Hoppy Easter!!!

The very first thing we did this week was check our paper mache yarn Easter Eggs Monday morning.  They were hardened up and ready to pop!  Popping the balloons inside was by far the best part!

We are studying poetry right now in writing.  Here are some wonderful Fishy Poems that the kids wrote using rhyme.

We also learned that not all poems rhyme.  We wrote an acrostic poem together about SPRING!  Then each student created their own acrostic poem, and you can see them as well as our tissue paper flowers up on our Poet Tree!

We went on a virtual field trip to the Baranov Museum in Kodiak, AK.  This is the oldest Russian structure in Alaska!  They also showed us how to make tissue paper flowers, which the Russians used to decorate their homes for spring.  It was really tricky!  Olivia figured it out and was able to help lots of other students in the class!

In our continuing study of electricity, we walked over to the Biomass Plant at the school to learn how the left over steam from the boiler makes electricity for our school!  Huge thank you to Tony Lee for setting up the fieldtrip and Rion Sabin for his amazing ability to talk to the kids on their level about electricity!  We learned a LOT and saw the school's "new" 100 year old generator set to come online this fall and make even MORE electricity!  

This is the 100 year old generator that the school bought and is working on.

Answering one of our questions about electricity, "What is inside of a wire?"

We had a special visit from Mr. Monroe, the High School shop teacher, who came down to teach us about electrical circuits!  He had some wonderful hands-on circuit boards and the kids had a blast connecting them all up with wires, figuring out how to make a motor work, how to light up a lightbulb, and even how to make an electromagnet!  It was awesome!!! Thank you Mr. Monroe!  We will continue to use the circuit boards to do even more experiments with electricity next week.

Wahoooo!!!!!!!  In Math everyone in the class got an A on their Math Facts Test this week!

We had fun making Easter Baskets and delivering them to our Book Buddies for a little Easter surprise!  We made candy nests, filled them with jelly beans and a Peep, and wrote cards for our Buddies.

The kids had so much fun delivering our surprises to the 5th grade!

I Wonder...

"I Wonder..." are two of the most beautiful words that I get to hear on a daily basis.

Just take a look at a sampling of things your kids were wondering about this week...


"I wonder what the inside of a magnet looks like?"
"Do glow worms turn into fireflies?"
"Why do we have funerals?"
"I have a very big question in my head.  How did everything in the world get made?"
"How can you tell if a ladybug is a boy or a girl?"
"Will the sun ever run out?"



We are beginning our spring study of insects and plants!  Critters to be arriving in our classroom shortly!!!  We made lifecycle projects this week.

This Life Cycle drawing was made by the kinders! We also did a word study...

The kids did a fantastic job of creating beautiful symmetrical butterflies!

In reading we did research projects about beetles, and learned how to use an index.  The kids had to think of a research question, such as "What do water beetles eat?", "Do glow worms turn into fireflies?"  Or "What is the biggest beetle?" and then do research to find the answer.  Then they wrote their question and answer, drew a picture, and presented to the class.  Here are a couple of kids presenting their research findings to the class.  We all learned a lot!

In math we used beetles (ladybugs, to be exact!) and their spots to discover all of the addition facts that add up to 10.

We also began a study of electricity in science this week.  We made ourselves into a human circuit and learned about how electrons run through a conducting material  much like a current of water.  We also talked about the different ways that electricity gets made, and we have a field trip planned on Tuesday to go see the school's generator.  The kids were encouraged to think about how their lives would be different without electricity.  They were stunned when they stopped and thought about all of the things they wouldn't be able to do without electricity!

I also had the kindergarteners take the District Writing Assessment this spring.  I was pleasantly surprised at the independent writing they produced! Their writing prompt from the District was, "What is your favorite game to play outside?"  Here we are doing a group brainstorm to get ideas before writing.  I helped them with their topic sentences, but then they were on their own.  I will be sending copies of their writing assessments home.  

With Easter coming up, our Friday afternoon art project was to create yarn paper mache Easter Eggs.  Boy, was it messy!  On Monday we will pop the balloons inside, leaving only hardened string, and use them to decorate our classroom for Easter!

School Out Early Due to Budget Cuts...

Due to budget cuts in Juneau, the administration has decided to close school a month early this year.  The last day of school will be April 25th.

APRIL FOOLS!

It was April Fool's jokes all day long on Friday!  We began the day by sending Alianna to the office with a profusely bleeding arm for Ms. Diana to take care of .  I do believe we got her good, for a few seconds anyway.  Kindergartners just can't hide their smiles :)

The same trick was played on Ms. Joetta and Ms. Sara, only this time it was Emma with a bloody nose.   After lunch, I gave the kinders some brownies.  Or Brown E's, to be exact!  They were a bit disappointed, but then when presented with the opportunity to do the same trick on the first graders, they were ALL IN!  

Then I surprised them all with REAL brownies, so happily, all disappointment was forgotten, and we had a fun brownie party with First Grade! 

Later, we played invisible catch with invisible balls and bags to catch them in.  Has your kindergartner showed you his or her invisible ball yet?  The power of suggestion is amazing.  One kindergartner SWORE she saw an invisible ball... "I saw it!  It was whitish!"  

There was another trick, too, but I can't tell you, in case you haven't found it yet!  Hee, hee, hee!  Make sure you check your child's folder.

We continued to work on color mixing.  The kids enjoyed making potions like "real" scientists with pipettes and colored water!

We also continued exploring magnets this week!  We went "fishing" and sorted objects into items that were attracted to magnets, and items that weren't, and came up with the answer to our question about what types of things are attracted to magnets.

THEN, we made our own magnets by aligning the positive and negative charges in a steel needle by stroking it across a magnet 50 times!  I love their, "Wow!  I can't believe I MADE a MAGNET!" faces!

We learned that the earth is a big magnet, and how a compass works.  We had fun finding North in our classroom, and other places in the school.  The kids learned how to draw a "Never Eat Soggy Waffles" compass rose, and created their own maps of our classroom or school, correctly oriented to North.  I think they are pretty amazing!

Finally, we learned that magnets are strongest at the poles, by doing an experiment with iron filings.  Then we watched a movie on how that fact helps create the Northern Lights with the solar wind emitted by solar flares and attracted towards the earth's poles.  Cool stuff!  Magnets are so much fun! 

We continued our study of fractions (halves and fourths) by creating pizzas, and then writing recipes for our favorite kind of pizza!  "My pizza is 1/2 cheese, 1/4 pepperoni, and 1/4 mushroom and olive" etc.   Emma got off easy because she likes her pizza all cheese!

Last but not least, the Battle of the Books finally arrived!  With great anticipation we headed to the library to compete.  There were 16 very detailed questions about our 4 selected picture books.  We took three teams to the Battle, and they all did GREAT!  We came back with a first, second, and third place wins!  OK, there were only 4 teams competing, but honestly, our teams only missed a couple of questions each, and we even had to go into an exciting tie breaker round.  I was very proud of the kids.  Thank you to all the families who helped the kids practice at home, and who came to watch the Battle!