Your child might come home today and explain that they are in a new classroom. The large space we were in was originally the Learning Commons (library) for many years but due to a lack of classrooms last year it was made into a shared space. We began the year in there but have been given the opportunities to have a robotics/maker space, as well as a science area with some recently purchased plant growing structures. The Learning Commons will be better utilized to allow for more students to use the space for a variety of activities. As there was another classroom available this year, Mrs. Brice's class is now in one of the portables and Mrs. Bredahl is in the room that was this years previous Learning Commons. We understand that change is hard and missing friends is even harder. Our classes will still be together for morning and lunch recesses, as well as gym everyday except on Monday's. We will still get together for buddies and special activities.
Today students continued learning about snow and how it forms. We read the book 'The Story of Snow' by Mark Cassino and then we watched a video about 'Snowflake Bently' a man who lived in the 1800's and was the first person to capture photographs of individual snow crystals. His work is remarkable and you can google his name to see the beauty he was able to share. Ask your child to tell you how a snow crystal forms (it needs a speck of dust, pollen, ash, salt to begin). They should also be able to tell you how many branches each snow crystal forms.
In our literacy today students were introduced to the 'sh' sound which is called a digraph as it is two consonants that produce one phoneme (sound). We also focused on retelling the main parts of a story including the characters, setting, beginning, middle and end. Ask your child to tell you what a setting is and what words could describe it the story they listened to today.
As we are now in two separate classes, for Valentines Day we are asking students, who would like to participate, to bring in 22 valentines for their friends with only their name on them. We have found in past years it is very difficult for one adult to help 22 students read and find 22 peers' bags. This way they can drop one in each bag as they move throughout the class. If they have a valentine for some closer friends in the other classes they can hand them out before/after school or during the day if there is time.
We used our health period today to talk a little bit about our move and the feelings that come with it. Many students were happy with the quieter space which also allowed for more turns during discussions :) but some students were feeling down due to the change. We used our zones: green, yellow, blue, and red, to put ourselves into a zone and then talked about it being okay to have the feelings we have.
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