Grade 4 at Bertschi
In Grade 4, students step into genuinely sophisticated academic work. Fourth graders read and discuss complex literature, conduct multi-step research projects, write across multiple genres with increasing craft and independence, and tackle multi-digit multiplication, division, fractions, and decimals. They manage deadlines, navigate group dynamics, advocate for themselves, and begin to see their learning as connected to the world beyond the classroom. By the end of the year, they are independent thinkers who can find information, evaluate it, form an opinion, and make a case.
Grade 4 Math
Grade 4 math builds computational fluency and flexible thinking in equal measure. Accelerated math is offered using the fifth grade Reveal Math curriculum as the core. Fourth graders engage in multi-digit addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, and algebra. Students learn multiple strategies for each operation so they can choose the most efficient approach for any problem. They also work deeply with fractions and decimals, exploring equivalencies and operations across fractions, mixed numbers, and decimals.
Once a week, the entire grade gathers for Big Math, an open-ended collaborative project that puts mathematical skills to work in real-world contexts. Big Math asks students to think flexibly, collaborate with new peers, and explore the parts of mathematics that live beyond calculation: estimation, reasoning, data analysis, and creative problem-solving. Daily math conversations require students to explain their thinking and justify their reasoning, building the mathematical communication skills that matter as much as the answers themselves.
Grade 4 Language Arts
Reading in Grade 4 moves into genuine literary analysis. Fourth graders read complex novels in small literature circles, discussing character motivation, plot, theme, and inference while learning to respectfully challenge each other's interpretations and support their own with evidence from the text. Nonfiction reading is equally rigorous, with students reading articles and primary sources to fuel research projects and practice deriving meaning from both explicit and implied information.
Writing in Grade 4 spans the full range of genres, with an emphasis on the six writing traits: ideas, organization, voice, word choice, sentence fluency, and conventions. Students conduct full research projects from start to finish, formulating questions, gathering information from reliable sources, taking notes, drafting, revising, and presenting final work. Keyboarding, cursive, vocabulary development, and literary devices are woven throughout the year.
Science, Technology, Engineering, Art, and Mathematics (STEAM)
In Grade 4, STEAM learning becomes genuinely sophisticated, with students applying scientific, technological, and creative thinking to complex, open-ended challenges. In science, fourth graders investigate nutrition, human biology, and environmental systems, developing the ability to gather evidence, analyze data, and draw conclusions. In robotics and technology, students take on more advanced coding challenges and computational thinking projects, building the logical reasoning and persistence that serious technical work requires. The Food Truck Project integrates math, design thinking, and economics into a single extended challenge, asking students to model a real business from concept to pitch. In art, fourth graders develop increasing technical mastery and creative independence, producing work that reflects their growing ability to make intentional choices about materials, form, and meaning. In drama, every fourth grader performs a full production in Bertschi's drama lab, drawing on years of accumulated creative confidence and collaborative skill. Across all of these subjects, specialist teachers collaborate closely with classroom teachers to ensure that STEAM thinking is woven into the fabric of Grade 4 learning, not siloed into separate class periods.
Social-Emotional Learning (SEL)
Grade 4 is a year of deepening self-knowledge and expanding interpersonal sophistication, and the SEL curriculum is designed to match that developmental moment. Fourth graders create identity maps early in the year, exploring their own values, beliefs, and experiences as a foundation for the more complex social and academic work ahead. Personal creeds, developed over the course of the year, ask students to articulate what they stand for and how they want to show up in the world. These are not abstract exercises: they connect directly to the collaborative demands of literature circles, research projects, and the Food Truck Project, all of which require students to navigate multiple perspectives, manage disagreements, and follow through on shared commitments. Verbal and nonverbal communication are explicit focuses in Grade 4. Students learn to read body language, manage tone, and understand the difference between intent and impact in their interactions with peers. Empathy, self-regulation, and impulse control are practiced through classroom discussions, morning meetings, and health education using the FLASH curriculum. Fourth graders also develop the executive function skills that increasingly ambitious projects demand: deadline management, self-advocacy, time management, and the ability to stay organized across multiple concurrent assignments. By the end of Grade 4, students have the emotional intelligence, collaborative habits, and self-directedness to take on the leadership expectations of Grade 5.
Learning in Action
At Bertschi, students connect learning to their families, communities, and the world around them. Scroll below to see a few Grade 4 learning experiences.
The Food Truck Project
Fourth graders end the year by launching a food truck. Each student designs a food truck concept to address a food need in Seattle, developing a full business plan that includes menu development, cost analysis, profit and loss projections, pricing strategy, and a pitch presentation to peers. The project integrates fourth grade math (multi-digit operations, decimals, fractions, and measurement), persuasive writing, research, and economics into a single capstone experience, and gives students an early, concrete experience of what it means to think like an entrepreneur.
Big Math: Real-World Problem Solving
Every week, the entire Grade 4 cohort comes together for Big Math, a collaborative, open-ended project that applies mathematical skills to real-world contexts. Big Math problems are open-ended: there's more than one right approach, and the goal is flexible thinking as much as correct answers. Students work with peers, defend their reasoning, and discover that math extends far beyond calculation into data, design, measurement, and logic. It's one of the clearest expressions of how Bertschi approaches mathematical thinking.
World Religions: Research and Field Study
Fourth graders study five major world religions through a research process that combines note-taking, primary source analysis, and direct experience. Students visit culturally and spiritually significant spaces in Seattle, interact with community members, and research deities, major figures, and traditions before synthesizing their findings into independent inquiry projects. The unit builds research skills, cross-cultural understanding, and the ability to discuss complex and sensitive topics with precision and respect, skills that transfer directly to the academic and civic demands of middle school.
Literature Circles: Reading Like a Scholar
Fourth graders engage in small literature circles, reading and discussing a rotating set of novels spanning cultures, identities, and historical periods. Students come prepared, ask questions of the text, respectfully push back on each other's interpretations, and form and defend their own opinions. Books have included Where the Mountain Meets the Moon, The Night Diary, Finding Langston, Song for a Whale, and Too Bright to See. The literature circle model develops close reading, evidence-based argumentation, and the intellectual confidence to hold and defend a point of view.
Portrait of a Whole Person
In this signature Grade 4 project, students investigate the contributions of people with visible and invisible disabilities. They examine the disability rights movement, research a specific disability, and present their findings in a format of their own design. The project develops the full research and writing pipeline: question formation, note-taking from multiple sources, drafting, revision, and public presentation. It also builds the habit of looking past surface-level narratives to find the complete story.