, add more in the comments.

Running
Planning
Winning

Verbs and tenses

2005-11-26T23:40:00.000-08:00

Verbs describe actions or feelings. People often call them "doing" words, and they often have "ing" at the end. In our spelling lessons, we found a selection of verbs that we could use in our Unit of Inquiry about finite resources. First, we put them into sentences. Then, we learned how the spelling changes when the tense changes. Here are some examples:

Verb - Past tense - Future tense
Using - Used - Use
Looking - Looked - Look
Running - Ran - Run
Wasting - Wasted - Waste

Make a comment and add another verb with the past tense and future tense.

What makes a good speech?

2005-11-21T18:32:00.000-08:00

"If you express your speech and talk loudly then the people will get impressed, interested and pleased with your expression." Meem

"If you want a good speech you will have to talk clearly and loudly, you cant hide behind your book or look at your book and talk." Zahin

"If you want to have a good speech You have to introduce your speech, be confident and don't
be shy, don't hide behind your book." Farzad

Writing Powerful Speeches

2005-11-19T20:39:00.000-08:00

In Language Lab for the next two weeks, we're going to be concentrating on how to write powerful speeches. We're going to read, watch and listen to famous speeches and identify what makes them powerful. We're going to practice writing our own speeches, practice delivering them to the class, record them on tape and video them.

At the end of the Unit of Inquiry on Finite Resources, we will use our speech-writing skills to present a speech about our chosen finite resource. We will be persuading our audience that the time has come to think about how to conserve our resources and to think about what we will do when they run out.

Ayesha has found some excellent websites that will help us to learn about writing speeches:

http://www.kidsturncentral.com/links/speakinglinks.htm
http://teacher.scholastic.com/writewit/speech/library.htm
http://www.speeches.com/

What should our next class novel be?

2005-11-19T05:02:00.000-08:00

We have nearly finished 'Boy Overboard' and I've got to choose a new class novel. You can help me decide what exact book it should be, or just make some suggestions about what kind of story you would like it to be. Have a browse in the library, go online, speak to other students or adults... and then write a comment to say what you would prefer.

Language Activities on Enchanted Learning

2005-11-19T03:57:00.000-08:00

Looking for something to do during Language Lab? There's lots of ideas on the Enchanted Learning website... all sorts of stuff to do. Have a look at it and then chat to Mr. Sherratt about which one you would like to do, then we'll print out what you need.

Here's the website:

http://www.enchantedlearning.com/languagearts/

Mnemonics

2005-10-30T00:45:00.000-07:00

We have identified words that are difficult for us to spell and made mnemonics for them to help us remember the spelling. Here's a few examples:

Brother - Berries Roll Over The Hedge Every Rainfall (Armaan)
Flush - Flush Like Ugly Stinky Hens (Farshed)
Friend - Fat Rhinos In Endless Naans Digging (Yaman)
Defeated - Dogs Eat Fish Eggs And They Eat Dogs (Meem)
Nuts - Nobody Uses The Shoes (Ashfaq)
Because - Bees Eat Cats As Useful Sandwich Errors (Sohel)
Views - Very Icky Environment Works Somewhere (Rushmila)
Contest - Cannonball Over Nasty Terrible Everest Stinky Tomato (Saqlain)
First - Fire Is Roasted Sun Toasted (Rhythma)
Neighbours - Night Eat Ice Gorilla Hate Burger Our Umbrella Rains Strong (Farhana)
Until - Unicorns Need To Iron Lobsters (Yaman... again!)
Leopard - Leopards Essentially Often Park At Rusty Dumptrucks (Mahabubul)
Rip - Rest In Peace (Lubana)
Hamster - Hot Ants Made Stupid Terrible Eeww Roast (Rushmila... again!)
Hot - Hotty October Termites (Mahabubul... again!)
Finished - Ferry Is Naughty In School
Roast - Rats Of America Stink Terribly (Rushmila... again!!!)
Popular - People Overcook Popcorn Up Lying And Racing (Lubana)
How - How Odd Wow (Farzad)
Muslims - Monks Use Sauce Like Iguana's Meal's Size (Moin)
Intelligent - In Nile Telling Environment Like Lime In Gazipur Environment Notice The (Zahin)
Believe- Babies Eating Lolypops In Evenings Very Educatedly (Yaman... again!!!)
Could- Crazy Old Ugly Little Duck (Lubana... again!))

Have a look at these websites for more information about mnemonics:
http://www.fun-with-words.com/mnem_example.html
http://www.nathhan.com/mnemonicexample.htm

Literature Circles in 4S

2005-10-26T20:44:00.000-07:00

We have started doing these this year and, so far, they have worked really well. Small groups of students read the same book and then do some activities about it - activities chosen either by Mr. Sherratt or the students themselves. The books and groups were chosen by Mr. Sherratt for the first few times (Cloudforest with Zaima, Rawan, Yaman and Lubana, Serve Me Stefan with Saqlain,Sohel, Afsana and Afif). Soon the students will be making groups and choosing books themselves.

BBC Website has some great language activities

2005-10-26T03:50:00.000-07:00

Check out the language activities on the BBC website. They're suitable for kids from age 4 to 11.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/4_11/literacy.shtml

Our class book - Boy Overboard by Morris Gleitzman

2005-10-25T00:28:00.000-07:00

We're reading Boy Overboard. Here's some information about it from the Puffin website (http://www.puffin.co.uk/).

A story of adventure, ball control and hope.
Jamal and Bibi have a dream. To lead Australia to football glory in the next World Cup. But first they must face landmines, pirates, storms and assassins.
Can Jamal and his family survive their incredible journey and get to Australia?
Sometimes, to save the people you love, you have to go overboard.

We'll be putting some of the work we do about this book on this site soon, so keep a look out!