Five Minutes of Fame

I captured a few of the students being interviewed regarding their recipes. It was fun and exciting for us and I will let you know as soon as the finished product is complete.

Weekly Update

We learned about fractions using Legos. What fraction of this Lego tower is blue?

In Language Arts we will be starting our first Literature Study of the year. We will be reading Thanksgiving on Thursday and doing many higher level thinking activities based on this historical fiction. At some point this week or next week, we will be doing a readers theater of Arthur's Thanksgiving. 

In Math we started the Three Minute Subtraction Challenge and students have been flying through the facts! In class this week we will also be discussing, reviewing and practicing some problem solving strategies for CML word problems.

I have a fun, hands-on Science experiment planned for this week. We will be creating bubble soap and making and observing "bubble windows". Students will learn about surface tension and flexibility. This project is sure to be good, clean fun. Ha! :)

In Social Studies we will continue discussing and learning about the first Thanksgiving, the Wampanoag people, the Mayflower, etc. Much of this unit has been self-directed student research, which the class has really enjoyed.

As a very special treat this week, we have a professional photographer coming in to teach us about digital photography. Mrs. Kolker taught several digital photography after school enrichment classes, which garnered rave reviews from participating students. I am really excited about this 21st century learning opportunity!

Monday morning students with permission will be interviewed regarding their turkey recipes. When the project is finished I will be sure to post a link.

As always, feel free to contact me with any questions or concerns. Have a super week!

Apple Action

Fun Is In Session!

Our Apple Store field trip today was a huge success! Thanks so much to all the wonderful parent helpers who were part of this exciting experience. Students learned how to create a soundtrack using Garage Band.  At the end of the lesson their project(s) were burned to a CD for them to keep. Possibly the most exciting part of the trip was when we received lots of applause and loud cheering as we filed out of the store. (I don't think it because we were leaving.) Students kept mentioning their "standing ovation" for the rest of the day.

Click the slideshow below to see a few photos that I snapped.

Another slideshow by Smilebox

November

This will be a very busy and quick month! We have this Thursday, November 11th off from school in honor of Veterans Day and Thanksgiving recess is November 25 - 26.

Pilgrim mosaics from math class.

This Friday, November 12th is "Friendly Friday". Parents are welcome to join us in the classroom from 9:15am - 9:45am. I will be off site this Friday at a school leadership meeting all day, but the guest teacher will still facilitate "Friendly Friday".

Students researched the history of Thanksgiving online and wrote down interesting facts.

This week we will be learning about Garage Band, the history of Thanksgiving and geometry and measurement. In accordance with Arizona State Standards we have been doing some functional writing and started writing some Thanksgiving recipes which will will revise and illustrate this week.

A little bit later this month we will be taking a virtual field trip to Plimoth Plantation, in Plymouth, Massachusetts.

As always, please contact me with any questions or concerns! :)

Noetic Math Contest

National Winners!!!!!!!

The Prime Pumpkin Prediction

Do you know what "Prime Pumpkin Prediction" is an example of? Your child does - ask!

Today we wrapped up this fun autumn project. Students estimated how many seeds were in their pumpkin, then they dug in and counted. We compared seed count to pumpkin size and figured out the difference between our estimates and the actual count.

Students also "planted" a few seeds in a wet paper towel which was sent home in a plastic baggie. I urged them to tape the baggie to a sunny window and observe. If the water dries up they should add a bit more. We would do it in the classroom but we have no windows!