Happy Valentines’ Day
Last week as I was sitting down to complete our weekly newsletter, the phone rang. No school – so I put it aside. And then again on Monday. What!? On Tuesday when 3E finally met after our unexpected break, the children had to decide, “Should I post on my blog, or should I work on my Artists-Writers’ workshop piece?” They made their decisions and our week began. It has been one full of choices and self-direction.
3 Africas ÷ 3 SouthAmericas + 3 North Americas + 2 Asias – 2 Australias ÷ 2 Antarcticas ÷ Europes = 1 World
The research, writing and planning that for the last six weeks + is coming quickly to an end. The children began to realize how precious their time is. The children still have quite a bit of drafting and all of the display work to accomplish in three days time. The loss of those two days clearly became apparent. The room is abuzz with industry – full of art so our classroom gallery can change to introduce our animals of study on museum day; full of writing so our families can see how our information writing abilities are growing.
Some of the children are feeling concern. They are working hard to do their best and feel time slipping away from them. If you hear this worry at home please be in touch. Perhaps we can make plans for children to come into the classroom early or to stay so your child feels more relaxed, confident and proud of what is shared. I know you’ll see a real difference in the class’ informational writing when you tour this museum and think back to our insect share in the fall. I am also sure three days of focused attention to the display portion of our research, will give the children time to create the display they hope to have. There is some great work going on in 3E.
As a reminder, our global geography museum, 3 Africas ÷ 3 SouthAmericas + 3 North Americas + 2 Asias – 2 Australias ÷ 2 Antarcticas ÷2 Europes = 1 World, is on Wednesday, February 17. The gallery and museum will be open from 1 to 2 during the school day and from 5:15 to 6:00 in the evening. We hope everyone will be able to come for at least some of that time. The children will be at their displays ready to share what they know about their continent, country and animal. They are excited (and a little nervous) about sharing their expertise and answering whatever questions you may have once you tour their displays.
Happy 100th Day of School
Thank you to everyone for your food donations for the Seacoast Food Pantry. The food has been arranged by a 7th grade service learning group in displays of 100 for the school to tour. It is amazing to see the difference between 100 cans of tuna, 100 small portions, 100 boxes of oatmeal or 100 jars of jelly. What is equally stunning about this display is the power it shows when all of us are working together. We can do great things. Walking into the library and seeing what was collected caused gasps of awe. “Wow!” “Look at this.” “Oh! Think of how many people won’t feel hungry.” “It just makes you feel good, doesn’t.” Yes, it does. The children both feel appreciation for what they have, and also what they can give. That is special. Again, thank you for your generous support of this project.
Bits and Pieces –
We are nearing the end of Wildwood. The Northwoodians and the Bandits have joined together to see if they can stop the Dowager Governess from awakening the ivy and destroying all of The Wood. You may want to talk to your child about what they think as the battle progresses and we finish the book this week. Because, yes good does triumph but there is a cost.- We’ve been learning more about common and proper nouns. We’ve been working to identify nouns in paragraphs. It one thing to say, “A noun is a person, place or thing.” and another to think about what they means in sentences. We’ve also been sorting nouns to identify the difference even if they have been capitalized by mistake, or not
capitalized when they should be. Most of the children know proper nouns in isolation. Our next step is writing them properly in everyday use and eliminating random capital letters that are written out of habit.
- We have finished learning 19 of the lower case letters in cursive. There are two more groups and then we’ll learn the upper case letters and create a class alphabet to guide our cursive writing.
- We have a challenge with Mr. Caron next Tuesday – it may be outside so the children should be prepared for that.
This has been a week to complete many things. Our biggest accomplishment was our museum; the final step of our three-part research project. The children learned a great deal about both the world and themselves. They were given research guides, books and online sources. The project was structured so they had a week to read and learn about their continent, two weeks to read and learn about their country and two weeks to read and learn about their animal. Using their notes, they had two weeks to organize the information and create their display. In between the research and the writing we learned about different types of leads. We also explored types of sentences and formats and features of information writing.
