Fourth Grade

Welcome to Grantfork's 4th Grade

Teachers: Carrie Warnecke and Marissa Weiss

Email - [email protected] Email - [email protected]

Carrie Warnecke

My name is Carrie Warnecke. I grew up in the small town of Hoffman where I attended Kindergarten to Eighth Grade. I then attended Carlyle High School High School where I met the love of my life, Adam Warnecke. WE have been married since 2008. I knew since I was in First Grade that I wanted to be a teacher, so that's what I did. I went to SIU Carbondale and graduated with my Bachelor's degree in 2006. That same year, I began my teaching career in Godfrey, IL. My husband and I fell in love with Highland, so we moved to what we call home. We quickly fell in love with this small town, and can't imagine being anywhere else. While living here, my husband and I have been blessed with three little boys of our own, Noah 7, Oscar and Finnegan (Finn). Both of the little boys are under 2. We also have a dog named Butters. I feel incredibly excited to work with your children and be a part of the Grantfork team!

Mrs. Warnecke's Classroom Handbook

Marissa Weiss


My name is Marissa Weiss. I grew up in Pocahontas where I attended school from Pre-K to 8th grade. I then went on to attend and graduate from Greenville High School. Since the 2nd grade, I had known I wanted to be a teacher. After graduating high school, I went on to pursue my dream and to earn my Bachelor’s Degree in Education at McKendree University. I had the opportunity to complete both a field experience and my student teaching at Highland Primary. I graduated from McKendree University in May of 2017, and I went on to obtain my endorsement in Middle School Language Arts in August of 2017. I had the pleasure of working as a reading aide at both Highland and Alhambra Primary for the 2017-2018 school year, and I currently teach 4th grade at Grantfork Elementary School. I love being a part of the Highland School District, and I truly feel that it is the perfect place for me!

Ms. Weiss Classroom Handbook

Subjects taught in 4th grade include reading, English, spelling, math, social studies, science, and health.

The Wonders Reading series adopted by the district in 2013-14 leads instruction in reading, spelling, and grammar. Areas of focus include fluency, comprehension, and summarizing. The series concentrates on genres, literary elements, text features, and citing evidence. Much of the writing curriculum concentrates on developing clear, concise responses to the material read in the Reader Writer Workshop and the literature anthology textbooks. Both textbooks include well-written fiction and informative nonfiction. The spelling words coordinate with the selections within both textbooks. The emphasis of the spelling instruction revolves around word families, grammar rules, prefixes, and suffixes. Students complete their weekly spelling and vocabulary tests through Spelling City, a computerized program, which includes a multitude of games, writing activities, practice sessions, and printable cursive handwriting worksheets.

The Eureka Math curriculum serves as the core of the mathematics program. Students must learn and retain multiplication and division facts. After mastering the facts, students continue to take daily timed tests to increase speed and accuracy. Concepts included in 4th grade include multiple digit addition and subtraction, various methods of multiplication and division, fractions, geometry, algebraic understanding, money, time, and decimal usage.

Social studies and science are taught through textbooks, hands-on projects, and experiments. In these classes students learn note-taking skills, research, and presentation skills. Collaborating with a partner or in a small group allows students to build skills they will use in the workplace - cooperation, delegation, leadership, and self-monitoring.Health is taught in conjunction with P.E. using the textbook and hands-on projects.

At Grantfork, students have two very rare benefits lacking in most U. S. schools.While most classes must pick up their supplies at the end of a subject’s allotted time, the Exploratory Room offers teachers and students open space where they can set up ongoing projects returning to them frequently without additional set up and cleanup. Sharing the computer lab with limited classes gifts students with abundant access to online learning -- daily keyboarding, online testing coordinated with the Wonders and enVision curriculum, ability to progress monitor students more frequently, daily practice of spelling, math, and reading skills through STAR, Accelerated Reading, Spelling City, Reflex Math, Skoolbo, and general research and development of computerized presentations in all subject areas.