Dictation

Students in dictation class have been focusing on reading and spelling words that follow the vowel-consonant-e pattern and comparing them with words that follow the consonant-vowel-consonant pattern. Students sort, compare, read, and write words and sentences using words with these patterns. We have emphasized spelling patterns for certain consonant sounds at the ends of these types of words. For example, /k/ is spelled -k in V-C-e words (bake), but -ck in C-V-C words (back). Now students are learning the patterns for adding -ed and -ing to V-C-e words (take away the -e and add the ending: hope-->hoped, hoping), and to C-V-C words (double a single consonant and add the ending: hop-->hopped, hopping). Attending to these word patterns is helping students' reading and writing become more fluent.

Fox Book Club

Some of our younger students have been participating in their first book club. We have been reading several of the Fox books by Edward Marshall, including Fox On Wheels, Fox and His Friends, Fox On the Job, Fox Be Nimble, Fox On Stage, and Fox Outfoxed. Each book is divided into three chapters, each a humorous story about Fox and his family, friends, and neighbors. The children read one chapter each week. They write a response which includes a picture and a sentence or two of something in the story. When we meet, the students share their responses and then we discuss the story. As there is lots of dialog, we usually assign parts and do a little "readers' theater" of a page or two from the story.

Variables

Our two 7^th graders and one 5^th grader have taken a journey into pre-algebra this year.  This class has been called Variables all year, but we have explored so much more than just variables.  One thing that is constant is that there is often an “unknown” or “x” in most of our work, so the name “Variables” has stuck!  Even when working on fractions, proportions and ratios, we’ve substituted an “x” for the place where you might originally have seen a box in younger student’s math books.  These three students have added, subtracted, multiplied and divided positive and negative numbers and are currently working on a memory game that practices these skills.  They have explored relations and functions graphically as well as in table form, have examined tables to figure out the function being performed on the x to get the y and been solving for x in equations and inequalities.  We are constantly being tested as we solve these problems to see if order of operations really does make a difference – yes it does!  We’ve also worked on our math vocabulary and worked on honing our math skills all around.  We’ll finish out this year with some statistics and a review of what we’ve worked on this year.

Heating and Cooling

The youngest group of students have taken part in a science class on Heating and Cooling. They started the unit by discussing what hot, cold and temperature meant. They classified their findings on a Venn Diagram.

The students were introduced to thermometers and practiced using them by taking the temperature of their fist, the room and outside. They had many chances to understand the term “below zero” this winter! This activity gave each student the opportunity to measure the temperature, read the temperature, inquire about celcius and farenheit and graph their results.

To investigate hot and cold further, the students experimented with activities such as “Melt a Cube” and “Keep a Cube.” Students predicted how long it would take an ice cube to melt and tested their predictions by running hot water over it, sitting on it, rubbing it and placing it near the heater. They constructed a definition of “insulation” after they experimented with keeping an ice cube from melting. “Insulation can keep something warm or cold.” They made a list of what materials they thought would be good insulators of heat and used these materials to test which ones insulated a cup of hot water the best. They questioned “Are we trying to keep the hot in or the cold out?” 

Alaa, Frannie and Glady’s Mom, invited the students to her lab where they learned how to use microscopes and closely observed some insulators such as styrofoam, wool and feathers! (And other cool stuff like bugs, flowers and gems.) Alaa helped the students understand their question about insulation as she shared how heat energy flows from place to place and their coats for example are trying to keep the hot air IN.

The students were excited to hear that they would be presenting on Hot and Cold for the Science Celebration! In pairs, they designed an invention that would either keep an ice cube from melting or keep hot water hot. They were introduced to the scientific process as they formed a hypothesis and materials list of effective insulators. Soon their inventions will be complete and put to the test! You will be able to view their inventions and results at the Science Celebration!

Government

In January the oldest students started a “Government” unit. For three-months we have studied the needs and rights of individuals, the rights of a community and different forms of government in existence today. Children were first asked to bring in a newspaper article describing some aspect of government. The diversity of topics, from Speaker Sheldon Silver’s abuses in Albany, to Obama lifting restrictions against Cuba, to a New York State childcare law being proposed, to a landmark Supreme Court case about gay rights were the catalyst to many fascinating discussions. After each article was presented we identified whether the issue related to local, state or federal level of government. We watched a video to support our understanding of the different levels of government.

At the start of this unit we established ground rules for all discussions. These rules are essential if there is to be an informed and respectful dialogue. There are bound to be times when we disagree with one another, but the important point is that we can agree to disagree respectfully.

1.    Everyone participates

2.    We respect the opinions of all.

3.    One voice at a time

4.    We can all work with each person.

Students went on to read articles about monarchy, oligarchy and democracy and then compared each form of government after making a list of their pros and cons. To explore these topics further children were asked to find out what kind of  government existed in 19 different countries. The children noted that there were more Constitutional Monarchies in our small sample of countries.

In March we turned our attention to the US government and its three branches of government. We read articles from High Road, and Cobblestone Magazine and watched a video to help us understand our system of checks and. Studying the Bill of Rights and a number of other amendments to the Constitution offered more rich discussion – especially the right to bear arms. There was definitely dissent about whether this amendment was indeed necessary today.

We will continue studying the constitution, and hopefully go on field trips to see our local government in action – the legislative, executive and judicial branches.

Explorers

Students in grades K-2 started a social students unit this fall on explorers.  Students were first asked to explain the difference between an Explorer and Exploring and came up with statements such as: Explore means to look for things and Explorer is something or someone that discovers things; Explore means to find things and Explorer is someone that finds different things; Explore means to find fish in the ocean and an Explorer is a person.  We started off our unit by reading a book about Mary Kingsley who travelled to Africa.  What fun the students had learning of her travels and the people, plants and animals she encountered.  We then went on to read about Admiral Richard Byrd, Matthew Henson, Captain James Cook, Ponce de Leon Eric the Red and Roy Chapman Andrews. As we read about each explorer we filled in our chart with who, when, where, how and findings.  We’ve now taken all of our information and made Explorer Cards to play a memory game with and teach the older students all about these explorers.

Multiplication/Division

A group of seven 3^rd and 4^th graders have been learning all about multiplication and division this winter.  With multiplication, they started with cluster problems which break large problems such as 358x27 into small clusters of easily known multiplication sentences such as: 300x2, 300x20, 50x20, etc.  Once the smaller problems are solved, students figure out which cluster will help them solve the initial problem.  This was a way for children to see how a large multiplication problem could be broken into smaller pieces.  

Our next look at multiplication came in the form of the lattice method.  Students learned how to set up the problem and place the numbers in a way that they would add together to get the correct solution.  This was a favorite method for many of the students.  

The last multiplication method we tried out was the traditional algorithm.  Some of the students had seen this method before and took to it immediately; many still favor the lattice method.  Students are encouraged to use which ever method they understand and can easily use.  

With division we started with “short” division.  Problems such as 75÷3 where there are no remainders.  We then played games such as Leftovers and Roll a Remainder to look at what it means to have a remainder and did “short” division problems such as: 82÷4 and 65÷6.  As we got more confident in our efforts, we have moved on the long division and have even worked on 6-digit numbers divided by one-digit.  Many students are still practicing and honing their division skills at this point and work with teachers and on their own to get better at this skill.