Difference between butterflies and moths
Above is a link we watched today and then we organized the information with a Venn diagram.


Our butterflies are still in their chrysalises.  We hope they will wait until we get back on Monday before emerging. 

We finally finished and photographed the Tangram book we started long ago.  Enjoy reading it below.

We also finished up our realistic fiction books this week.  They are pictured below with our butterfly life cycle in pasta.

  

Field Trip!

We had a great time at Kelkenberg Farms.  It was such a clean, well run farm with lots of young animals running around.  One of the chaperones was kind enough to take photos for me to put on the blog site- Thank you!

There were newborn goats running around for us to pet.

One of the chicks was born the day we got there and Mrs. Kelenberg named her after our Grace because it was Grace's birthday!

Every child got a pony ride!

In "Goat Country" we roamed amongst the goats and could even pick them up.

Happy Mothers' Day!

I had to share the "garden" that the class made for Mothers' Day.  I hope you all have a wonderful day with your children. 

Our Painted Lady butterflies have formed their chrysalises and we are waiting for them to emerge.  We were lucky enough to observe them forming the J and creating their chrysalises  on Friday. 

Thank You!

Thank you to my wonderful class for these beautiful potted flowers.  They look great on my front porch!

Good Causes

There are two great events coming up that some of my school families are involved in.  The CF for cystic fibrosis walk is May 18th and the Tour de Cure for diabetes research is on June 8th.  Though I don't post names on my blog, most of you know the families that are affected by these diseases.  The strength and faith of the children and their families as they live with these life changing diseases are an inspiration.  If you would like to help out by donating or participating but you don't know who to contact please email me and I would be happy to give you the info.

Insects

This is a fun site we looked at today.  It has great info about insects.
http://urbanext.illinois.edu/insects/15.html

Math Magicians All!

We have finally all achieved Math Magician status!  We congratulated each other today and celebrated with a small treat.  We will continue to have a quiz every Monday on an addend between 1 and 10 to strengthen our skills.  Keep studying!

Everything's coming up....

     To go along with our Living Things unit we planted seeds this week.  For the first time, I decided to have the students plant herb seeds instead of flowers.  The students picked from basil, rosemary, chives, thyme, and parsley to plant.  The students will have fun observing the differences between the plants.  If the seeds sprout we will send them home for you to enjoy.

We've been enjoying the chapter book, Young Canaller by Gerry Stafford.  It's a realistic fiction story about a young boy who works on a packet boat on the canal.  The students are enjoying hearing about the canal from long ago.  If you have never gone on the canal boat tour I would encourage you to do that this summer.  The students are all excited about learning some of the history of Lockport. 

 

Music Assembly: On May 8th at 9:30 we will have a Spring Music Assembly in the gym for the elementary classes.  Parents are welcome to come and enjoy the music.

Below are the writing passages we completed last week.  Each child wrote about a fun day during their Easter vacation.  We concentrated on adding details and excitement to our writing.  I think it is one of the best writing exercises we have had so far!

This week we are finally finishing up two writing assignments I have had in the works for awhile: the story of making bread, and the tangram story.  I had some technical problems with my camera and printing off the photos and then some scheduling problems trying to fit the work in, but we are almost through with them now.  They will be classroom books for the students to enjoy.

Don't forget the Chicken BBQ at DeSales on Monday.  If you didn't get advanced sale tickets you can still pay at the "door".  It's so easy- you just pull your car up and the dinners come right to your car.  Tickets are $8 a piece.

It was so nice to take advantage of the weather this week.  The students loved getting out to run around without jackets.  The recess parents even brought them out for awhile today before the weather turned.

Report cards were sent home today.  If you have any questions about your child's report don't hesitate to call me.  Please view these grades as indicators of where your child is doing well and where they need help.  They do not necessarily reflect how hard your child is working or what kind of a student he/she is.  

    We enjoyed some wonderful folktales this week in the form of plays.  The children love to perform and are excited whenever we do plays.  It was a fun week.



    

We had fun making s'mores this week.  The students were surprised at how the marshmallows puffed up in the microwave.  Here are the very easy directions: place one square of graham cracker on a napkin.  Place 1/4 of a Hershey's candy bar on top.  Place 6 miniature marshmallows on the chocolate.  Put in microwave and cook  on high for 8-9 seconds.  Place second graham cracker square on top and enjoy.

     









Every day we work towards playing a game the last 10 to 15 minutes of class.  Not only is it a great team builder but games like 20 questions are great for building critical thinking skills. Basically, good behavior from the class as a whole earns us a game and most days we do earn it.

     We had a great first week back from vacation!  The students came back ready to work and we got a lot done.  

  As you know we've started our "Measurement Unit" in Math and the kids have had a lot of fun measuring items in the classroom.  We are getting pretty good at converting yards into feet and inches.


We are in the process of revising the writing that we started on Monday describing a day during our Easter vacation.  We are working on making our writing more exciting to read by adding adjectives.

 We had some fun making "fortune tellers" yesterday.  It's a skill every kid should know.  :-)  It also promotes following directions, fine motor skills, and language skills!

     Our Fun Friday centers included a game to practice telling time, math facts practice, a Weekly Reader for Earth Day, a book called More Pies! by Robert Munsch at the listening center, and an information center about Space.

 Next Friday, the 19th, there will be a dress down day for Cystic Fibrosis.  One of our own classmates initiated the fund raiser with her parents.  Please show her our love and support by participating in this event.
     Enjoy your weekend!