Ways to Keep the Earth Clean

We are studying about ways to help save the Earth this week. Earth Day is this Friday and today we brainstormed a list of ways we can help keep the Earth clean.

Our list included:

• keep animals clean
• do not litter
• do not light fire
• do not throw things on the ground
• clean up your mess
• do not throw things on the ground
• do not throw trash in the water
• keep our room clean
• keep trash away from animals
• keep plants/animals outside

We discussed why each of these things are important in helping keep our Earth clean and healthy.

Surfer of the Week

A.J. brought in a special football today. He went to a Bengals vs Colts football game and his favorite player Chad Ochocinco threw him a football! He wore his favorite players jersey and brought the football, along with a couple of pictures from that game. He was very excited to share this with our class and had many fun things to say about what he and his dad do with the football. They play catch, kick it, throw it and run with it.

CAFE Strategy

I introduced a new CAFE strategy today called "Tune in to interesting words." We read the story The Windy Day. After reading a page I would ask the class if they heard any interesting words. We made a list of these words on a chart. We are going to continue to add to this list every time we read a story or when the student's are reading their own stories and come across interesting words. We discussed what makes a word interesting and how we can also add these new words to our writings!

Surfer of the Week

A.J. is our surfer of the week. He brought in a shirt his dad wore when he was born with his footprints on it and pictures from when he was a baby. He also brought in a medal he received from a surfing competition.

American Red Cross Heart Challenge

Our gym teacher, Mr. Z wrote an essay for a contest to the American Heart Association. His essay won and our school received gym equiptment that helps teach how our hearts pump blood inside our body. Below are pictures and video showing the obstacle course. What a fun way to learn such an important concept!

 

Surfer of the Week

Riley's mom and little brother came in today. She read two stories to the class. The students really loved seeing Riley's 3 month old baby brother. They had so many questions and compliments for him =).

More Plants!

We completed an activity where we used four different objects to identify the parts of a plant. We used a lima bean for the seed, yarn for the roots, pipe cleaners for the stem and green tissue paper for the leaves.

Plant/Not a Plant

Today, we completed an activity with pictures of various items. Each student had one picture and when it was their turn they had to decide if their picture was a plant or was not a plant. Before we began, we discussed what makes a plant special. The class came up with roots, stem, leaves, seeds, flowers and photosynthesis (yes, I was proud of that word too)! We had a great week learning about plants and are excited to continue right into next week and learning about Earth Day!

Riley brought his soccer trophy to share with the class. He was very excited to share and talk about soccer!


He also brought in his family dog Rambo, Rammy for short. Rammy loved our classroom and the students!

Clocks!

I introduced a new activity for math by myself. This activity is all about clocks. The students have a stack of cards where on one side shows the time with numbers “8:30” and the other side has the correct answer drawn on a clock. Before the student flips the card over to see how it looks on a clock, they are to make their clock show the correct time. After setting the time, the student flips the card over to check the answer.

Number Stories

We worked with the number 10 today. We made our "Story of 10" chart. We used ten plastic cups to determine how many of each number makes ten. We counted how many cups were facing down, compared to how many cups were facing up. We filled in the missing blanks of our story chart and hung it up in our room!

Sharing Time

Riley is our surfer of the week. He brought in his football to share with the class. He said he loves to play football with his dad and brother.

Parts of a Flower!

We practiced the parts of a flower today. We made our own flowers and labeled them. Several students also added their own sun, rain, grass and other flowers to their picture when they were finished. We also watched a great video to the tune of "head, shoulder, knees and toes" that went through each part of the flower.

Listening Station!

We have not had a listening station for the past 3 weeks. Our old station stopped working one day and our new one arrived in the mail yesterday! We were very excited that our new station was able to play cds, as well as tapes. Below are pictures of our listening station and the cards each student receives as their "job" when they go to the station. Each student is given a specific job to help the station run smoothly.