Quotes & Sayings About Fourth Grade

A fourth-grade reader may be a sixth-grade mathematician. The grade is an administrative device which does violence to the nature of the developmental process. — B.F. Skinner

Children without access to quality early education programs start kindergarten with an 18-month disadvantage, and that gap continues to widen. By the time they are in fourth grade, many cannot do math or read at grade level. — Mark Shriver

He reminded me of Gerald Roma from grade school, who used to burn ants with a magnifying glass. He was never quite right. It was weird that he spontaneously combusted during finals week our freshman year in college. Payback was a bitch. — Darynda Jones

I had one of those defining moments in the fourth grade when my teacher said the story I wrote was the best in the class, and therefore I would be going Young Authors Conference where I'd get to hang out with authors all day. — Lisa McMann

If you are building a thirty-story building and you use worm-eaten wood for the frame, inferior structural supports, and other fourth-rate, low-grade materials, what kind of finished product do you think you will wind up with? No need to answer. So if you're building a human body and the material that will become your blood, bones, skin, organs-indeed, every cell of your body-is inferior and of poor quality, what kind of body do you think you will wind up with? No need to answer. — Harvey Diamond

I came up poor. My mother only had a fourth-grade education. My dad didn't have any education at all. But they were very structured. They worked hard. You know, they didn't complain. They didn't murmur. And they believe in the Christ. — Evander Holyfield

California is the highest-tax state in the nation and has been for a long time. It has the highest-paid teachers in the nation, by far - $400 a month more than New Jersey - and yet California is the third lowest state on test scores for fourth and eighth grade English and math in the nation, and has been at the low level for a long, long time. — Arthur Laffer

My reading is dead!' Pilar gasped. The little girl held the fourth grade reading book, rigid as a stillborn, across her open palms as if pleading with the pretty gringa teacher to take the burden away. — Janiece Hopper

All the math you need in the stock market you get in the fourth grade. — Peter Lynch

I loved teaching. I used to teach fourth grade. — Bruce Coville

Most of my teachers wanted to send me to the principal's office. But my fourth-grade teacher once put her arms around me and said, 'You sure write well.' And I've had good penmanship until this day. She was the only one who ever said anything nice to me. That's the kind of motivation that students need. — Andrew Young

When I was a kid, I used to wonder (I bet everyone did) whether there was somebody somewhere on the earth, or even in the universe, or ever had been in all of time, who had had exactly the same experience that I was having at that moment, and I hoped so badly that there was. But I realized then that could never occur, because every moment is all the things that are going to happen, and every moment is just the way all those things look at one point on their way along a line. And I thought how maybe once there was, say, a princess who lost her mother's ring in a forest, and how in some other galaxy a strange creature might fall, screaming, on the shore of a red lake, and how right at that second there could be a man standing at a window overlooking a busy street, aiming a loaded revolver, but how it was just me, there, after Chris, staring at that turtle in the fourth-grade room and wondering if it would die before I stopped being able to see it. — Deborah Eisenberg

Most Americans who made it past the fourth grade have a pretty good idea who Thurgood Marshall, Rosa Parks, and Martin Luther King, Jr., were. Not many Americans have even heard of Alice Paul, Howard W. Smith, and Martha Griffiths. But they played almost as big a role in the history of women's rights as Marshall and King played in the history of civil rights for African-Americans. They gave women the handle to the door to economic opportunity, and nearly all the gains women have made in that sphere since the nineteen-sixties were made because of what they did. — Louis Menand

I was very shy - I didn't speak to anyone outside of my family until the fourth grade. — Margaret Stohl

I was the ghost-faced killer for Halloween in the third or fourth grade. — Rory Culkin

When I went to Afghanistan in 2003, I walked into a war zone. Entire neighborhoods had been demolished. There were an overwhelming number of widows and orphans and people who had been physically and emotionally damaged; every 10-year-old kid on the street knew how to dismantle a Kalashnikov in under a minute. I would flip through math textbooks intended for third grade, fourth grade, and they would include word problems such as, "If you have 100 grenades and 20 mujahideen, how many grenades per mujahideen do you get?" War has infiltrated every facet of life. — Khaled Hosseini

I've gone to school with the same kids since kindergarten. And they knew what I was long before I did. I was uncool by FOURTH GRADE. How is it even possible to be an uncool fourth grader? Didn't we all just string together friendship bracelets and daydream about horses and pretend to solve mysteries back then? — Leila Sales

When I was in fourth grade I was drawing Jordans when my mama couldn't afford them. — Kanye West

Really, he called me that? Ellen DeGenerate? I've been getting that since fourth grade. I guess I'm happy I could give him work. — Ellen DeGeneres

I once made a check of all books in my fourth-grade classroom. Of the slightly more than six hundred books, almost one quarter had been published prior to the bombing of Hiroshima; 60 percent were either ten years old or older. — Jonathan Kozol

Now don't go getting excited that I'll suddenly notice Hutch in the soft pink light of the sunset and fall in love. He's not the love of my life, and no, we haven't been destined to get together ever since those gummy bears back in fourth grade, just because that's what happens in moves. And don't go thinking he and I become best friends in a Breakfast Club sort of way, either, with me realizing he's got a heart of gold under the Iron Maiden motorcycle jacket, and him realizing that I'm not the slut everyone thinks I am. Yes, that happens onscreen. But forget it. This is real life. He creeps me out. We have nothing in common besides leprosy. — E. Lockhart

You can't have an honest fourth grade school teacher. Mr. and Mrs. Jones, Johnny, your son, your only child, the fruit of your loin, is a moron. I have no idea how this kid finds a door to get out of the house in the morning. If I were you, I would waste him and start over. Now, I say that with all due respect. — Dom Irrera

The main thing is, and of course this is a pedant talking, we should start our education on these issues in kindergarten. Instead of saying, "See Spot run," we ought to say, "See the plant grow in the sun." We ought to explain what runs the weather in the third or fourth grade to start out with. — Paul R. Ehrlich

My parents were divorced and my dad was in the Marines. I lived in California until I was 10 then we moved to Bettendorf, Iowa when I was in the fourth grade. I had an older brother so it made it a little easier to adjust to things. — Robbie Lawler

In the sixth grade, I auditioned for a play called 'Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing.' I got the lead, and I was terrified, but I went and did it. — Michael Mosley

I stopped going to school in the middle of fourth grade. Everyone grows up with the peer pressure, and kids being mean to each other in school. I think that's such a horrible thing, but I never really dealt with it in a high school way. — Hilary Duff

Children, of course, don't understand at first that they are being cheated. They come to school with a degree of faith and optimism, and they often seem to thrive during the first few years. It is sometimes not until the third grade that their teachers start to see the warning signs of failure. By the fourth grade many children see it too. — Jonathan Kozol

By the time I was in the fourth grade, I sounded exactly like my father on the phone. — Dick Cavett

When I was in fourth grade, I had a lot of upheaval in my life. Both of my parents remarried, and we all got new houses. That was also the year my older brother got very sick. — Lisa Graff

I was a paper boy, beginning the summer between my fourth-grade and fifth-grade years. — David Boies

I'm remembering one book that I wrote, 'Fourth Grade Rats,' that took a month to write, but most of them, full-length novels, I would say about a year. — Jerry Spinelli

My mother worked full-time running a foundation, but she found all the time in the world to have supper ready every night, feed us shirred eggs on the weekends, and produce a leg of lamb for my fourth-grade Bedouin feast at school. — Isabel Gillies

I got the writing bug in the fourth grade when a poem of mine was published in the school newspaper. Music criticism came a little later, when I was in high school. — Ann Powers

I have four relatively small children, and around fourth grade, they start doing big projects on Native Americas: everything is Native Americans in elementary school. Do you know how many Native American dresses I've sewn, on and on; it's a full yearlong study. And then never again. As journalists, we never even cover Native Americans. — Soledad O'Brien

I have loved football as an almost mythic game since I was in the fourth grade. To me, the game wasn't even grounded in reality. The uniform turned you into a warrior. Being on a team, the mythology of physical combat, the struggle against the elements, the narrative of the game. — Steve Sabol

My parents separated before I was 1 year old. I moved in with my aunt and uncle when I was in fourth grade. I was, like, 8 or 9 years old. I was getting in a lot of trouble when I was in Southern California. My older sisters were in gangs. My older brother was in gangs. — Troy Polamalu

Very talented people make some very bad songs so that people with a fourth grade reading level can sing along. Sure, corporate worship is good- but for me, I get very bored in Church trying to worship. — Reese Roper

I was diagnosed as mentally retarded as late as the fourth grade. — Dannel Malloy

The first time I shot the hook, I was in fourth grade, and I was about five feet eight inches tall. I put the ball up and felt totally at ease with the shot. I was completely confident it would go in. I've been shooting it ever since. — Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

I was always a very quirky kid. I remember very early like fourth or fifth grade doing pratfalls to make my friends laugh, like falling on the ground on the playground and doing like bits and characters. — Busy Philipps

I have a memory of my fourth-grade self wanting to be the first woman president of the United States, but I think that has a lot more to do with my love of world records and reference books than a love of serving my country. — Elizabeth McCracken

It feels like last week, but in fact we're now closing in on five thousand days at war. I always picture Sami as a nine-year-old soccer stud ... and yet there are soldiers in Afghanistan today who were in fourth grade on 9/11. — Tucker Elliot

The New Groupthink is also practiced in our schools, via an increasingly popular method of instruction called "cooperative" or "small group" learning. In many elementary schools, the traditional rows of seats facing the teacher have been replaced with "pods" of four or more desks pushed together to facilitate countless group learning activities. Even subjects like math and creative writing, which would seem to depend on solo flights of thought, are often taught as group projects. In one fourth-grade classroom I visited, a big sign announced the "Rules for Group Work," including, YOU CAN'T ASK A TEACHER FOR HELP UNLESS EVERYONE IN YOUR GROUP HAS THE SAME QUESTION. — Susan Cain

You ever been in a fight?" he asked.
"Not a proper fight ... I got detention for kicking Shelly Walker in the butt with my muddy boot when I was in fourth grade."
Flynn laughed. "What'd she do to deserve it?"
She smiled down at her hand. "I think she badmouthed Joey McIntyre or something. I was a hardcore New Kids fan."
Flynn made an amused, judging face. "I hope it was worth it."
"Oh yes. Nobody puts Joey Mac down and gets away with it. — Cara McKenna

I moved in fourth grade in the middle of the school year, and I was the new kid in school. — Michael Steger

I'd have to say that Nixon feels like the public figure who most dominated my life - from the time I went to fourth grade wearing a Nixon-Lodge button in the fall of 1960, through my college years, which overlapped with Kent State, Cambodia, the China trip and all the rest. — Thomas Mallon

Do you ever tell the truth?"
"Once. In fourth grade. It was overrated. — Gemma Halliday

When I was nine, I started reading Homer. I would get up at four o'clock in the morning, before I had to go to school, in third or fourth grade, and, for several hours, I would read 'The Iliad' or 'The Odyssey.' — Franz Wright

My father gave me an old Olympia portable when I was in fourth grade. Our ancestors came from Ireland. Our family stories of immigration helped me understand more about my characters in 'The Lemon Orchard.' — Luanne Rice

At the fourth grade level, girls at the same percentages of boys say they're interested in careers in engineering or math or astrophysics, but by eighth grade that has dropped precipitously. — Chelsea Clinton

When I made 'Who Needs Pictures,' my first album, I had been west of the Mississippi River one time in my life, and that was in fourth grade. We traveled to California for vacation and stayed with some friends of my parents. It was culture shock, and it was different. — Brad Paisley

I loved being away from school. I didn't really fancy school that much when I was little; it wasn't until I was in third or fourth grade that I really settled down at school and I was much happier at home with my mum and she was very creative and sort of fostered all my interests. — Geraldine Brooks

I've been doing the academic side of music and the rock side of music in conjunction, basically, since I was in fourth grade. — Glenn Kotche

I learned the word non-conformist in fourth grade and immediately announced that I would grow up to become one. — Nick Offerman

And this year, when we end the cruel, defeatist practice of passing children who cannot read into fourth grade, and when our most diligent students begin to graduate from high school in 11 years, and get a head start on college costs with the dollars they earned through their hard work, others will take notice of Indiana yet again. — Mitch McConnell

But hey, what's life without a little adversity?
That had to have been the fakest attempt at optimism since my fourth grade teacher tried reasoning that we were better off without the dead kids in our class because it'd mean more turns on the playground swings for the rest of us. — Alexandra Bracken

In fourth grade, I missed 82 days of school. Out of 160. — LeBron James

There were definitely curveballs in my growing up, from a family aspect. My parents got divorced when I was in second grade. I moved around a lot. Actually, I went to about four different schools when I was in fourth grade. — Taylor Hicks

When you are a kid you have your own language, and unlike French or Spanish or whatever you start learning in fourth grade, this one you are born with, and eventually lose ... Kids think with their brains cracked wide open; becoming an adult ... is only a slow sewing it shut. — Jodi Picoult

The first book I ever wrote was in fourth grade and it was called 'Billy's Booger.' It was an autobiographical piece about a kid who was really bad at math. — William Joyce

When I was in lower school, I graduated from fourth grade, and the principal gave us a summer assignment to take a 30-minute reflection period every day. And, of course, there were no cell phones at the time. She said to just think. And that's lost. It doesn't exist anymore. Just imagine being on a couch and just thinking. — Ansel Elgort

With gray thread Beezus carefully outlined the steam coming from the teakettle's spout and thought about her pretty young aunt, who was always so gay and so understanding. No wonder she was Mother's favorite sister. Beezus hoped to be exactly like Aunt Beatrice when she grew up. She wanted to be a fourth-grade teacher and drive a yellow convertible and live in an apartment house with an elevator and a buzzer that opened the front door. Because she was named after Aunt Beatrice, Beezus felt she might be like her in other ways, too. — Beverly Cleary

It took me nine years to get through the fourth grade. When I got into television commercials, I had to take a crash course in reading. I was 32 years old, and I couldn't read the cue cards. — Rocky Graziano

I don't recall exactly when I first began reading about Lewis and Clark and their Corps of Discovery, but I suspect that it was in fourth grade. — Joseph Bruchac

By the fourth grade, I graduated to an erector set and spent many happy hours constructing devices of unknown purpose where the main design criterion was to maximize the number of moving parts and overall size. — Steven Chu

When I moved to Seattle in fourth grade, I joined the Seattle Girls' Choir. It's a world-class choir, and we competed, toured Europe, and went and sang at the Vatican, so it was a really awesome experience to have that young. — Bonnie McKee

The genesis of my interest in being a writer can be traced to fourth grade when we listened to a radio production of Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew and I asked the teacher if I could rewrite it for our class to present. Nothing like going head-to-head with the Bard, right?
I can still visualise the pages I filled creating this first "great" literary endeavor. Encouraged by teachers (and one doting grandmother), I went on to write reams of yearbook copy in high school and college and, then, to teach high school English. My "real" writing career didn't begin until I turned from education to the full-time pursuit of storytelling. — Laura Abbot

In fourth grade, I learned that reading was serious business, not just a pleasant way to pass the time, and that like medicine or engineering, it had a definite, valuable purpose: to foster 'comprehension.' — Walter Kirn

By the time I was in fourth grade, the teacher had already called my parents more than once to say they did not think I could tell fantasy from reality. I could tell. I could. I just didn't want to. I don't want to, I don't want to, I wailed, marched out to the hallway bench. Again. — Leigh Alexander

She expected a lot of me. When I was in fourth grade working on a book report, she made me start the whole thing over when she read it and said it was barely even legible. "What's wrong with it?" I asked her. "It's not good enough yet. You have to try harder," she said, her voice gentle. "You have to try hard at everything you do. That's all I ask." I rolled my eyes and revised it, and over time her approach wore off on me and I became like her too - wanting to do my best, expecting my best. — Daisy Whitney

I gravitated to Judy Blume early on. 'Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing' was my favorite, with a realistic and relatable protagonist in Peter Hatcher. When I reached the fourth grade, I made the leap to science fiction and never looked back. — Jeff Kinney

I was a Russian dancer in my elementary school production of 'Fiddler on the Roof' when I was in third grade or fourth grade. I was one of the younger kids accepted into the play, and the plays were pretty impressive, let me say. — Lizzy Caplan

I made the decision that I was going to make rap music in, like, fourth grade, so it's been something I was saying for a long time. — Chance The Rapper

It would have to be connected with performance art somehow, either in the front of the house or the back. I was myopic about this from fourth grade on. — James Marsters

There were other stories and other names. Second Base Stace, who had breasts in fourth grade and let some of the boys feel them. Vincent, who took acid and tried to flush a sofa down the toilet. Sheila, who allegedly masturbated with a hot dog and had to go to the emergency room. The list went on and on. — Stephen Chbosky

When I was in fourth grade, a novelist came to talk to my English class. She told us that being an author meant sitting at the kitchen table in pajamas, drinking tea with the dogs at your feet. — J. Courtney Sullivan

this is real, and it is happening now, just as it happened before: We are under the big tree in my backyard, on that patch of dirt where we used to build fairy houses from moss and sticks and scraps of birch. It is late afternoon. All around us is golden light. We have been together all day, in our cutoff shorts and bare feet. It is the start of fifth grade, the start of being the oldest in the school. Next year, we will be the youngest all over again. But not yet. We are playing that hand-slapping game, the one we like to play at recess. You hold your hands out, palms up, and I place mine lightly on top. You pull yours out and try to slap mine. You hit air three times. On the fourth try, your — Ali Benjamin

I wrote my first play as extra credit for my fourth grade English class. 'Can Helen Stop Smoking' was a satire on the ill effects of cigarette smoking. My friend Vicki Haugabrook played as Helen and I directed the show. At the time, my brother Vince was leading the campaign to get our grandmother to quit. — T'Keyah Crystal Keymah

I walked to Seward School first through fourth grade. It's just amazing to me now that we'd walk down 10th Avenue on Capitol Hill. — Stone Gossard

I've been musically inclined since I picked up an instrument in the fourth grade. I just really appreciate music. I love to listen to it; I love to sing. I wouldn't consider myself, like, a natural singer. I just developed it over time, honestly, just listening. I'm a great listener to music. — Kyrie Irving

Morning."
"What do you think you're doing?"
"Hey, you aren't the only one who had a bad night. Fourth grade is rough. I had two hours of homework. — Colleen Hoover

I had to take a moment to wonder who else fell into this category of default enemy. I went through a mental list of people who, in theory, I'd want to hit in the face with a meat tenderizer. My coworker from ten years ago who owes me like three grand? It was ten years ago! You were addicted to OxyContin! Go! Be free! My seventh-grade teacher, who told me that most child actors don't succeed as adult actors? You just wanted to scare me into having a backup plan! Farewell! Good luck! Tori from fourth grade, who accused me of writing mean stuff about all our friends on the playground wall? BURN IN HELL, TORI. I KNOW IT WAS YOU!!! I'm still working on it. — Anna Kendrick

I remember I was in grade school, the fourth grade, in a free reading period in the library. Someone in my class found a copy of the Forbes 400, a list of the richest people in America, and my dad's name was on it. — Jamie Johnson

After the turmoil of the Second World War, my family ended up in Russian-occupied East Germany. When I attended fourth grade, I had to learn Russian as my first foreign language in school. I found this quite difficult because of the Cyrillic alphabet, but as time went on, I seemed to do all right. — Dieter F. Uchtdorf

When you're from a boring town, you have to find things to do. It's funny: I always knew I wanted to make music, so I was always kind of ahead of my peers. I had an MP3 player by the time I was in the fourth grade. — Shamir

We started when I was in the fourth grade, which would have made me ten, I guess. It's different for everyone, but at that age, though I couldn't have said that I was gay, I knew that I was not like the other boys in my class or my Scout troop. While they welcomed male company, I shrank from it, dreaded it, feeling like someone forever trying to pass, someone who would eventually be found out, and expelled from polite society. Is this how a normal boy would swing his arms? I'd ask myself, standing before the full-length mirror in my parents' bedroom. Is this how he'd laugh? Is this what he would find funny? It was like doing an English accent. The more concentrated the attempt, the more self-conscious and unconvincing I became. — David Sedaris

In the summer after kindergarten, a friend introduced me to the joys of building plastic model airplanes and warships. By the fourth grade, I graduated to an erector set and spent many happy hours constructing devices of unknown purpose where the main design criterion was to maximize the number of moving parts and overall size. The living room rug was frequently littered with hundreds of metal "girders" and tiny nuts and bolts surrounding half-finished structures. An understanding mother allowed me to keep the projects going for days on end. — Steven Chu

Because my parents were American missionaries who sent me to public schools in rural Japan, I had to confront Hiroshima as a child. I was in the fourth grade - the only American in my class - when our teacher wrote the words "America" and "Atomic Bomb" in white chalk on the blackboard. All forty Japanese children turned around to stare at me. My country had done something unforgivable and I had to take responsibility for it, all by myself. I desperately wanted to dig a hole under my desk, to escape my classmates' mute disbelief and never have to face them again. — Linda Hoaglund

I don't miss anything about the 1960s, not really. I did it. It's like asking, 'Do you miss the fourth grade?' I loved the fourth grade when I was in it, but I don't want to do it again. — Grace Slick

In the fourth grade, my history teacher gave us a project: Why was the auto industry located in Detroit, Michigan? I didn't know I was going to be an economist, but I knew I was going to do something that was involved in answering questions like that one because I thought that was a fascinating question. — Mark Zandi

This is about as far as I can go without some sarcasm creeping in. But before it does, I must say, with utmost sincerity, that your cookies are good enough to bring some of these wax statues back to life. Thanks for that. I once made corn muffins for a fourth-grade project on Williamsburg and they came out like baseballs. So I'm not sure how to reciprocate ... but, believe me, I shall. — Rachel Cohn

No mathematician in the world would bother making these senseless distinctions: 2 1/2 is a "mixed number " while 5/2 is an "improper fraction." They're EQUAL for crying out loud. They are the exact same numbers and have the exact same properties. Who uses such words outside of fourth grade? — Paul Lockhart

I have only a couple friends, but I've known them since, like, you know, fourth grade or something. I've never changed anything about my little group of friends. I think if you're just smart, and you have the friends who care about you most, that's really all that matters. — Rob Kardashian

I remember liking to write stories pretty early on. In fourth or fifth grade, they would give us the beginning of a story, and we were supposed to finish it. I remember liking that. But I didn't think about deciding to become a writer until high school at about the age of 16. — Jeffrey Eugenides

I'd love to go back and teach primary school. I used to teach fourth grade and fifth grade. I'd love to spend several years teaching kindergarten or maybe third grade. — Jonathan Kozol

It makes little sense to spend a month teaching decimal fractions to fourth-grade pupils when they can be taught in a week, and better understood and retained, by sixth-grade students. Child-centeredness does not mean lack of rigor or standards; it does mean finding the best match between curricula and children's developing interests and abilities. — David Elkind

Thank you. There were three of us kids, all right together. I'm the oldest, she was the knee-baby, and my brother Henry came last. Funny, I miss her all the time, but I miss her most when I'm reading Austen. We'd been fans since we were in the seventh and eighth grade, two Creole girls gigglin' about marriage proposals gone bad. Our daddy teased us about reading each other passages during a Fourth of July crawfish boil, so he named the biggest one Mr. Darcy and threw him in the pot." She looked up, a smile fighting the tears in her eyes. "We refused to eat him. — Mary Jane Hathaway

In fourth grade I had a high school reading level, but I didn't want to go to school and I didn't feel I belonged there. — Freddie Prinze

I remember my fourth grade teacher reading 'Charlotte's Web' and 'Stuart Little' to us - both, of course, by E. B. White. His stories were genuinely funny, thought provoking and full of irony and charm. He didn't condescend to his readers, which was why I liked his books, and why I wasn't a big reader of other children's' books. — Louis Sachar

Here's to falling ... " He levelled his eyes on both of us. " ... in love ... and to the best example of it that I've ever seen, which is sitting right in front of me. And here's to hoping my two best friends finally find the guts to tell each other they've been in love with one another since the fourth fucking grade. Cheers. — Christine Zolendz