About Our School

Classrooms

Featured Programs

Parent Resources

PTSA & CSC

From Kids

History

BROMWELL ELEMENTARY SCHOOL (214)
2500 East
Fourth Avenue,
80206-4214
(Columbine Street at East Fourth Avenue)

Telephone:
(303) 388-5969
Fax: (720) 424-9355
E-mail: Bromwell@dpsk12.org

Mr. Jonathan Wolfer, Principal

A-5: Mrs. Lewis' Fourth Grade Classroom

Welcome to fourth grade! We hope it will be the best year you'll ever have at Bromwell Elementary. In the fourth grade, we study earth science, and simple machines, and Colorado history. We also study reading and writing and math, of course! We will build on the excellent education you've already received at Bromwell (or in some cases, from other schools). We do a lot of things they same way they do things in Bromwell's third grade. There are some differences, though. For example, we use the Alphasmarts (word-processing laptops) in many of our writing activities, and we have special projects and performances throughout the year.

We also enjoy going on great field trips in the fourth grade. Our biggest and best trip is in the Spring, when we go to the Keystone Science School for three days. We hike and climb and explore during the days while learning about geology and weather. At night we bunk down in dormitories after chowing down in the Dining Hall. Don't fret -- the food is good and the dorms are really comfortable! Many students say the Keystone trip is their favorite Bromwell memory.

On this page, you'll find lots of information about how the fourth grade works. As you cursor down, you'll see the schedule and the grading scale and our discipline system, too. Don't let all this serious stuff worry you! fourth grade is a lot of fun, and we're going to have a great year!

Additional Curriculum Notes...

Sally Foster Sales
Our trip to Keystone is expensive, and we manage the costs by having a huge sale of Sally Foster's wrapping paper and gifts early in the school year. Please make an effort to help us with this important event!

The Specials
This year there will be some important changes with the Specials. The Physical Education schedule is being reduced somewhat, and the Art program is being expanded. Our art teacher is new to the building, and will likely welcome parent volunteers and they help they can offer.

Challenge
Ms. Kraybill is our Challenge teacher, offering alternative or supplemental instruction to qualifying students – probably one hour a week. She will most often work with Challenge students in our classroom. She may also sometimes take these students to Room A-1b for a separate learning activity.

Special Education/PD Center
As with Ms. Kraybill and the Challenge students, the teachers and staff members who work with our L.D. or P.D. students will sometimes work in our classrooms and sometimes in their own rooms (A-0 or A-1a).

Bromwell Eagles Always Care
The B.E.A.C. program has been our school's character-education initiative. The B.E.A.C. committee, a team of parents and teachers, helped integrate character ed programming into our classroom activities, usually on a weekly basis. Many of the parents who have spear-headed this work in the past, however, have now moved on. We hope this program can continue, and I am particularly interested in finding one or two parent volunteers to help bring it into A-5 this year. Stay tuned!

What is good behavior?
By the time students become fourth graders, they know what constitutes "good behavior" and what doesn't. At Bromwell, specific examples of good behavior are identified in the "Student Responsibility Pledge" and the associated list of "Characteristics of Bromwell Students." Good behavior is also promoted by the B.E.A.C. program in materials and activities shared with students, and by information posted on our school website. With all these resources, we will refrain from creating an additional list of "dos and don'ts." We are sure that good behavior will be normative in our Fourth Grade classrooms.

Reprimands and Rewards
Of course, normative behavior doesn't happen 100% of the time. Children, like adults, sometimes do the wrong thing just because they are human. We believe that "wrong choices" or "difficult behaviors" don't make a student a bad person. They are a part of any student's life and every classroom experience.

In our classrooms, students who make persistent "wrong choices" will be given a verbal warning and a slash mark ( / ) by their name on the chart. A second occurrence merits another slash, forming an X. A third time makes for a new slash which can then (at a fourth occurrence) become another X and so on. Students will always be notified of their infractions, and only teachers can give slashes.

At the end of the week, X 's are tallied. Students with no X 's or only one enjoy Friday Free Time, a half-hour break given from 2:55 to 3:25 at the end of each week. Students with more X 's will spend some or all of that time in a common classroom in detention. This is how the system works:

A = no X 's -- earn Friday Free Time
& a possible additional reward
B = one X -- earn Friday Free Time
C = two X 's -- miss half of Friday Free Time
D = three X 's -- miss all of Friday Free Time
F = four X 's -- miss all of Friday Free Time & weekend writing assignment

Five or more X 's constitute a severe disruption pattern and will require a conference with the student, teacher, and parents.

Continuum of Management
This management plan builds upon the management patterns of third grade classrooms and, particularly, incorporates specific parts of the management system used for several years by the fifth grade program. As always, we are open to feedback from parents and students about this system.

Our program uses a number of textbooks. They include books from theEveryday Math program, and The Daybook of Critical Reading and Writing (published by the Great Source Education Group, a Houghton Mifflin company).

Keystone

Keystone is a very big part of the fourth grade
experience. You can follow the link below to the
Keystone Science School and see what they
have to say about themselves!

http://www.keystone.org/

Ms Lewis is a crazy teacher! She laughs a lot, she is not too strict and sings all the time.

She gets most of her songs from her kids' radio. The songs she sings a lot are "A Hero," "Respect," and "Ghostbusters" ("Who you gonna call? Ms. Lewis!")

When she gets mad, she pretends to be the incredible hulk and pretends to throw the kid who's bugging her out the window. What's the farthest she's thrown a kid? "I don't know, but I think Australia," she says. I asked Ms. Loftus, who teaches next to her, "Do you think Ms. Lewis is kind of nuts?" "Yeah, sort of. Maybe a lot."

I asked her if she could meet anyone, who would it be? "Coretta Scott King," she said. (That's the widow of Martin Luther King.)

MS. LEWIS: FUNNY AND FUN
by Danielle

I interviewed Ms Lewis. She is a funny and a fun person to be with. Ms Lewis has two children. Her favorite hobbies are reading and singing. She likes to see kids having fun learning. Her favorite candies are jellybeans, gummy bears and Mentos. She doesn't tell her age because she says as old as she is, she forgets her age and her birthday. But I found out her birthday is on December 18th.

Ms Lewis says she's happy 95% of the time when she teaches. She feels happy about coming to Bromwell Elementary every August. She likes to meet new and old students.

I also found out:Her favorite cake is chocolate. Her favorite colors are pink and green. Her favorite food is Mexican food. Her favorite subject is Reading. She's going to leave when Ms Loftus leaves.

It doesn't matter to Ms Lewis if she teaches 20 or 30 kids because she loves teaching!

Here's a Blabber article written by one of
Ms. Lewis' students about two class outings...

FOURTH GRADE FIELD TRIPS
by Claire, Class of 2001

I'm going to tell you about the two latest field trips of the Fourth grade. First of all, there's the Plains Conservation Center. When we got there we thought it was going to be a fun field trip. But it wasn't fun at first. We went to a one-room school and the the teacher there said, "If you are left-handed you have to write with your right hand." Not only that, but you couldn't wear nail polish. But when we left the school, we were excited about goinng to the next activity. The next activity was all games! We walked on stilts, climbed Jacob's Ladder, and played pick-up sticks. After that we had lunch and we looked at the animals, and the man working there took out a snake!

Now, our second field trip. We went to Ocean Journey! Ocean Journey was a great field trip. The sharks were great! We learned a lot about the Colorado River. The tigers were up and they were running around! I think Ocean Journey is a great place.

And finally, here's another piece about Ms. Lewis herself...

FROM OUR PRINCIPAL

Ms. Lewis creates a caring and supportive learning environment for her students and exemplifies personal and professional integrity. Her service on the CSC and as a supportive member of the faculty makes her a critical part of the teaching team at Bromwell Elementary.

- Mr. Wolfer