Happy Days

Well, we're back online again! Happy days are here again!

Just a wonderful day. We began by doing final drafts of our "My Favorite Things" composition we did yesterday. We've completed five of the eight Thinking Maps, and I think the students are getting the idea of monitoring their own thinking and using these simple graphic devices to focus their thinking.

Then we did something really neat. Yesterday we had noted descriptive language in the "Toto" story by writing the words or phrases on little yellow post-it notes. Today we shared some of the words and we used these to create some wonderful African landscapes. It was hard for a few of the students who are accustomed to relying on the illustrator instead of the author to help them form pictures, but the results were excellent. You can see some above.

After lunch we did another really neat Science activity. We used chopsticks, clothes pins, and spoons to imitate different types of beaks. The students used each one to pick up a variety of different types of foods such as gummy worms, rice, bird seed, etc. They had to figure out which type of "beak" was best adapted for each type of food. They had a great time, particularly eating the peanuts and sunflower seeds afterwards. That led us naturally into a reading of the Science text, and boy were they attentive. Hands-on science is hard work, but it's really worth it.

The rest of the day was devoted to finishing the math packet. I helped students who needed it, and some of the students who were already done also volunteered as tutors. We'll be having a test on this tomorrow after doing some review.

Home Studies: (1) Do independent reading. Remember, students should read for at least 15 to 30 minutes daily and write about a half page summary in their journals. (2) If not already done, finish the math packet. There will be time to do some correcting tomorrow, but no more work on it in class.