Celebrating our partnership with | Learning that Group Work is Team Work!To prepare the students for working in their expert animal groups this coming week, we did a mock group work activity during readers' workshop last week. I taught them about the group roles we will be using: and then assigned each student a role to practice as they worked in their reading groups to create a collaborative African Savannah. Before starting, each group came up with a fair plan that would ensure that everyone had a chance to draw and help create the savannah. The savannah are amazing (proudly displayed on our large class bulletin board!), showing off everything the students have learned about the savanna. On Monday, students will be assigned new table groups that will also be their animal expert groups. We will be doing some more creative collaborative work early in the week before diving into researching and writing our non-fiction all about animal books. Group members will work together to find a role for each member of the group that best suits everyone's needs. |
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Science ~Last week was filled with learning adventures. On Monday, we administered a fair test during Science to determine what kind of food our land snails liked to eat. After that, we explored water snails and compared their body parts and behavior to the body parts and behavior of our land snails. We ended the week with another fair test, this time to determine what type of surface a land snail preferred to crawl on - smooth or rough. As we observed our land snails, we were surprised to learn that land snails do not move as slowly as we thought. In fact many of our snails surprised us by moving quite rapidly when they wanted to ~ especially one that the green table named Turbo.
All About Animals PBL ~Throughout the week we continued to learn about African Animals, using our KWL charts to reflect on what we think we know, generate questions we wonder about and record what we learn from reading our non-fiction animal books. This week, we will decide as a class what animals our five African Animals expert groups will focus on.
We finished using our collaborative skills to play strategy games with our 2nd grade reading buddies. Playing games is a great way to practice taking turns, listening to each other and solving small problems that come up. On Friday afternoon I sent home Spring Progress Reports. Please keep the paper document but sign and return the envelope that the paper document came in.
Enjoy the week! Katie What we have Learned About ...Goldfish
Life on the African Savanna
We welcomed in March with a few special events last week. On Thursday, we ventured out on our first field trip. We rode yellow school buses to the Woodland Park Zoo where we spent the day learning about the weather and organisms of the African Savanna! We made sure to visit all of our favorite african animals ~ giraffes, lions, elephants, zebras, hippos, and monkeys ~ as these will be the animals that we will become experts on in our upcoming PBL All About Animals project. The kids did an amazing job, as did the many grown up family members that joined us. Thank you, chaperones! Your generous support made this a fabulous experience for all of us! If any of you took photos that you would be willing to share, I would love to see them! Coming up this week!
We had another busy week as we wrapped up February. On Monday, we celebrated our 100th day of kindergarten! On Friday, we celebrated the third filling of our listening marble jar and celebrated Dr. Seuss' birthday, reading our favorite Dr. Seuss books with our 2nd grade reading buddies...
On Friday, we also had our first "Lock Down" drill. During this safety drill, we practice how we would respond if something dangerous was happening in our neighborhood or on our school campus. To initiate the drill, Ms. Kirch stated very clearly on the intercom that we are having a lockdown drill. When that happened, the adults in the room locked the doors and pulled the shades while the students all sat against the front wall of the classroom, quietly "hiding". We started to read a book, but Mr. Elliott came in after about 3 minutes to tell us that the drill was over. The students did a great job listening and following the behaviors expected during the drill. I answered a lot of questions during our discussions before and after the drill, and your child may have even more questions for you at home. Let me know if you want support in talking to your student further about this. Coming up this week...
A message from our fabulous class photographer & her support team (Thanks Jody & Mark!)The photos that the talented Jody Stewart took at our Valentine's Party have been uploaded. You can browse (and download) them here: http://goqae.com/2/cryanlearyphotos You'll need the usual "explorers" password to view. If anyone wants to add pictures of their own to share, contact Mark @ [email protected]. Fabulous Fabric Art from Ms. Meg's Art Studio!Thank you, Party Planners, for our wonderful Valentines' Day celebration!!!Thank You to Lucy and her food drive team for working hard to help the QA Food Bank! |