Serious Business

In looking over this weeks pics I was struck by the concentration and focus that the children are bringing to all that we're doing.  They have matured and grown together as a group in many ways!  On Tuesday, we learned a new poem and placed it in our poetry journals, but when it became snack time many children wanted to read and recite poetry while they ate!

Even when it comes to playing cooperative games, our class is showing that they're with "the group plan".  Here you can see us playing "Doggie Doggie", a game of sneaky guessing that Ms. Coppock taught us.

This month in Number Corner the March calendar has us working on computations "to the next 10".  On the the 12th we came upon a word problem that added up to 12.  As a group we decided that it would take 8 more to get to the next 10- aka 20.  But after, I asked the children to "find more math" with that particular calendar square.  Here you can have a look at one student's thinking on their white board.  Wow!  

On Wednesday our big buddies helped us with our next Force and Motion experiment!  Again, our class was "all in"- this time with the challenge of making a marble travel the length of the paper, turn a corner, hit a target and cause another object move.  ...All without pushing the marble with your hands.  Have a look.

Science is All Around Us

On our first week back from February break, we launched right into an exciting new science unit on Force and Motion.  This hands on unit captivated the children's interest right away with a challenge to use the forces of PUSH and PULL to move a stuffed animal on a vehicle with only the following materials: a string, a ruler, a block, and a book.  Have a look...

As you can see, "wind" was soon discovered as a source of a push force and gravity was also employed as a pull!

Later in the day, some motivated friends decided to use our marble track and the force of gravity to make an "automatic chimer"- meaning there would be no need for me to strike our chime with the mallet anymore, I would simply drop a marble down the track and ...ding! What a group effort- check it out!

Adding more science to our week was this month's Farm to School lesson about the medicinal and relaxing properties of mint tea.  Here you can see Miss Meg explaining how mint can be added to a salve to sooth the skin.  You can also have a look at myself and one student breathing in deeply to clear our stuffy noses while tasting the tea.

And concluding our week, but kicking off our March sharing theme of signs of spring was Ms. Freeman with her Forsythia branch for us to observe opening right in our classroom! Thanks Ms. Freeman, we'll be checking on it daily.  

Words We Know

I meant to post this before the break but I want to make sure everyone knows the Popcorn (high frequency) words we've worked on and the words that we often reference on our word wall.  "If it's up in the room you should know it or figure out how to spell it correctly" - that's our guideline.

Birds, Mice and Ladybugs!

During the week before our February break we reconnected with Juli from the Winooski Parks Department for a winter bird walk.  As in the fall, Juli worked with Ms. Garland's class and ours together, first in the classroom and then outside to help us learn about how birds survive in the winter and what we as humans can do if we want to observe them. 

Later in the week we had a ton of fun with our big buddies rising to the challenge making birds (and other figures) with Tangrams!

And now about the mice...I should really say three"versions" of our most favorite mouse, Frederick!  Here you can see three classmates entertaining the crew with a Frederick puppet show.

To round out this post, have a look at our latest math game with Mrs. Lamphier- the Ladybug Race.  After the break we're going to use the "winning number" results to learn a bit about probability.

We're so Fancy!

We achieved our goal of respectful listening on the rug and had a ton a fun with Fancy Day! Below you can see us dancing it out to the Kids Bop version of the pop song "Fancy" and enjoying a quiet lunch in the classroom that we "fancied" up with some table treatments and dinner jazz!

Before Friday came around there were some other memorable events- stuffing valentine cards, making friendship salad and then reveling in all the adorable paper cards that had been carefully made for each one of us.  Have a look...

And we can't forget that on top of it all, this past week was I LOVE TO READ AND WRITE WEEK which our class has been honoring for the month with our sharing theme of "books we love". Here is a picture of one of our classmates sharing her pick, Rad Girls A-Z  which actually features some SBHS alums!

To top it all off we've been preparing for Random Acts of Kindness Day (2/17 but we're gearing up for 2/18) and after watching an inspiring video about spreading kindness we teamed up with a first grade class to sew some felt hearts that will serve as reminders to do a RAK,  Have a look...

The February "blahs" don't apply to us!

In a recent conversation with I friend I explained that while we may still be in the dark and cold time of year, February is full of fun for Kindergarteners!  Besides the wacky holidays like Groundhog Day and the 100th Day of School, what really makes all the celebrating rewarding is how capable the children have become.  Below you can see us engaged in some new routines like group work at tables-
"how many little words can we make out of the letters in GROUNDHOG?" and reading at level books independently, with partners and with a teacher.  Lastly- in preparation for President's Day, you can see us busy with coin observations and coin rubbings- learning from one another by listening and looking.

Hooray for the 100th Day!

Have a look at the festivities from Thursday...
* 100 piece necklaces!  
* a K/1 Dance Party with 100th Day headbands! 
* a mural of 100 things we LOVE about Kindergarten!
* 100 piece pattern block designs! 

-A great time was had by all-