Frigid Friday

 Frigid Friday

1^st Grade LA

Hamburger Writing: Monday we started the outline for our persuasive paragraph. I showed the students the ‘hamburger’ we would be filling in. The top ‘bun’ was our introduction. The 3 middle ingredients were our reasons to support our introduction. The last section was the bottom bun, our conclusion. We filled this in and will write the paragraph on Monday. I did not see the kids on Tuesday because of their field trip.

1^st Grade MA

About The Same As:  We are still working with 3 bags of 50. Last week the students were trying to find the heaviest and lightest of the 3 bags. This week, our goal was to take the same 3 bags from last week and make them ‘about the same as’ each other. This required the student to take items out of bags and reweigh them. A lot of trial and error went on, but they all got their bags to weigh about the same. This lesson helped reinforce the idea that two sets of a different number of objects can weigh about the same.

2^nd Grade LA

Edward Tulane: Wednesday, we reviewed chapters 11-13 and filled out our settings, outfits, and name sheets. These sheets help us keep track of Edward’s journey, the outfits he gets dressed in and the names people give him. Thursday we talked about connection and point of view. We discussed how connections we have with people, places and things affect our point of view. We looked at the different point of views Edward, Nellie and Lawrence had about Lawrence bringing Edward home to Nellie. We talked about their connection and point of view of this event and the evidence we read supporting it. It was a great discussion. HOMEWORK: Read chapter 14 and finish filling out the settings sheet. On the settings sheet, the children just need to write a short sentence about an event that has happened at each setting we’ve listed.

2^nd Grade MA

Think Beyond: We ended lesson 2 and completed our think deeply this week. Our think deeply asked which measuring tool was the best one to measure the circumference of the egg. We went back and reviewed the four tools they measured the egg with. We then came up with reasons why that tool worked the best. As a class we made an outline of the think deeply. On their own, the students needed to put the outline into complete sentences using PQA form.  

3^rd Grade LA

No class: On Monday all but 3 of the students were NWEA testing. The 3 I had, played Kahoot on their Chromebooks. It was a quiz game over tall tales. Tuesday, the third graders had to switch their lunch time with first grade because of a field trip schedule, we were unable to have class.

3^rd Grade MA

The Yeti’s Pet: We have a Yeti, and this week we found out the Yeti has a pet. In class we started working on perimeter. We will be building a pen for our Yeti’s pet. We measured out the pen we read about in a story; however it won’t fit in the area we have. Next week we will figure out how to build a pen with the same perimeter but different area.

4^th Grade LA

BIO SUMMARY: The biography summaries were due THIS WEEK!!! There are still a couple who have yet to turn it in. I will send out an email if your child is falling behind. With this project, each step builds on the next, it is very important to follow the timeline. Our next ‘big step’ is a list of 10 major events and dates about the students change maker. This will due December 19^th. As all the students have been told, they may come into my class during their lunch recess to work on their project.

4^th Grade MA

3-D Shapes: NWEA testing has mixed up our schedule a bit, but after this week we will be back on track. Wednesday, half the class finished their think deeply, while the other half played triple play and reviewed their polygon knowledge. Thursday, we started our lesson on 3-D shapes. We started the lesson with a list to compare the difference between 2-D and 3-D shapes. Flat and ‘poofy’ were examples given. Needless to say, our vocabulary will be growing immensely with this lesson, 14 new words and ‘poofy’ is NOT one of them. We then went on to the understanding of a polyhedron, a three-dimensional shape whose faces are polygons. We also discussed non-polyhedron shapes such as cones, spheres and cylinders. We ended the class sharing examples of these shapes we’ve found around the room.

Happy December!!

Happy December!!

I hope all my students who participated in the Lion King Jr. Musical had an amazing time!!

1st Grade LA

That’s your OPINION:  On Monday, I introduced the terms: opinion, convince and persuade. I asked the students “should all first graders learn to speak Pig Latin”? They were given a few moments to decide their opinion and think of a reason they felt that way. We then discussed that someone’s opinion, same or different, is not right or wrong; we are allowed to have different opinions. This will lead to us to write a persuasive paragraph together. A majority of the class felt first graders should learn Pig Latin. We will write our persuasive paragraph to convince or persuade others to feel the same way.

For fun, the kids drew a picture of their favorite activity (their opinion), then wrote a sentence on how they may convince someone to enjoy it as well.

1st Grade MA

Groups of 50: Our last lesson compared the weight of 2 items; we are now comparing the weight of 3 items in our new lesson we started. In this lesson we have a few new vocabulary words, heaviest, lightest and transitivity. These first graders knocked it out of the park understanding the concept of transitivity, so proud of them!!! Each student then counted out 50 items to place in a bag for our centers. We discussed counting and grouping the 50 items by 2’s, 5’s and 10’s to help prevent miscounting before putting the items in our bags. The students were then placed in pairs with 3 different bags of 50 items, one being a bag of 50 pennies. They then had to weight the bags and decide which was the heaviest.

HOMEWORK: The students were given a half sheet stapled to a zip lock bag. Half the students are asked to bring in 1-5 of the same items that would be lighter than 50 pennies and the other half are asked to bring in 1-5 of the same items heavier than 50 pennies. Please make sure the items can fit into a zip lock bag, even if it has to be larger than the one provided.

2nd Grade LA

It’s been a long time: I haven’t had 2^nd grade LA for over a week so we did a lot of reviewing the past couple of days. We went through each chapter and reviewed the setting, what characters were involved, and the different feelings Edward had developed. Before reading the book we answered 7 questions based on the knowledge we got from the title and cover. This week we answered the same 7 questions again. We wanted to see how our answers have changed after reading half the book; we will do this one more time at the end. We will then compare our 3 sets of answers. We will discuss what information we read that caused us to change our minds. Before leaving on Thursday, we reread chapter 10 and got excited about what is coming next! HOMEWORK:  Read chapters 11-13. Please make sure your child brings their books back to school next week.

2nd Grade MA

Educated guess then measure: Last week the students estimated then measured the length and width circumference of an egg using four different tools, least accurate (centimeter cubes) to most accurate (measuring tape). The students were to estimate a length in centimeters then measure it with one of the four tools going in accuracy order.  The goal of the lesson was to estimate a length then measure. Using the measurement data they just recorded, estimate again and re-measure with the next more accurate tool. Doing this process with our four tools, the students should have seen their estimates getting closer and closer to the most accurate measurement by the end. Going over everyone’s measurements, some didn’t quite understand the idea to use the data from their previous measurement when making their next estimate. We did this lesson again as a class with the circumference of a roll of tape. I made sure the students were looking at the previous measurement(s) and explaining to everyone why they choose their next estimate. This gave the class the chance to decide if ones thinking was correct or not and why??
*Picture fail this week. I am sorry.*

3rd Grade LA

Grammar: Monday we reviewed verbs, nouns and pronouns. The students were then handed out two paragraphs and needed to identify the words. They also needed to draw an arrow showing what noun the pronoun was referring to. Of course these kids were rock starts!!!! Tuesday we started our Modern Legend lesson. We read “The Edmoud Fitzgerald” and will continue this next week and most likely the following week.

3rd Grade MA

Think Deeply:  This week 3^rd grade math finished our ‘In Search of the Yeti’ unit with our think deeply. On Wednesday we reviewed the Yeti lesson to refresh our memory from the holiday break. We discussed the Yeti story that told us how we found the foot print measurement, the foundation of the entire unit. We also went our vocabulary words, the measuring tools we used, who we measured and why, and if there was anything we would have done differently. On Thursday the students spent the class time writing their Think Deeply.

4th Grade LA

The students are working well on their biography projects. All of you should have received an email with the project’s due dates on them; this is to help you keep track of the project at home. I have also informed the students they are able to come into my class during their lunch recess to work on their projects. Below are the instructions for students to work on their project from any computer with internet. All of the parts to the project are shared to their google account, accessible from google.com. The next step of the project is the biography summery, DUE MONDAY, DECEMBER 5.

Logging into your Google account from ANY computer:

1.      Go to google.com, click on the 9 point grid in the top right hand corner.

2.      Click on Google Drive

3.      Click “sign in with different account” OR “add account”

4.      Enter YOUR school email address: First letter of your first name, last name, last four digits of your student ID, @myduneland.org.

Example: jboster6789@myduneland.org

5.      Enter YOUR password: lower case ‘d’ then your whole student ID#

Example: d1234567

4th Grade MA

Think Deeply: On Wednesday we reviewed our Triple Play with shapes lesson. As a class we read over our think deeply and discussed our ideas and questions on what we were being asked to answer. I told the students to make sure and include our math vocabulary words when writing their answer. At that time, a few (almost all) of them, asked when I was going to hang up their vocabulary words on our word wall. I told them if they were not up by Thursday, they did not have to write their think deeply. One of the students came in my room before I got there on Thursday and saw no words were up; he was quite disappointed to see them at class time!!! It was a fun afternoon…….for me. 
*Picture: Half the class (the the other half NWEA testing), obviously VERY excited seeing the word wall!!!



And, when one of your students dresses like you, hair included, you kind of need to capture it!!

Then the younger sister sees it and wants a special picture on the blog too.....

I have the BEST students ever!!!!!! Each of them make my job so fun!!!!

THANKFUL FOR THEM!!

As you may have guessed I only had half my classes with our short week, but I have a message for ALL of my parents. I wanted to let you know how thankful I am for your children. I could not have asked for better students my first year!! Each one has taught me different strategies in teaching, listening and learning. Thank you parents for sharing your amazing children with me!

Happy Thanksgiving and safe travels!!

1^st Grade LA

We Sang the Song!!!: We practiced our Pig Latin song and tried REALLY HARD to sing along with the video. They were awesome! We also worked on more writing and translating English into Pig Latin, then sharing to the class. We used our connection homework from a few weeks ago for this lesson. We wrote our connection in English then translated into Pig Latin. Once everyone had completed the writing, they stood in front of the class individually and shared their connection speaking in Pig Latin. Everyone in the audience needed to figure out what they said. It was a lot of fun!! They also shared what they were thankful for in Pig Latin. First grade was thankful for their: og-day, isiter-say, other-bray, am-Say, amily-fay, and am-hay.

2^nd Grade MA

Eggciting Measurements:  This week we were measuring eggs, plastic ones, the real ones come later……yikes!! We are continuing our lesson on circumference and the appropriate tools to measure it with accuracy. Together we estimated then measured the length and width of a large egg with centimeter cubes, a ruler, a pipe cleaner and a tape measure. We discussed how and why our estimates should be getting better with each trial. We figured out with each trial we used a more accurate way to measure. The students where then assigned a partner and did the same activity with a smaller egg. We will discuss our finding next week!!!

3^rd Grade LA

Definitions and Change: Third grade made definition booklets and wrote in their journals. The definition booklets were hysterical!! The premise, staple 2 large pieces of construction paper together with 5 almost equal flaps, when opened, one can read the definition of the story genre written on the front flap. Directions were given and an example hung on the board…… Let’s just say, some clearly had vacation on the mind because this was a bit of a struggle. After having to make a few alterations, we all had a booklet with the genre written on the outside and definitions with examples written on the inside. We’ll call that a short week success!! Tuesday, we wrote in our journals about the concept of change, our ongoing theme throughout the year. They needed to tell me how our genre definitions reflect change and how the stories we’ve read lately show change. This will be my bedtime reading over the long weekend.

4^th Grade LA

*Shout out to my 4th grade boys who always remind me to take blog photos at the beginning of class, unfortunately I forget until the end. This week a couple of girls were the only ones left. Next week boys, I promise!!*

Bio Project Continued: I have shared with the students through their Google Drive the following files; change maker instructions (these are the guidelines for the project), a due date timeline (tells the  students when each part of the project is due), biography timeline (they’ll use as an outline for the timeline part of the project), biography summery (they’ll use this as the back bone for their monologue, it needs to be FULL of information from ALL their sources), and a work cited sheet (a very basic work sited sheet, just info on the resources they’ve used and where they got their images). They have all made copies of the files I have shared with them. They have also made a “bio HA project” folder and shared it to me. This allows me to check their work as they go along. They are able to do the “paper work” part of this project on their chrome books OR on printed worksheets. The students can type on the copied files and work on them as they read, if they choose to. I have reminded them they need to be reading their 3 (or more) sources at home and I will give class time for the other work. As long as they have their Google login name and password, they are able to access this project form any computer with internet. If your child was here this week, they should have already showed me 2-3 sources on their changer maker, it was due MONDAY. If they missed this week, they MUST show me next Monday.  As always, PLEASE contact me if you have ANY questions!!!! I know if you are unfamiliar with Google Drive some of the “copying, sharing files and folder” terms may sound confusing.

Fall is in the air Friday!

1^st Grade LA

Ig-pay Atin-lay: We are continuing our work on Pig Latin! This is a fun time in class. On Monday we finished a translation worksheet. The students translated Pig Latin words into English and an English sentence into Pig Latin. First grade is number one! Irst-Fay ade-gray is-way umber-nay one-way! On Tuesday, we listened to a song, Lead Belly’s Pig Latin Song. We then translated the English version into Pig Latin as a class. Next Monday, we are going to try to sing it together like the video. IF my tech savviness is around, I will record it and post it on next week’s blog.

1st Grade MA

Math Writers: These kids were AMAZING this week!! I emailed the all their teachers and let them know how outstanding they were. They were all great at participating and in high spirits, absolute ROCK STARS!! They are always a great class, but this week, amazing! On Monday, we reviewed our vocabulary words from the lesson and worked on some Think Beyond cards. The Think Beyond cards are brain teasers that test our knowledge from the lesson. Of course, they did great! Tuesday, we worked on our math writing. Our Think Deeply page is what we do at the end of every lesson. This worksheet helps the kids write in words what they have learned. We talked about the importance of writing in math. When mathematicians write, they need to convince other mathematicians that their solutions to a problem are mathematically valid.  

2^nd Grade LA

EDWARD TULANE:  This week was a little off because of poetry café. I was only able to sit in for a few minutes but Mrs. Roles’ class did amazing!! Great job poets!

We love Edward Tulane! The participation from everyone is outstanding! This helps the class move smoothly and is more enjoyable for everyone. As we continue with the story, Edwards starts to “feel” real emotions. We are filling out a worksheet that helps us track his feelings, and what has caused them. We are also completing a settings worksheet. By following the different settings, we are able to “map” Edward’s journey on paper. Since I will not see second grade LA until AFTER Thanksgiving, we decided to keep the books in class. This way none of the books get lost over the long break. When we return, we will review where we left off, and reread a little in class to jog our memories.

2^nd Grade MA

EGGCITING: Car seats, circumference, and centimeters…… With this unit we will be configuring how to design a car seat for an egg passenger. We looked over a car seat rating report. The report showed us prices, crash protections test scores, ease of car seat rating, and fit to vehicle rating. We then did some computations when comparing car seats.  I also learned a new way to subtract ;) . Tuesday, we went over the definition of circumference. We started measuring the length and width of a plastic egg in class. We are estimating first, then using different centimeter measuring tools to measure. The purpose is to decide what tool is most appropriate for measuring an accurate circumference.

3^rd Grade LA

WHAT’S THE DIFFERENCE: This week we finished reading two stories. Half the class read “Billy Beg and His Bull” while the other half read “Hans and the Four Big Giants”.  The group needed to tell us about their story and any exaggerations they found in it. We were looking at exaggerations because that is a large component of tall tales. However, while these stories had plenty of exaggerations, they also had traits of myths and legends. The stories did NOT qualify for any of the genres we have studied!! They were only fiction stories…..tricked them!!

3^rd Grade MA

OUR YETI HAS HANDS!!: It took us TWO days but we did it!!! As you can see by the picture, one group had a mitten hand while the other group had the more challenging “high five” hand. The second day, we worked on the “high five” hand as a class. We strategized how to double the size. We ended up drawing a perimeter around the hand and plotted points based our measurements. This helped us because our struggle was drawing angles and trying to use them to calculate the Yeti’s hand. We do not have the instrument to measure angles, therefore the measurement were not working.

4^th Grade LA

BIOGRAPHY PROJECT: As of now, your child should have their “Change Maker” selected and shared with you. All the students but one, who was absent, have given me a name. Their job now, is to collect the biographies and other resources on their chosen individual. These are DUE NOVEMBER 21^st!! The students have access to ALL the due dates associated with this project on their Google Drive account. Over the long weekend I would HIGHLY suggest students read about their individual. I will be giving class time to work on the different steps, but NOT time for reading. I will be sending home the Change Maker Instructions you signed with due date. I would suggest keeping this to help you track the project. PLEASE contact me with any questions!!!!

4^th Grade MA

CARDS, GAMES, AND SOME CRAZY COMPETITIVE 4^TH GRADERS: Last class until after Thanksgiving break, had to make it a fun time. We found the class winner of our Triple Play game, a girls’ team with Bella, Emma, and Becca, GREAT JOB girls!!!  We also played an out of the box thinking game called Set; there was a lot of competition going on. Thursday, we reviewed our vocabulary from this lesson and made a game from our Think Beyond cards. Our Think Beyond cards test our knowledge from the lesson. I had the students in two groups, read them the card and had everyone answer the question. Each correct answer received a point, if there needed to be a clarification, it was an extra point. This was a great review for our Think Deeply we will do after Thanksgiving break. 

 

Happy Veteran’s Day!!

Honoring all those who have served our country

1^st Grade LA

Ecret-Say Anguage-Lay: This week we started to learn Pig Latin. Why would learning a silly language like Pig Latin be taught in High Ability? The language is a fun way to develop and apply our knowledge of vowel sounds and syllables. We will continue this next week too. The students were also given a fun phone puzzle to take home and see who could figure it out. We did this in class, it was NOT homework.

1^st Grade MA

Weight Centers: We completed our weight center activity this week. The purpose of this activity was to have the children predict then weight two different objects with our scales. The vocabulary we needed to use was, heavier than, lighter than, or about the same as. For example, we would hold two bags, one in each hand, and decide if one bag was heavier than, light than, or about the same as, the other bag. We would then use our “hanger” scale and decide if the prediction was correct.

2^nd Grade LA

Edward Tulane: This week we needed to read in class the first day. Make sure we are reading our chapters at home. On Thursday we went over the importance of asking questions while reading. We also went over the importance of interpretive questions, questions that can have more than one correct answer. This has helped while going over Paul’s Reasoning Wheel. This wheel uses a different way to think about the text and formulating questions. The wheel helps to ask questions on the Purpose/Goals, Point of View, Evidence/Data, Concepts/Ideas, Issues/Problem, Assumptions, Inferences, and Implications/Consequences of a story.

~HOME WORK: Read chapter 8-10~

2^nd Grade MA

Centimeters: We are measuring in centimeters now!  We practiced in depth, how to measure using the centimeter side of a ruler. We also touched on millimeters.  We need to know what those “little marks” between the centimeters are in order to round up or down if needed, just like our inches and half inches.  We played with a centimeter cube to help visualize what a centimeter looks like in ‘real life’. By doing this, the students can get better at estimating in centimeters.

3^rd Grade LA

Tall Tales……or was it: This week the 3^rd graders were all given stories to read with a partner. They needed to decide if the story was a tall tale, myth, or a legend. They were also required to give examples from the story to support their choice and share with the class. Of course they did an amazing job!!

3^rd Grade MA

We made a YETI: Well…..almost! We struggled with the hands; we’ll take care of that Wednesday as a class. The Yeti was made by dividing the class into groups, each group in charge of measuring and cutting different Yeti body parts. Once everyone was done, we had to work as a team and piece “him” together. The students had to construct the Yeti with little information given to them in a story. They created this masterpiece with the knowledge of a single foot print size, and went from there!! I took a serious picture, but if you knew this class, the goofy one fit us better!!

4^th Grade LA

BIOGRAPHY TIME: Alright 4^th grade parents………be ready for an email. I will be emailing you with details about our 4^th grade biography project. You should have received a ‘Change Maker Instructions’ sheet to read and sign this week. The sheet is so I know you have seen what this project in tales. Once I receive the signed copy, I will return it. I would keep this sheet to help you keep track of this project’s process. THIS WEEKEND, your child should choose a famous person who has contributed to  change in society. They need to have a name to me by Monday. Your child needs to be able to find multiple sources on this person, please remind them of this as they choose. Next week I will go over last year’s examples, our deadlines, and how they will share info with me using their Chrome books. PLEASE, feel free to email me at any time with questions!!

4^th Grade MA

TRIPLE PLAY: We got it!!! I think we have a great feel for the similarities and differences between our two-dimensional shapes. This game was a great opportunity to help us understand categories and subcategories of polygons. I have my 4^th graders after lunch and recess, so it also helped with our excited energy level we get sometimes.  

Happy Friday

1^st Grade LA

This week we finished our Creaser Cipher wheel fun! We completed a cipher puzzle worksheet. (There was also a worksheet that went home for fun, along with the wheel.) The students then chose a word from the puzzle, found a connection word for it and drew a detailed picture. While a number of students choose sky and clouds, a few, great, out of the box connections were; water and fish by Adelyn, water and glass by Camille and water and sand by Henry!!!

1^st Grade MA                       

Scale Time!!!  We had fun this week working with partners. The class broke into groups of two for measuring centers. Each center contained 1 heavy item, 1 medium item, 1 light item, and 1 item about the same weight as another. The children then needed to predict using their “scale” arms, if an item was lighter than, heavier than, or about the same as another. Once their predictions were made, they needed to measure the items with our hanger scales. We have 5 stations; we will most likely be finishing this next week.

*I want to apologize, I dropped the ball on second grade photos this week!!!*

I am SORRY!!!!!

2^nd Grade LA
Sentence Dissection, say what????? Once we learned what the word “dissection” meant, we were good to go. ;) The students did a great job on reviewing what nouns, pronouns, adjectives, and verbs were. They taught me some cute songs to go with them, if you’ve never heard them.

Our Edward homework this week is very simple, read chapters 5 & 6. The students may read it to an adult or older sibling.  They may also take turns reading the pages with someone. Retelling what they read is always a good idea as well.

2^nd Grade MA

Think Deeply: The ‘Think Deeply’ in math is writing to understand. Think deeply questions will always review what our lesson was about. This is to help the student be able to retell what they learned in word form. This took both days and will be finished on Monday. It will not usually take this long, but I wanted to be sure the children knew what kind of information was important to add.

3^rd Grade LA

Grammar Time: On Monday we worked on grammar, nouns especially. We looked at the many different jobs nouns have in a sentence. We also labeled a sentence’s article adjective, subject noun, verb, preposition, object of the preposition. We also leaned to separate a sentence from the complete subject and the complete predicate. Tuesday we started a new genre of stories, Tall Tales, by reading 2 versions of Johnny Appleseed. This will be continued next week as well.

3^rd Grade MA

Building a Yeti: This week we read a story about a Yeti sighting in the Himalayas. Our story lead us to a Yeti footprint we needed to measure. Upon losing our pack in a crevasse with all of our measuring supplies, we had to measure the foot print with an unsharpened pencil found in our pocket. The footprint was about 2 pencil lengths long. From this information the class will need to construct a life size Yeti……..Picture to come next week!

4^th Grade LA

This was the week of grammar. 4^th grade as well had to analyze sentences and label the article adjective, adjective, noun, verb, conjunction, subject and the predicate. They did a great job!! On Tuesday, we picked biographies to read and started to work on a biography summery. All this will be leading up to our biography project we will be starting in a couple of weeks. I will be sending home information next week on it. In the meantime, make sure to ask your child what kind of man or woman they may want to research. The person needs to be someone who has changed the world; Taylor Swift would not work, sorry!!

4^th Grade MA

Game time: Wednesday we worked on one more worksheet that helped us compare and contrast different polygons. This allowed us to analyze what shapes have same, similar, and different properties. This knowledge was reinforced in our card game we played Thursday. Triple Play is a game using cards with different polygons, front and back. The goal is to get the most points. Points are made by collecting three of a kind in squares and trapezoids earning 10 points, rectangles and rhombi earning 5 points, and parallelograms and regular polygons earning 3 points.  If you noticed, the strategy was to put shapes in the most detailed definition they fit. For example, a square could be named a rectangle, parallelogram, or regular polygon. However, the most points would be earned if it were placed under the square category.