Acorn Nursery News from Ms. Jan:
We had a wonderful week with the children and were especially pleased with drop off on Wednesday. Even with the long weekend, all of the children arrived happily, without any tears. The children are really blossoming and delighting in school. We happily welcomed that cooler fall weather that I've been waiting for and we had a busy week even though it was short. This week we planted little lettuces, tomatoes, parsley, basil, rosemary, etc. in our garden beds in the backyard. We will have plenty of seasoning for our soup in a few weeks when the weather gets a little cooler. The children have been enjoying watering each day with our little kid-sized watering cans. Be sure to take a look at the garden one day at drop off. We also began our Halloween Circle, adding favorites like "Five Little Pumpkins Sitting On A Gate" and "Jack-O-Lantern."
Grade 1 News from Ms. Contento:
We had a lovely three day week in First Grade! My students are enjoying the "number" stories I am telling on a daily basis. This is the beginning of mental math for these students and they are enjoying the challenge. At this point, they are using the gems as manipulatives to learn to add and subtract. I am also having them learn to count by two's and five's. We will finish this math block Monday with the number ten. The mental math and counting will continue throughout the year. Learning the numbers in this way gives the children a connection to each number and an amazing number sense.
Tuesday I will start the language arts block. We will continue listening to imaginative story content that engages the feeling nature in preparation for writing and reading uppercase consonants, drawing and writing with crayons, listening skills, and retelling stories through memory.
Grade 2 News from Ms. Mullen:
The children had show and tell last Friday with Ms. Allie and discussed a poem called The Spider and the Fly. We discussed this story deeper on Friday and looked for rhymes within the poem and made a drawing for our main lesson books. We also welcomed a new student to our class - we are so excited to welcome her!
Grade 3 / 4 News from Ms. Flores:
We completed our work with corn with a look at and a drawing of the parts of the corn plant. We also completed a writing about our discussions. The class then moved onto wheat with a review about our visit from Bellegarde Bakery. I told the class a story about wheat that included details about the types of wheat, when it grows and the parts of the wheat plant. Each child took apart a wheat stalk and counted how many kernels where in their stalk's head. Normally, there is an average of 50. The students seemed excited to see how that number can vary. We discovered that there were over 850 kernels in the wheat we had in the classroom alone. The students also learned that a bushel is 60 pounds of wheat and that equals roughly 1,000,000 kernels!
Grade 5 / 6 News from Ms. Nelson:
We transitioned to our first science block by speaking about what a scientist does, and how each of the students can be scientists in their own way through careful observation and then the drawing of conclusions based on the information they collected. We spent some time discussing the difference between quantitative and qualitative data, as well. The first experiment centered around light and color. The students stood in a circle in "rainbow order" based on what they were wearing in the library with the lights off. I then increased the light slowly. The students observed which colors could be discerned first, and when I did the experiment in reverse order, which colors disappeared first. We then shared our observations and drew some conclusions about visible light. After this, I explained a bit about how light behaves, and the physics behind the experiment. From there, we transitioned to an exploration of heat, and heat conductivity. On Friday, the students observed that different metals conduct heat more or less efficiently. They also formulated hypotheses (or guesses, if they did not have experience with or knowledge of metals in this context) about which metals might be the most effective conductors. Overall, it was a great beginning to our studies! I was impressed by how seriously the students took up each area of inquiry..
We transitioned to our first science block by speaking about what a scientist does, and how each of the students can be scientists in their own way through careful observation and then the drawing of conclusions based on the information they collected. We spent some time discussing the difference between quantitative and qualitative data, as well. The first experiment centered around light and color. The students stood in a circle in "rainbow order" based on what they were wearing in the library with the lights off. I then increased the light slowly. The students observed which colors could be discerned first, and when I did the experiment in reverse order, which colors disappeared first. We then shared our observations and drew some conclusions about visible light. After this, I explained a bit about how light behaves, and the physics behind the experiment. From there, we transitioned to an exploration of heat, and heat conductivity. On Friday, the students observed that different metals conduct heat more or less efficiently. They also formulated hypotheses (or guesses, if they did not have experience with or knowledge of metals in this context) about which metals might be the most effective conductors. Overall, it was a great beginning to our studies! I was impressed by how seriously the students took up each area of inquiry.
Ms. Nelson's class continues their science block by exploring how static electricity works.
Grade 7 / 8 News from Mr. Pauzolis:
In this very short week following Fall Break, we deepened our understanding of the Platonic solids by creating the second of the Platonic solids: the hexahedron, or cube. The class was required to take detailed notes of each step so that they could recreate this solid on their own. They will also create main lesson notes on this entire process. We also explored the equilateral triangle, and each student was challenged to learn how to create a template for an octahedron without any instruction. We then tested several of these proposed designs and found there were many ways to create this shape. Furthermore, they learned that the octahedron and the hexahedron had a connection, or "duality" with each other. This week we also had our class photos. The weather was beautiful and the pictures should look wonderful
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