Calvin & Hobbs Sequencing

Putting things in order, especially a story, can be tricky, so we are doing lots of practice!  Our first task: organizing a Calvin & Hobbs comic strip.  

The class split into small groups and had to work together to put the comic strip in order.  It didn't seem too difficult at first, but once we got started we realized there was a lot more to it!  We had to pay close attention to key words and look carefully at every cartoon.  After much trial and error, as well as teamwork, groups were able to put the story in order! 

Our Read Aloud: Gooney Bird Greene

Hi!  this is A.W and A.Z . We are going too tell you about the book Gooney Bird Greene.

It is a great story!

These are the Characters:  Class, Mrs. Pidgeon, Gooney Bird Greene          

This is the Loction:   Watertower Elementary        
                                                                                 
This is the Action:  Gooney Bird Greene told stories.

This is the Problem:  The class did not know how to wright there own stories.

This is the Solution:  Gooney Bird tout the class how to wright good stories.  
                                 

This is the best story in the world!

CLAPS!

Interesting Observations

Last week, our observation table had us really wondering!  Our wonder board was packed with great questions and wonders.  Find out what we were so curious about!

We had a box full of preserved insects and arachnids!  Each was labeled- some known insects and many unknown.  We used our magnifying glass to observe every detail, which lead us to MANY wonders and observations.

Here are some of our awesome observers!

Stories with Feelings

In writer's workshop, we read an excellent book called Fireflies by Julie Brinckloe  The narrator shares how summer nights are spent with friends catching fireflies outside.  One night, after catching many, he puts them in a jar and uses the fireflies as a nightlight in his room.  As the night goes on, the light becomes dimmer and the fireflies are no longer flying.  The narrator becomes very sad and must decide what to do.

  While reading the book, we shared how it was making us feel.  We learned that we were each having different feelings about the events in the story.  We decided to make a chart...

Then, we talked about other favorite small moment books and how they made us feel.  We started to realize that ALL small moment stories give us lots of feelings.  We created a map with some of them and shared our personal experiences of these emotions.  We were able to see that our own experiences provide us with lots of feelings and make the best stories!

Everyone received their own feelings map and got busy!  Wow- do we have a lot of happy, sad, angry, excited (and MORE) stories to get started on!

 

Happy Veteran's Day

All of the students and staff at McDole celebrated Veteran's Day today and showed our respect in several different ways....

The second graders made an American flag out of our handprints.

Over the last two weeks, the office has been collecting photos and information about veterans that belong to McDole families.

We had a whole-school assembly, with the fourth graders kicking things off with a few favorite patriotic songs.

The Boy Scouts held a ceremony for McDole's new flag for the outside flagpole.  Our new flag is from Washington D.C. and even flew on a flagpole there!  Due to the weather, we were not able to go outside and watch the complete ceremony.


It was very interesting and enjoyable learning about Veteran's Day today.  We all learned something new!  Be sure to take time to thank those men and women who have served for our country!

Some Recaps...

It has been too long since the last recap post!  Take a look at what is happening in room 119....

Math:  Single-digit addition and subtraction have finished, and we are slowly moving into double-digit addition and subtraction.  We will learn many different strategies to solve these problems and will be able to choose the one we prefer most.  Before diving in too deep with double-digits, however, we are reviewing how to solve simple word problems.  We will then learn how to solve word problems with 2-digit numbers and problems with two steps.  It will take some time, but we will get there!

Fundations: Suffixes have been our main focus in unit 4.  We learned the suffixes -es, -ing, - ed, -er, -s, and -est.  We learned what each suffix means and how it changes the meaning to base words.  Since -s was one of the suffixes, we spent a lot of time working on how to make nouns plural.  We learned how to conjugate all different endings and even worked on irregulars.

Reading: We have been learning the different parts of a story and know a fun way to remember them.  The acronym CLAPS has helped us to remember the parts quickly and independently.  For more information, see our previous post.

Writing: Personal narratives, or small moment writing, is still in session during writer's workshop!  We have been working hard to write complete sentences (capitalization & punctuation included!) and add more detail to stories.  At times, we pause and partner up with our writing buddy to look over our work.  Editing is something we are still learning how to do, but it is getting easier!

Science: We wrapped up our health unit just before the quarter ended.  Some of the big ideas in it were: germs, body systems, healthy foods, exercise, dental hygiene, and positive mental health.  We did a fun activity that showed off what germs would look like if we could see them.  We learned that they are everywhere and spread fast!  We also learned how important it is to eat healthy and take care of ourselves.  We need to feel and look good on the inside and outside!

Flashback to Halloween!

Thank you parents for making our party such a success!  We had a blast!

Parts of a Story

In reader's workshop, we have learning the different parts of a story.  To help us remember each part, we are using the acronym CLAPS: 

Characters

Location

Action

Problem

Solution

The first book we practiced this with was The Princess and the Pig,  It has become a classroom favorite!  In addition, we have used the iPads to create a slideshow with each story part as a slide.  This was a lot of fun and we read an especially funny book, Dog Breath!  Log onto your child's Educreation account to see the great slideshow!  

PJ Day on 10/24

We did it again!  Our links touched the floor and we earned another celebration day!  After taking a class vote, Pajama Day won.  It was so much fun and so cozy working in our PJ's all day.  In the afternoon, we headed to the Literacy Lounge to work on writing and to play a noun sorting game.  What a great Friday!