This week the students started some new projects! One of our big, looooong projects is creating a long paper chain to estimate the distance from our class to the gym. So far, the class has made over 280 chains.
In math, the students finished up the unit on graphs and data management by finishing their individual surveys and putting the information on posters. These posters are now on display in the hallway outside of our classroom.The students also wrote an end-of-unit final review worksheet. At the end of the week we started the geometry unit by reviewing the names and properties of two-dimensional shapes.
In writing, the students started a new writing challenge. The goal is to write a fiction story, using the animal from his/her science research as the main character in the story. This story will be the longest stories the students have written all year as each one must be at least two pages long.
The children are almost finished their science animal research posters. Each student wrote the animal fact sentences on the posters, drew and glued on a drawing of the animal and used stencils to create a title.
The class learned a lot about snow this week! As part of our new unit on the properties of liquids and solids, the children read the true story about "Snowflake Bentley" who was the first person to photograph snow over 100 years ago. Did you know that snowflakes are made in the shape of hexagons (six-sided shapes) because of the shape of a water molecule (H2O)? We also learned how snowflake crystals are formed from water drops in clouds, starting with a speck (of dirt for example). The different patterns are due to temperature, wind movement and the amount of water in the air. The children grew their own crystals on pipe cleaners using borax and hot water.
Another way to make snowflakes, of course is to make them out of paper. The children learned how to fold the paper, remember where the centre is and cut out chunks of paper to create lacey paper snowflakes.
The class had a chance to watch a classic holiday film, Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer.
In the computer lab, the students played some games on this animal site:
www.a-z-animals.com
Books read aloud this week:
Snowflake Bentley - The story of the first person to photograph snowflakes by Jacqueline Martin
The Story of Snow - The science of winter's wonder by Mark Cassino
The Snow Must Go On by Molly Wigand
Dragons Love Tacos by Adam Rubin
365 Penguins by Jean-Luc Fromental
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