Monday, October 31, 2011
Friday, October 28, 2011
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
Botanist Bert Studies Blossoms
Boys and Girls,
Please tell me something you are learning about botanists and the study of botany. You could also post your comment about our Quirkles' experiment and your observations.
Mrs. Koch
Please tell me something you are learning about botanists and the study of botany. You could also post your comment about our Quirkles' experiment and your observations.
Mrs. Koch
Wednesday, October 19, 2011
What Clever Children You Have!
The students continued their individual work in the TOPS Math and Math Rules programs. We also completed a creative thinking exercise to work on our flexible thinking, originality and elaboration skills. The students were each given a paper with four circles. They had to use each circle to create a very different picture. I challenged them to see if they could come up with something no one else in their class created and to be as elaborative as possible. These drawing exercises strengthen the skills (fluency, flexibility, originality and elaboration) the children will need to do real problem solving..
We went to the library to begin work on our research skills. We discussed how the Briarcliff library is arranged, the difference between fiction and non-fiction books, how to read the call number on the spine of a fictional book, what the letters mean in the call number, how the books are arranged on the shelves and the importance of being sure we put books back in their correct location and order. It is empowering to students to learn to locate books on their own. Mastery of these skills frees them to select books on topics of interest and locate specific books without having to wait for adult assistance. This is monumental for early readers and for students interested in unusual or "hard to locate" topics and information. Next week we will focus on how non-fiction books are organized. We will continue to focus on research skills over the next several weeks.
This afternoon, we met our second "Quirkle" of the year - Andy Acid!
The Quirkle's series, written by Missouri authors, is a science exploration and phonetic program. When we have Quirkle time, we will first read a story featuring one of the 26 (each letter of the alphabet) Quirkle characters and follow up with a hands-on experiment or demonstration. Each book is full of words that begin with the letter sound of the character, has rich vocabulary words, and focuses on a science topic that we may or may not be familiar with. Some of the concepts are pretty complex, but exposure to the topic is our goal! Today, Andy Acid helped us learn about acids and bases and we found out what happens when we eat too much acidic food. We made a magic formula to test for acids and bases. Ask your child to tell you about our demonstration and show you their Andy Acid science log.
Have a great week!
We went to the library to begin work on our research skills. We discussed how the Briarcliff library is arranged, the difference between fiction and non-fiction books, how to read the call number on the spine of a fictional book, what the letters mean in the call number, how the books are arranged on the shelves and the importance of being sure we put books back in their correct location and order. It is empowering to students to learn to locate books on their own. Mastery of these skills frees them to select books on topics of interest and locate specific books without having to wait for adult assistance. This is monumental for early readers and for students interested in unusual or "hard to locate" topics and information. Next week we will focus on how non-fiction books are organized. We will continue to focus on research skills over the next several weeks.
This afternoon, we met our second "Quirkle" of the year - Andy Acid!
The Quirkle's series, written by Missouri authors, is a science exploration and phonetic program. When we have Quirkle time, we will first read a story featuring one of the 26 (each letter of the alphabet) Quirkle characters and follow up with a hands-on experiment or demonstration. Each book is full of words that begin with the letter sound of the character, has rich vocabulary words, and focuses on a science topic that we may or may not be familiar with. Some of the concepts are pretty complex, but exposure to the topic is our goal! Today, Andy Acid helped us learn about acids and bases and we found out what happens when we eat too much acidic food. We made a magic formula to test for acids and bases. Ask your child to tell you about our demonstration and show you their Andy Acid science log.
Have a great week!
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Creative Thinkers & Fledgling Bloggers
The boys and girls worked so hard today! We started our day with a discussion on our class Blogging Guidelines. These can be found in a new tab on our main page. Please take a moment to familiarize yourself with them.
We also learned how to post a comment on our blog and reviewed what makes for a quality comment (from the video by Mrs. Yollis' 3rd grade students from Los Angeles, California: How to Compose a Quality Comment, http://vimeo.com/15695021about.) The students then wrote a rough draft of their own comment and posted it on our Rotation D blog. They did a wonderful job! If you have a moment, check out their thoughts.
I explained that our blog is an academic blog and should not be used as a social network. I want to avoid students spending large amounts of time just socializing here. I want them to post comments on their learning and "Ah Ha!" moments. The source of their learning and revelations can be from within or outside of school. Ideally, I would like to see students post a comment from home once or twice a week. In the beginning, their comments may not be very sophisticated. With instruction, practice and encouragement, your child will gain a desire to share their ideas and opinions with others and the skills to do it through our blog. Blogging provides a real world platform for students to improve not only their reading and writing skills, but also the technology skills 21st Century Learners will need.
Please encourage your child to share their enthusiasm and experiences from rich learning moments. At this age, they will need your support and assistance with proof reading their comments prior to clicking that "publish" button. In the next week or so, I will try to get a screen cast tutorial made on how to post a comment to our blog for those parents and grandparents that would like directions. By all means, encourage your child's grandparents, aunts, uncles and other interested adults to post their thoughts on our blog! I am looking forward to hearing from you all!
We also learned how to post a comment on our blog and reviewed what makes for a quality comment (from the video by Mrs. Yollis' 3rd grade students from Los Angeles, California: How to Compose a Quality Comment, http://vimeo.com/15695021about.) The students then wrote a rough draft of their own comment and posted it on our Rotation D blog. They did a wonderful job! If you have a moment, check out their thoughts.
I explained that our blog is an academic blog and should not be used as a social network. I want to avoid students spending large amounts of time just socializing here. I want them to post comments on their learning and "Ah Ha!" moments. The source of their learning and revelations can be from within or outside of school. Ideally, I would like to see students post a comment from home once or twice a week. In the beginning, their comments may not be very sophisticated. With instruction, practice and encouragement, your child will gain a desire to share their ideas and opinions with others and the skills to do it through our blog. Blogging provides a real world platform for students to improve not only their reading and writing skills, but also the technology skills 21st Century Learners will need.
Please encourage your child to share their enthusiasm and experiences from rich learning moments. At this age, they will need your support and assistance with proof reading their comments prior to clicking that "publish" button. In the next week or so, I will try to get a screen cast tutorial made on how to post a comment to our blog for those parents and grandparents that would like directions. By all means, encourage your child's grandparents, aunts, uncles and other interested adults to post their thoughts on our blog! I am looking forward to hearing from you all!
We have struggled with problems between Internet Explorer and Blogger. From my research, Safari and FireFox seem to be a good match to Blogger, but IE has had problems working with it. Many of you may have tried to post a comment only to have it erased, without your post going through. Thanks to our IT department, I think we have finally found a "fix." Please let me know if you are ever having difficulties with the blog. A lot of this is new for me too, so in some cases, the kids and I are learning together. (I hope you don't mind being dragged along with us!) If you have a working knowledge of blogs and have any suggestions or ideas, please pass them along to me!
The students continued their individual work in Math Rules, TOPS Math and Exploratory today. Ask your child about their current task. I continue to encourage them to take their time for their personal best effort. In the afternoon, they learned/reviewed the rules for brainstorming. They individually "things you might find in a pocket." They were very fluent and original in their ideas!
We ended our day with a Quirkles Science lesson on Inquisitive Inman. Check out our new vocabulary words and our experiment in the slide show I am posting today.
Have a great week!
The students continued their individual work in Math Rules, TOPS Math and Exploratory today. Ask your child about their current task. I continue to encourage them to take their time for their personal best effort. In the afternoon, they learned/reviewed the rules for brainstorming. They individually "things you might find in a pocket." They were very fluent and original in their ideas!
We ended our day with a Quirkles Science lesson on Inquisitive Inman. Check out our new vocabulary words and our experiment in the slide show I am posting today.
Have a great week!
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
Our First Commenting Challenge
Boys and Girls,
Today we talked about posting a quality comment. Remembering the tips we discussed, try posting your first comment here. I would like for you to share a fact or two that you have learned at your Exploratory Center. What project are you working on? Which projects are you hoping to do at this center?
Today we talked about posting a quality comment. Remembering the tips we discussed, try posting your first comment here. I would like for you to share a fact or two that you have learned at your Exploratory Center. What project are you working on? Which projects are you hoping to do at this center?
If you would like to view the video again, click on the link below: Mrs. Yollis' video, How to Compose a Quality Comment,
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
Exploring Tagxedo
As a part of our affective investigation to learn more about ourselves and our classmates, we spent some time this morning reflecting on our interests, influences and personality traits. We used our afternoon computer lab time to create an electronic word cloud that tells others about us. These will also be on display at our Open House this Thursday, October 6th. Although the students are anxious to share their work with you, you will have to wait until Open House. To give you an idea of what a word cloud is, and to give you some more information about me, my personal word cloud is below. I'm sure you will enjoy what your child created!
The students continued their individual work in TOPS Math problem solving and Exploratory. Ask your child about their current task and progress.
The students were also introduced to the Components of Creativity:
- Fluency
- Flexibility
- Originality
- Elaboration
Some questions have many answers: What are all of the ways you might have gotten to school today?
When I asked our students this second question, they jumped straight to creative, unusual, and original ideas. The first response to my question was, "by sky diving"- Great idea Caleb! This set the foundation for divergent thinking! Abigayle then suggested, "by zip-line!" (I am so loving this group!) A portion of the rest of their list included:
- submarine
- rocket
- skateboard
- secret passageway
- blimp
- elephant
- magic carpet
- piggy-back-ride
- mining tunnel
- zebra
I hope to see you all at our Open House this Thursday evening! Also, be sure you have gone to our Google Doc to sign up for a parent conference. If you need the link, please email me and I will resend it.
Have a wonderful week!
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