The Audience

The audience plays a very important role during our story acting.  Sometimes an author may need them to participate by makings sounds or repeating phrases.  The most important thing they do is get the drama started by stating:  LIGHTS, CAMERA, ACTION.  The second most important thing is  they like to give compliments to the author and the actors for a job well done.

Story Acting

We had Officer Buckle and her dog Gloria,  Mario and Luigi and several J.J. Watts.  Everyone had a great time writing and dramatizing their stories.  The best part for me was watching the students work together to figure out who their characters would be in the story and where it would take place.  There was a lot of conversation about what a story needs!

Story Book Parade Day

Wow!  What amazing costumes.  The Superheroes did such a great job choosing different books to be represented in the parade.   The best part was when we returned to the room and began writing stories to include all these wonderful characters.   This was yet another incentive the students earned from the Fun Run....  we story acted ALL DAY! (Well, technically half a day.) 

Parade

Fun Run

To say that we were a little excited about the Fun Run would be an understatement!  The Superheroes were thrilled to be running to raise money for the Spark Park.  Somehow I got roped into running the laps too!  Ms. Patin said at one point a parent took a picture of me grimacing instead of smiling and I said that's probably when my hip went out trying to maneuver around those corners! It was a great event and we had a fun time and got a workout all at the same time! 

Fun Run!!

Writing Conferences

You will often find us sitting and discussing our writing in small groups.  Today we are working on zig-zag books.   The students are writing stories and working hard to create

 a beginning with characters and a setting, the middle which involves the plot and

 the end which delivers a solution to the problem. 

Heat Energy

The Superheroes are exploring three different types of energy:  heat, light and sound.  We explored man made vs natural types of energy.  We determined that the sun provides two types of energy both heat and light.  Today we experimented by creating heat energy with our bodies.  The students rubbed their hands together which created friction and then held a chocolate kiss in their hand to see if it would melt.  The results were very interesting.

Pumpkin Math Stations

Instead of a Halloween Party, The Superheroes had Super Pumpkin stations.  Thank you parents for the donations of pumpkins and treats!  We had so much fun reading, writing and exploring science through pumpkin activities.  One student said, " I've had too much fun today!"

Pumpkin Math From The Inside

Our next time was to explore the pumpkins a little closer.  Did you know that the lines on the pumpkin match the stem of the pumpkin?   We decided to explore with the largest pumpkin.  Did you know that as soon as you cut a pumpkin open you can smell it?  We found out lots of interesting things such as: the inside of a pumpkin is hollow (that made us think of ships -which float), the seeds have a very distinct way of hanging in the pumpkin, and that a bigger pumpkin has bigger seeds!  

Does A Pumpkin Sink or Float?

CLICK ON PICTURE TO ENLARGE

 The Superhero scientists went to the garden today to determine whether pumpkins sink or float?  After a lot of discussion, we put (or threw) the pumpkins into the water!  And guess what no matter how heavy they are they all floated!  The interesting thing was they floated in different ways.  Some turned upside down, some turned sideways, and some floated with the stem sticking straight up!  Needless to say the experiment generated a lot of questions and 

we will have to explore the inside of the pumpkins next!

Live Version of The Five Little Pumpkins

Toy Dance Party

The Superheroes have done it!  They have worked together and earned a lot of jewels.  This happens when they are showing attributes of the Learner Profile.  Being principled and respectful and working together as a community.  Together we came up with a few possible ways to celebrate.  The winning choice:  A Toy Dance Party.  The students brought a favorite stuffed animal for the day and

 as you can see from the pictures: we danced!!!

Five Little Pumpkins

Students working in the poetry center on The Five Little Pumpkins.  It has become one of our favorites during the month of October.  

First Grade in Action

My students have been experimenting with taking pictures.  I love what I find when I download them!  Here are some random shots of The Superheroes in action.  Practicing sight words, writing books, and exploring science with poetry.

World Record

Today was a very exciting day at Mark Twain!  The whole school participated in trying to have the most students being read to at one time.  Thank you to Bryan's mom for volunteering.  We loved the book and the best part is it fit right into our planner.  

Parts of a Story

We continue to explore what makes a great story.  This week the students worked on the setting and the characters.  We broke up into small cooperative groups to read a book together.  After reading the group had to determine what the setting was and who the characters were.  

We used that information to create an anchor chart. 

Math Monsters

Today we tried something new in math.  We combined a little art with the art of creating equations.  The students were required to complete the equations before creating the art.

  The end result was a math monster!!

The Visit by The Superheroes

Here we are working hard with our partners to illustrate the story we wrote this week.  The students did an amazing job matching the picture to the words of the story.  The end result is fantastic!

Writing Wednesday

This week we worked on a story together.  We are discovering how the narrative of a story works.  What happens at the beginning, middle and end.  We also have to decide on what genre before writing.  This is a class story where everyone has input into the development.  Our first idea after writing the story - act it out!  The next day, we took the sentences and divided among our classmates to illustrate.  The end result is a wonderful new class book for our library! 

Math Stations

The Superheroes work in math stations daily where they get to explore different concepts.  Our newest interest is bar graphs.  The students are fascinated with the ability to gather the data.  The next step would be to develop questions based on the data they accumulated. 

Tye Dye Milk??

We continue to work on our scientific observations skills by performing different types of experiments.  Today the students explored colors using milk and dish washing soap.   As you can see we were quite surprised by the results.  It lead us to come up with several more questions (as any good scientist does) and we will continue to try different things in our science station.  

Birthday Treats

Today we got a special birthday treat from Jackson's dad.  He came with his guitar and played several songs for us.  We even got a mini lesson on how the guitar makes sound.  

The Superheroes are always interested in visitors, so if you have a special talent please feel free to contact me to come and share with us.