Ants Work Together, and So Do We!

I found these example of kids working together at recess the other day.  It made me happy to see my class helping each other!  We have been studying our ants, and watching how they work together...

We also watched a video of some leaf cutter ants that found a way to get across a broken branch they were crawling on.  They made a bridge!  So we made a bridge also!  Then we did some writing in our journals about how our ants work together.

We have been getting into the routine of our new math curriculum, My Math.  We also have time each day to do math centers... exploring hands on applications of math concepts.  Here the kids are in their math groups playing dominoes, making pattern necklaces, and working on their daily math lesson.

In science this week we asked the question, "What happens to all of the leaves that fall on the ground?  Why isn't forest piled up with old leaves?"  After making some hypotheses, we watched a time lapse video of what happens to leaves on the forest floor, and learned that they get decomposed by mushrooms and other fungi!  So... we went outside to see if we could see that happening.  We found some mushrooms growing, turned them over, and sure enough, they were "eating" leaves!  We could see their white thread-like roots growing into the leaves.  It was awesome!  We took some back to the classroom and took a closer look in the microscopes!

Then we wondered... does food decompose, or rot, the same way?  We decided to let some food decompose in our classroom, but we did some experiments to see what would affect how fast the fungi would grow on the food.  We added salt to one plate, water to another, left one out on the counter,  and put one in the fridge.  We will watch closely to see what happens, and what effects salt, moisture, and temperature have on the rate at which food decomposes!

This week we had a district cross country meet in Dot Lake.  Each class got to take their top three runners, so we had lots of fun in P.E. practicing and having races.  It was VERY competitive and exciting.

Melody, Natasha, and Braiden got to go to Dot Lake to race.  They all ran half a mile and did great!!!  You can only see Braiden's back leg in this picture, because he was so fast.  He was already almost gone by the time I took it!  We will have another race on Tuesday, Oct. 3rd in Tanacross, and this time we are going to take our whole class.  Hopefully you found a permission slip in your child's folder for this event.

We had the opportunity this week to watch some Fairy Tale plays that the Middle School and High School drama class put on for us.  It was SO much fun, and they did a great job!  Thank you to Ms. Walton and her drama students!

Our Brains Are Growing!

Our class made lots of mistakes this week!  We watched a movie called "The Girl Who Never Made Mistakes" and learned that when we make mistakes, our brains grow!  After we exercised to make our muscles grow, we learned that mistakes are like exercise for our brain, and when we learn from our mistakes, our brains grow!  Funny how after that lesson, kids were happily making mistakes all over the place!!!  

We had a wonderful time planting birch trees with Tok Forestry, and learning about how trees use cholorophyll to make their own food, and why they turn colors in the fall.  Our class has three birch trees by the front of the school, and the kids are watering and caring for "their" trees!  It will be fun to watch the trees grow as the kids do... I wonder how big they will be on graduation day 2030?!

We also took the beautiful fall leaves we collected last week out of the plant presses and used them to create various creatures, like caterpillars, birds, and mice!  

We continued our studies of fall leaves by making handprint trees for art with Ms. Alexa on Friday.  The kids all loved painting their hands, and discovering how to make orange by mixing colors.   The pictures turned out beautifully and will be up in the hallway on the KinderArt wall!

Our popcorn words keep popping!  Here the kids are teaching each other and playing a game with the popcorn word wall.  Thank you for all of your practice at home!  

In science we are learning about our five senses.  The kids took some time to be curious about senses and asked some great questions, such as, "How do our ears work?" and "Can bunnies taste things?"  We will explore more of their questions next week.  We experimented with TASTE this week, and here the kids are seeing how their sense of sight and smell affect their ability to taste.

We continued our study of TASTE by making cranberry muffins with the berries we picked a few weeks ago.  There were delicious!  We learned how important it is to know our numbers so that we can follow a recipe!

We shared our muffins with our Book Buddies on Friday at our first Book Buddies event.  It was a HUGE success!  Thank you to Michele Erickson, Alexa Peet, and the fifth grade teacher Mrs. Dunning for helping!  The kinders were each paired with a fifth grade buddy, and then went to the We Love Books cafe, where they were formally seated at tables and had a Book Tasting Party!  Each group had a book to "taste" as the big buddies read to the little buddies, and then afterwards were served the food that they read about!  They read books such as, The Carrot Seed, Chicks and Salsa, Bread and Jam for Francis, Blueberries for Sal, and of course, If You Give a Moose a Muffin!  The buddies had a fantastic time together, and then got to play together at recess.  They were all asking to do Book Buddies again right away!  This is a win-win for kinders and fifth graders, since the kinders get someone to read to them and encourage their love of books, as well as getting to know some of the older kids in the school.  The fifth graders get to practice their oral reading fluency and develop relationships with little people full of hugs and admiration!

We have some new critters in our room!  Our ANTS finally came in the mail, all the way from South Carolina, living on a slice of potato!  We put them into our ant farm on Friday, so we will be observing them, writing about them, and learning how we can work together as a class, just like the ants do!

Moon Lake Field Trip!

We had the most beautiful fall field trip to Moon Lake this week!  We went with the first and second grades and did a station rotation, learning about the water cycle, aquatic insects, and canoeing!  Here is Ms. Bonnie teaching the kids the water cycle.

Brandy Baker with Alaska Fish and Game out of Delta came down to help the kids collect aquatic insects and identify them!

Time for a picnic lunch!

The kids all went canoeing at the end of the day.  Some were nervous and had their first canoeing experience ever, but every single one of the kids went out on the water and did such a great job paddling!  It was such a gorgeous day to be out on the lake!  Thank you to Patricia Young and Chris and Michele Erickson for helping out, and to Tetlin Wildlife Refuge for providing the canoes!