World Travelers

So, I guess I should have sent all the permission slip forms home, but it was a oversight on my part.  I just couldn't pass up the field trip opportunity...  Today, the D Day SAGE students joined Ms. Webb and I on a  trip to Argentina.  I took care of arranging the necessary passport paper work and we were off.  Since our time was brief, we had to make it a very quick trip.  The students made notes on our trip...

This picture was taken on our arrival in Argentina.  We even got our passport stamped!  We were pretty tired at this point, but geared up for our learning adventure as our day wore on!  We learned they speak Spanish here.  It is a good thing Senora Gates has been teaching us some basic vocabulary.  We were able to ask for a drink of water and where the restrooms were located.  We were pretty limited beyond that--  there wasn't time to do much shopping so we didn't get a chance to practice our number and color words.  

Argentina is a pretty amazing place.  The land is very different depending on where you are at in the country.  There are high mountains on the west side and ocean beaches on the east side.  A few of us decided to climb Cerro Torre in the Southern Patagonian Ice Field.  (Dear Abby's Dad, Thanks for keeping me on my toes!)  (Mia, our newest classmate, was wishing she remembered her coat.  She said it was even colder here than on Briarcliff's windy playground!)

Another group of us headed to the southern part of the country to the pampas (grasslands).  We found emperor penguins!  Wow!  They were almost as tall as us!  (Mrs. Koch said we had to stay back so we didn't get pecked-- especially since she didn't have the permission slips!  She was being overly cautious.)

The rest of us went to see the gauchos.  That is what they call cowboys in Argentina.  We thought for sure we would get to ride horses.  Mrs. Koch vetoed that too!  :-(


We grabbed a quick steak and headed home.  (Did you know the people in Argentina eat beef almost every day.  They have a lot of farms and ranches there.)


On the bus ride home, Mrs. Koch read us a folktale from Argentina: The Gentle People.  It was a really neat story about the beautiful land, the gentle, kind people and what they did when their way of life was threatened.  In the story, every month right before the full moon, the Gentle People were granted one wish.  They always used it to make the world a better place.  We talked about what we might wish to make our world a better place.  Then we each wrote down our own wish.  Remind your child to tell you about his or her wish.  We slept the rest of the way home, so we wouldn't be too tired to do our work when we got back to school.


Once we were back at Briarcliff, we planted some wild flower seeds-- just like the flowers in the folktale!   We are hoping they will grow well in our classroom window.  We thought Mrs. Koch would let us rest, but oh no, she had lots of work for us!  We did have a good time on our trip to Argentina, you will have to ask us what all we learned!  We are hoping Mrs. Koch will take us somewhere cool next week too.  She said, "You never know...."

The boys and girls only whined for a little while about being tired.  We took a quick recess break and went back to work.  We found a little free time available in the library.  We used it to practice our Power Point skills and to begin a travel journal on the computers.  We are going to add some of the field trip pictures so we can share them with you at our spring Open House.  Today we practice/learned to open and save a new presentation.  We added a title to our travel journal and learned to format the font for color.  Lastly, we added a rectangle that filled the page, colored it and learned to send it behind our text.

 

We did just a little TOPS Math or Math Rules to practice our mathematical problem solving skills.  Then we were back on the computers in the Computer Lab.   

The students were introduced to a new, web based, digital storytelling application, Storybird.   Storybird uses a broad selection of art work to inspire you to write a story.  Each child was assigned a username and password today.  One of the great things about this application is students are able to continue their work from home, at their home school or here in SAGE.  All they have to do is login to the website.  They can even collaborate on a book with their classmates.  Another great feature of the site is you have the ability to print copies of your child's story (at no charge) on your home printer, share their stories through email, embed them in websites or blogs and even order hard or paperback copies of your child's book. 

The students spent some time exploring the available art work.  When they found an artist's work that inspired a story idea, they began creating their book.  Have your child login and share their story with you. 

We ended our day with our Spanish lesson with Senora Gates.

Now, they are tired!  I'm sure they will all be sleeping well tonight (and hopefully no one suffers from bus-lag.  LOL)

Have a great week!  Your kids are lots of fun!