Apple Day

Science rotation Wednesday

They are ready for SCIENCE!

The good ol' Baking Soda and Vinegar experiment.

First, we observed the reaction to vinegar and baking soda inside of a cup.

Lillie taking a closer look.

Then we asked the question: What will happen when we put vinegar and baking soda in a zip-lock bag and seal it? The kids made predictions to this question before we tested it.

Then the experiment:

Kate was our video taker! Didn't she do a great job?!

After we conducted the experiment, the kids wrote what they saw and then drew pictures.

Because today was Science Rotation Wednesday, our class visited two other first grade classrooms to practice the Science Method again with different experiments. They all had a fantastic time and their questions came pouring out! I can't wait to do more experiments with these young scientists!

So far this week...

We are learning how to show our work with math story problems.

We had indoor recess, check out that team work! This is the first class EVER to work together and use every lincoln log I own in their tower! 

Story problem work again, we do one of these every day!

several students come up and show how they solved the story problem.

We watched the clip on retelling, and then practiced. 

A Few Student Pattern Books

Pattern Books are a huge hit! This past week we began writing pattern books. First, we read several pattern books and we talked about how it was a pattern book. We also created a list of topics we could use in our own pattern books. Then, we wrote a class pattern book. Finally the kids had a go with writing their own pattern books. Below is a few examples, I couldn't get everyone's book in this first post. I will continue to add more posts this coming week with more student made books.

                                                                        Michelle K.'s

My Dinner

On Sunday I had pizza. On Monday I had Broccoli.

On Tuesday I had...Macaroni and cheese. On Wednesday I had Burgers.

On Thursday I had Celery. On Friday I had... pasta meat balls.

On Saturday I had... no dinner!

This is a great example of a student applying what we have been reading and talking about. The big book we read every day this week had ellipses and it was great seeing her put those in her book.

                                                                             Trae's

A octopus is a dangerous animal.

A shark is a dangerous animal. A jellyfish is a dangerous animal.

A stingray is a dangerous animal. A lionfish is a dangerous animal.

A sea turtle is a nice animal. A dolphin is a nice animal.

                                                                           Sophie's

A cheetah is on the African Savannah.

A rinocerous is on the African Savannah. A croc is in the African Savannah.

A zebra is on the African Savannah. An elephant is on the African Savannah.

The next pictures are one shot of several different books by different students. They weren't complete yet.

                                                                      Mackenzie's

There is a crab in the ocean.

                                          Chris'

A dolphin can have baby dolphin. A dolphin can flip.

                                   Dominic's

A cow is at the barn. A dog is at the barn.



Aren't those great! I can't wait for more of them to finish so that I can share them! 

Building Active Readers

We have been working very hard on becoming active readers. These are all things that would be great for you to work on at home too! I tell them that being an active reader is just like being a reading detective, they need to look for all the clues.

Our Stamina has grown to 20 minutes! I am So proud of this accomplishment and the kids are truly enjoying themselves while reading. After we have our independent reading time, we share how we have been an active reader and how we have tracked our thinking and learning using sticky notes. This is also a time where they can share which decoding strategy they used to figure out a tricky word. 

These are the first two decoding strategies that we learned. I really loved hearing one student say "today I used my eagle eyes to figure out the tricky word common".

We also began reading with a friend this week, and next week we will be working on story elements with our friends.