Yoga

Chrissy joined us again for another great yoga class! Thank you Union parent's group for funding these sessions!

Reader's Theater

The children have been working on short plays in their Guided Reading groups for the past two weeks.  I chose different scripts at different reading levels, to provide students with an opportunity to practice reading fluently.  We performed The Hare and the Tortoise, A Surprise for the Big Bad Wolf, The Enormous Turnip, and Who Needs a Fan.  Repeated readings offer children a chance to become confident with challenging words, add expression to their voice, and practice noticing and using the punctuation in a sentence.  Each child made a character mask, then performed the play Thursday or Friday.  We all had a lot of fun!

North Branch Nature Center

We had a great time exploring North Branch! We rode the city bus, walked the trails, played in the snow, and saw several animals.  Thank you Mrs. Brigham for joining us! When we returned, the children wrote about the morning in their "community journals".  Ask your child what he or she saw, felt, or discovered on the trip!

Happy 100th Day of School!

Happy day 100!  We had a fun day reading, writing, and solving problems around the number 100!  The children created projects for the 100th day which we displayed in a "100 Museum".  Projects included necklaces and shirts with 100 things, a 100 second video, and 100 hair accessories. We toured the museums in all 5 first grade classrooms and saw many different ways to make 100.  Ask your child to tell you more!

Writing My Opinion

The first graders recently began a new unit of study for writing opinion pieces.  Using the collections they brought to school, they started by lining up their collection like a judge would line up dogs for a dog show.  We then looked at each item, and thought about the favorite one.  Using details, the children had to give several reasons why a particular item was the favorite.  Upcoming lessons include using a counter argument in your writing, and writing a strong opening and conclusion.  Ask your child to tell you about the opinion piece he or she has started.

Sound Waves

Our next science unit of study investigates the properties of sound and light waves.  Students will use the scientific method to conduct experiments to answer questions about different kinds of waves.  Our first experiment had students asking, "Can sound make materials vibrate?"  The children topped a cup with cling wrap and salt, and brainstormed ways they could make the salt move by only using sound.  We worked together to fill out the following chart before and after the experiment:

What do scientists do?

1. Ask a question	Can sound make materials vibrate?
2. Form a hypothesis	We think that clapping, hitting the ground, the radio, our voice, and the bell will make the salt vibrate.
3. Test
4. Record
5. Make a conclusion	The salt vibrated when we used the radio and our voice. The bell worked for some people.  Clapping and hitting the ground only worked for some people.

We recorded our results too. Ask your child to tell you more!

Four Winds

Plate, needle, column, stellar dendrite.  Did you know that these are names of snow crystals? Today Sophie and Nathan used puppetry to teach us that tiny specks of dust, salt, pollen, or dirt are the start of every snowflake. After the children learned some of the names of the snow crystals and how they are made, they used photographs of actual snow crystals to sort them by design.  We also had fun cutting a six sided paper snowflake, and observing actual crystals with our hand lenses. Thankfully we had real snow to study!