Spring Has Sprung!

It's been officially spring for a few weeks now but with the temperatures finally climbing we are able to add more outdoor time back into our learning.  This week we "planted the seeds" for this- pun intended!  Inspired by one student's "signs of spring" sharing from March, we delved deeper into the life cycle of a seed and here you can see Bronagh showing the children how the seed we planted at sharing time is on it's way to becoming a new bean plant.  We followed this up with a sequencing activity.

Speaking of getting outside more, on Wednesday we watched our 5th grade buddies in the culminating activity from their Star Base Program... the Rocket Launch!!!  "How long until fifth grade" was asked more than once that afternoon.

And of course, I can't miss an opportunity to share how the children are learning more and more from one another all the time.  Below you can see children reading to one another from their "just right" book packs, and friends putting their heads together to create more "vowel power" with their vowel shields right close by.

How do you measure, measure a year?

Any musical fans out there may think the title of this post sounds a little familiar... As I look back over recent pictures it seems as though they all show how much the children have progressed in their ability to work collaboratively.  In Math we've been exploring different ways to measure length and weight.  Below you will see children working in pairs and as table groups to measure tape lines on the floor (in the standard unit of "craft sticks") and bundles of pencils and crayons in the standard unit of "bow tie pasta".

As we challenge ourselves to make our writing stronger, we've been looking to inspiring author Kevin Henkes (Chrysanthemum, A Weekend With Wendell, Lilly's Purple Plastic Purse and more) for a model of how to use "juicy" words and interesting details.  Here you can see table mates becoming more familiar with Henkes' style.

An important event in the last week or so was our final Farm to School session with Miss Meg. The program will continue with a different educator next year. Meg has been a motivated, dedicated, and knowledgeable food educator in the district for two years. In her last lesson she taught us about cacao, a plant native to the Dominican Republic where her mother is from.  We were able to try an authentic version of hot chocolate with a Vermont twist- it was sweetened with maple syrup!  A perfect tie in to our recent field trip to Shelburne Farms.  We learned all about the molinillo (wooden wisk tool). Take a look at what one student thought of the taste... thumb's up!

To the Woods and Back Again

Our Maple Sugaring field trip to Shelburne Farms on Monday of last week was picture perfect.  It was the kind of crisp and sunny early spring day that sugar makers hope for!  I will let the pictures speak for themselves- they show us tapping a tree, understanding how much sap it takes to make 1 gallon of syrup (40 gallons if you didn't know), learning about the evaporator, and re-enacting the whole process through dramatic play.

From the timeless and fairly low tech, to the very present day world of coding... we spent our tech time this week experimenting with using the bee bots to draw and write!  Some pairs of students even wrote codes that directed their bee bots to write a letter!

Friday morning's all school meeting was one of those very "Orchard School" times when everyone present can feel the strength of our school community.  We had a great time playing a cooperative game of pass-the-hoop with our big buddies.

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.