Declaration of Independece

As part of our study of the American Revolution, students took on Declaration Matching challenge. They tried to match translated, easier to understand phrases to actual phrases from the Declaration of Independence. It was tough but helped us gain a better understanding of what the Declaration of Independence actually means!

Reading Musical Chairs

Each Tuesday we get to go to the school library and check out books. When we get back to class we are so excited to read our books and show our books to our friends. One day after library, we decided to play Reading Musical Chairs. When the music plays, you move around the classroom. When the music stops, find a chair and read the book that is in that spot. We played over and over and over! They were loving getting to read and look at all of their friend's books!

Thanksgiving Feast

To top off learning about Nutrition, Pilgrims, and Indians, we had a Thanksgiving feast out in the first grade hall. To get ready for it, we make Indian headbands and Pilgrim hats. Then the whole first grade gathered around the table to feast. We passed plates of fish, vegetables, crackers, and other yummy foods. We remembered our manners and had a good time celebrating!

Parking Lot Madness

We have been lucky enough (or unlucky enough?) to have construction for the new parking lot RIGHT outside our window all year. There was often BIG machines inches from our window and for some reason, from time to time, the kids found that more fascinating than what we were learning about :) We frequently had to take a 2 minute break to peek out the window and see what was going on out there! It was fun to get to see all of the big machines that they used and get an up-close view of the construction. But I must admit, I'm not too sad that the parking lot is done now and we no longer have that distraction!

Turkey Hunting!

Last week we went turkey hunting and it was so much fun! We have been learning about the pilgrims and Indians. We learned that the Indians helped the pilgrims hunt food and settle in their new land. Somehow a whole bunch of turkeys got wild in our first grade hall and we had to go hunting with our bows and arrows to get them!


After we had hunted all the turkeys, we headed back to class to eat them! We made turkey cookies. First you start with a sugar cookie that has been cut into two pieces. Using frosting as the glue, glue one half on top of the other half. The next step is to add a whopper for the body. Then add a chocolate chip for the head and a red hot for the gobbler. Finish it off by using candy corns for the feathers! Then add a chocolate chip for the head and a red hot for the gobbler. Finish it off by using candy corns for the feathers! And.....Ta-Da.......a TURKEY cookie! YUM!!

Wacky Wednesday!

One of my favorite childhood books is Wacky Wednesday. It is about a boy that wakes up one Wednesday to find a shoe on his wall and that is just the beginning of the wackiness! One Wednesday in November I read the book to our class and did a bunch of Wacky things to our classroom. The students had to walk around and find and fix all of the wacky things so we could get our normal Wednesday back!

Here are some pictures from our classroom that day....can you find what is wacky?

Happy Halloween!!

Peter Pan and Captain Hook

Dracula, a ninja and Indian Jones.

A Jedi Knight, Indiana Jones and a cowboy.

The witch from Wizard of Oz, a cheerleader, a princess and Hermonie.

Can you find the girl that is actually a boy?!?

A vampire, cheerleader, indian and Wonder Woman!

Winter Princess, Cinderella, a magician and another Cinderella.

Painting Pumpkins!

This week the PTA brought in pumpkins for us to paint. We had a great time using our imagination and creating fun pictures and ideas on our pumpkins. They turned out so cute and surprisingly the whole activity went quiet smoothly!

Witches Brew

On Tuesday we got a big cauldron and made some witches brew....or at least pretended to. We learned a song called Witches Brew which is about all of the disgusting things that go into a witches brew. We had fun learning the song and pretending to make the brew and imagining what would happen to us if we drank that awful potion! Have your child sing the song for you - they are really good with the chorus!

Dead leaves, seaweed, rotten eggs, too.
Stir them in my witches' brew.

I got magic, Alakazamakazoo.

Spider web, moldy bread, mucky mud, too.

Stir them in my witches' brew.

I got magic, Alakazamakazoo.

OOO-my witches' brew.

OOO-what's it gonna do to you?

BOO!

Floor wax, thumb tacks, purple paint, too.

Stir them in my witches' brew.

I got magic, Alakazamakazoo.

Fingernails, lunch pails, apple cores, too.

Stir them in my witches' brew.

I got magic, Alakazamakazoo.

OOO-my witches' brew.

OOO-what's it gonna do to you?

BOO!

Wrinkled prunes, mushrooms, motor oil, too.

Stir them in my witches' brew.
I got magic, Alakazamakazoo.

Inventors!

This week we are spending a few days learning and talking about inventors and inventions. Inventors didn't come up with the perfect invention on the first try. They had to keep trying and trying. They were very creative and had to think differently about things. Yesterday the students got to invent new ideas with common household items. Oh, man were they so creative and fun. Here are a few of the fun idea our smart students came up with.

Spaghetti Drainer:
This is very much like a regular strainer. You simply dump the spaghetti into it and the water drains right out the bottom.

The Hear Teller:
If you can't hear very well, use the Hear Teller to help you out! The speaker puts the smaller hole up to the ear of the person they are talking to and speaks through the larger hole. And ta-dah! You can be heard loud and clear!

Ice Cutter and Massage Hospital:Roll the apparatus in ice to get it nice and cold, then take it to the hospital and use it to massage peoples aching backs! You can also use the sides of it to cut ice.

Halloween Is On It's Way!

Everyday for the last week or so we have had to count on our calendar to figure out how many more days until Halloween! These kids sure are excited for the costumes and candy!! Today we made our first Halloween decorations for our classroom - Skeletons! We started by reading a book about a skeleton who had the hic-ups. His friend, the ghost, tried lots of ways to help him get rid of those pesky hic-ups! Ask your child what finally helped the skeletons be rid of his hic-ups once and for all! When you come to SEPs you will see our fun skeletons hanging in our classroom!

Our 5 Senses - Taste

We had way too much fun on Friday learning about our sense of taste!! We combined with Mrs. Antonino's class and began by reading a book and learning all about our tongue, which we use to taste. We learned the places on our tongue where we taste bitter, sour, salty and sweet. Each child even made a diagram of a tongue to take home to show their family.

For our experiment Mrs. Antonino and I brought in a lot of different foods that were bitter, salty, sweet, and sour. We had brave students come up and stick out their tongue and let us rub the food onto their tongue with a Q-tip. We experimented by first placing the food, lemon juice for example, on the sweet tasting part of their tongue to see what happened. Usually the student said it wasn't sour or that they couldn't really taste it. But when we put the lemon juice on the sour tasting part of their tongue, we got quite the reaction and knew they could tell now how sour it was! We tried this with all sorts of tastes and had fun seeing what happened! At the end, all of the students got in a long line and got to try all of the different tastes on their own tongue. It was a fun science day!

Our 5 Senses - Smell

One day last week we learned about our sense of smell. We read a book and learned that there are over 5 million nerve cells in our nose that send signals to our brains about what we are smelling. We also talked about how our sense of smell and our sense of taste are related, so don't be surprised if your child starts plugging their nose next time you make them eat their vegetables!!

For our activity we passed around plastic baggies that had cotton balls with different smells on them and tried to figure out what they were. As you can tell by the pictures, some smells were good and others were not!!

Shapes!!

Today we had a chance to experiment making (composing and decomposing) shapes. Who knew there were so many ways to make a hexagon?! We also figured out how to make a triangle using a trapeziod and a little triangle. We learned that you can "cut" a square to make two triangles, four triangles or two rectangles. Have your child try this and experiment more creating shapes at home.

Our 5 Senses - Sight

This week and next for science we are learning about our 5 senses. Yesterday we did an intro and overview of all 5 senses. Today we focused on sight. We got to watch Mrs. Antonino's eye surgery video and see her eye and all of it's parts up close and personal! We also did lots of experiments and activities involving sight. We got a partner, had them close their eyes and count to 5. When they opened their eyes we looked at their pupil and saw it get smaller as it got used to the light. The kids thought that was awesome! We also played a game where there were lots of objects on a table. Everyone closed their eyes while I removed an item, then they had to open their eyes and figure out what was missing. Then they played with a partner at their desk.

The best experiment/activity that we did was to go outside and try to toss a bean bag into a hula hoop that was a few feet in front of us. This seems pretty easy and was when we were able to use both of our eyes! After doing that a few times, I gave each kid a black piece of construction paper to put over one eye and try tossing again. It was crazy how much that messed up our depth perception and made it hard to get the bean bag in the hula hoop. The next thing we tried was putting a big piece of construction paper over both eyes and seeing if we could still get the bean bag in the hula hoop. This was so hard, but some lucky kids still made it somehow! All of these experiments and games dealing with sight made us very grateful that we have two eyes to help us see all of the wonderful things around us!