Fourth graders are learning about plants, food webs and ecosystems.  To start the unit the students went on a walk and found plant leaves.  They then described the texture, color and size of the leaf.

The first week of school we participated in a mystery activity.  The source for the activity was from the GEMS unit Mystery Festival.  The stage was set with a crime scene.  Students observed the scene and made a map.  Students wrote descriptions about items at the crime scene.  Next, students read the story and suspect statements to match clues with the suspects.  Information was recorded on a suspect sheet.  Ten crime lab stations were used to test items at the crime scene.  Finally, the students used all the data to try to figure out who was the culprit or even if there was a crime.  Students wrote, drew, created a news paper, or TV news broadcast to report their findings.