Writing Night!

If you missed the Parent Writing Night tonight, here's some of what you missed!

Silhouette Biome Art

Today, we did a really fun art project!  First, each student drew then cut out some shapes from black construction paper specific to their biome.  Then we water-colored a sunset sky, paying close attention to blending the colors together instead of creating stripes.  These kiddos did SO well!  I loved seeing what they came up with!

AMAZING!!!

Friendship Day!

We finished our first S.H.A.K.E. (Science and History Applied when Kids Explore) It Up unit!  Students presented their countries at our Friendship Day event on October 22nd!

Here are some of the displays:

Mr. President of United Justiceforall:

Students also participated in fun, cooperative games where they received points for teamwork and encouragement:

Crossing a "river" made of jumpropes was a big leap!

How long can you hula hoop?  If you're me, the answer is about 7-8 seconds...maybe.  If you're Eddie, maybe a little longer!

On a hot day, we were thankful some stations had shade!

Imagine a game where you and all your friends took off your shoes and then had to race to put them back on...

After the fun and games, we got a chance to look at other countries' displays!

Any day that ends with a smile this big is a good day!

I can't wait for our next S.H.A.K.E. It Up unit--Holidays Around the World!  We will be starting that in mid-November!

Apple Day!

We are starting our Fruits unit in conjunction with the UC Nutritional Education program.  Friday was a great kickoff, where we learned all about apples!

First thing in the morning, each student got 1/3 of an apple to dice for our crockpot applesauce...

...into which we added many apples, cinnamon, nutmeg, cardamom, a bit of butter, lemon juice, and brown sugar...

When that was done cooking (and it smelled AMAZING!) we tried dried apples, freeze-dried apples, fresh apples, applesauce, and apple donuts.  So not everything was exactly HEALTHY, but it sure was tasty!

Thank you, parents, for sending in apples and supporting our fun (and educational) days!

Biome Presentations

In groups of 3-4, students researched 7 different biomes: rainforest, boreal forest, ocean, African savanna, American prairie, desert, and tundra.  After becoming an "expert" on their biome, the groups created a poster and presented to 7-8 students from other biome groups!

Here is DJ presenting about the rainforest.  DJ also found a cool National Geographic poster with information, photos, a map, and diagrams detailing the rainforest!

Avery taught about the tundra...

Zoey did a great job with her boreal forest poster...

Every student, like Max here, listened politely and intently to their classmates and took detailed notes about each biome.

Here's a close-up of a poster:

Lots of information on this Savanna poster!

Presenting in front of these small groups is great practice for giving speeches in front of the whole class!  It also is great for getting insight on how teachers try to hold the attention of 23 people at once ;)

Larissa is answering a question for Eddie.  It was so cute to see them raise their hands respectfully to ask questions of the presenters!

These types of projects and presentations really help with speaking and listening skills (a new standard in Common Core) as well as teamwork, summarizing information, finding main ideas and details, understanding informational texts, and more!

These 7-, 8-, and 9- year olds sure impressed me with their hard work!

Sneak Peek of S.H.A.K.E. It Up presentations!

You've seen our voting process, and here are some more photos from our work in S.H.A.K.E It Up!  Please join us this Thursday, October 22nd from 12:30-2:30 for Friendship Day.  All classes will be demonstrating their work and displaying their unique creations.  In our classroom, third graders from the countries of Gummikash and United Justiceforall worked on the following:

Deciding on laws...

Designing flags (and voting on which ones would represent their countries)...

...then blowing up and painting the flags...

...deciding on national symbols...

...and finishing the country's constitution...

...not to mention, starting to create the map (including the biomes) for their country...

Great work, third graders!  We can't wait to see your finished products!