Sam Van Aken and his Tree of Life

On Thursday, October 30, Sam Van Aken was our third mystery guest of the year. Sam created, using grafting, a tree that can bear 40 different kinds of stone fruits. The children asked their yes/no questions and quickly determined Sam had come to share something about trees. But then we challenged them, in the remaining minute, to figure out his specific interest in trees. Asher, one of our older students, had his hand raised for a good 30 seconds before Sam called on him. Asher nailed it by asking Sam, “Do you cut a part of one tree and add it to another one?” Sam proceeded to explain how he got started six years ago. After learning about an orchard at the NYS Agricultural Experiment Station in Geneva, which was home to over 200 varieties of plums and apricots, he began experimenting with "sculpture through grafting." We will take all the children to SU’s campus in the spring to view one of Sam’s trees planted on SU’s quad.  We can’t wait to see the tree in its multi-colored splendor. Some of us will return in the summer to sample some of its fruit!

http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2014/08/trees_40_fruits_sam_van_aken_syracuse_university_food_inspiration.html

Margaret Bourke-White Field Trip

On Thursday, October 16, 2014, nineteen of our oldest students visited Syracuse University’s campus to view Margaret Bourke White’s exhibit of 180 vintage photographs taken in the Soviet Union, Czechoslovakia, Germany, England and Italy in the 1930s and 40s.

Prior to our field trip, Andrew Saluti, Assistant Director to SU’s Art Galleries, visited The New School as a mystery guest, and then proceeded to share with the school the significance of Margaret Bourke White’s work – her passion for photographing industry, people, and her documentation of World War II. It is hard for today’s youth, familiar with instant access to information, to grasp how Bourke-White’s photographs in Life Magazine informed the world. Andrew was also able to show and explain how different the process of taking photographs was in the 1930’s. Children were also amazed to learn how large her camera was! Andrew is gifted when it comes to engaging children of all ages in a sophisticated topic. His presentation was masterful.

At the exhibit, the older children used Visual Thinking Strategies (VTS) to study two photographs. The discussions that ensued were facilitated by graduate students in SU’s Museum Studies program. Finally, students were given time to view the entire exhibit and to identify photos they found especially meaningful. We are indeed lucky to have such resources in our community and couldn’t be more grateful to Andrew for hosting such a rich learning experience for our students.

Geometry

Our 5th graders have been working on all facets of geometry lately.  They started with reviewing polygons during class and individual time on their contracts.  They played games such as: Guess My Rule and Get it Together Polygon 1-4.  The challenge lately has been measuring all types of angles using protractors.  An angle hunt around the school was in order to get kids up and measuring.  Using Power Polygons, we have explored area in square inches and will be moving on to using the algorithm of Area=base x height for a rectangle and having students discover how to use this algorithm to find the area of a triangle.  Students have also recently been challenged to classify triangles by their sides and angles.

Place Value Fun

Seven 3rd and 4th graders have been working hard in a place value class that has also integrated multiplication.  We started with talking about skip counting on the 100s chart and what numbers would land us exactly on 100.  We learned that 100 has the factors of 1, 100, 2, 50, 4, 25, 5, 20 and 10!  We've also been working on landmark numbers and how to use those when figuring out factors of 200, 300 and higher numbers!  We will be working our way to 1000 soon.

Xerox - Learning to Read

To assist children learning how to read, we offer small group instruction that focuses on the six syllable types. Using Road to Reading, and Wilson Language, each week children receive instruction that meets them at their instructional level. Typically children meet in small groups with a teacher three or four times a week for 20 – 30 minutes each. Students manipulate letters on a sound-board to make words which change one sound at a time. For example: (hat, hit, hot, not, cot, cat, mat, map, mop.) At other times they play games (such as Go Fish, Bingo, Word Sorts and board games) to practice these skills. In a third session they are asked to write words, sometimes sorting them into columns (such as short a, short i, short o), sometimes writing complete sentences.  Finally each child reads one-on-one with an adult to practice these skills in context.

Currently we have four groups of children benefitting from this program. We have early readers working on cvc syllables with blends and digraphs (such as lift, glass and ship). A second group is working on reading cvce syllables (such as cake, bike). Another group is working on two syllable words and words with vowel teams which make one sound: ay, ai, oy, oi, oa, aw, au and ee. Finally, a group of older students who have been introduced to all six syllable types are working on decoding multisyllable words and words with endings such as -ed, -tion, and -ture. 

Writing Workshop with Dana

We are working on short story structure:  beginnings, middles, and ends. We have been discussing character motivation, dramatic conflict, and how to resolve things in an interesting and satisfying way.  It's a challenge to structure imaginative worlds, and it takes a lot of focus to show a dramatic arc in a compressed form. Our goal is to have the students publish their short (under five pages) and completed stories in a class literary magazine by winter break. 

Cursive

Students in 3rd and 4th grades have been working on reviewing all of the lower case cursive letters from the clock climbers to the hills and valleys.  As we finish up our lower case letters, students have been challenged to write two words in cursive, switch with a partner and print what their partner has written.  This is the real test - if someone else can read your writing!  What fun it has also been to practice our cursive in our pen pal letters that will be heading to Michigan shortly.  Next it will be on to capitals and practice, practice, practice!