Upcoming events and a week of har work!

First of all, we have a few events coming up.  Next week we will be finishing our food drive collection (on Monday), showing our school spirit (all week), and inviting you into our classroom on Wednesday evening for a learning showcase!

Spirit Week:  

Monday : Class color Day- Show your class spirit by dressing in the color your class picks!  SLT members will come around to classes with a hat full of color names your class will pick from. Our color is WHITE!

Tuesday : Sporty Day- Wear your favorite sport jersey or even dress as your favorite team player!  

Wednesday : Country Day- Yeehaa! Wear your favorite flannel shirt, and maybe even cowboy boots! Dress as a western.

Thursday : Crazy Hat Or Hair day- Choose a safe, respectful way to show your spirit with crazy hat or hair!

Friday : Sweats Day- Not comfy cozy day but sweats day.  Wear you favorite sweat pants and or sweat shirt, and be comfy all day!

Showcase of learning:  Wednesday evening 5:30-7:00.  Please come and check out the genealogy work we have been doing!

As usual I will round out this update with a few authentic student reflections from the week:

This week we are making scrap books for our genealogy project.  

I like this week because we are doing some more progress in the genealogy program. I will be done today!

This week I have been working on my scrapbook and Genealogy! I have it almost done and I also get to have hot lunch today at the valentine,s feast.It has been an awesome week!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! .

-Dave

Weekly update!

Hey gang, we are clipping along.  Our energy is high and our focus is tight.  We have been entering into division in math, moving forward with our story keepers project, and diving into a new book.

In division we have been talking about the notion that division is the inverse of multiplication, as well as repeated subtraction.  To solidify this understanding we have been writing word problems, evaluating them to see if they are indeed asking us to divide, writing the expression that matches them, and finally solving to find the quotient!

Our work with Natalie Kinsey-Warnock is super exciting.  This week we went to the town clerk's office to look at some primary sources, and we saw a Victrola!  We will be moving forward with our family research in the coming weeks, and are looking forward to producing and showing off the fruits of this work.

Also, we have started a new book during our read-aloud and writer's workshop.  The Tiger Rising, is a beautiful book by Kate DiCamillo.  Throughout the course of this book the main characters learn a lot about themselves, and how the world works.

Have a great weekend!

-Dave

Information coming home tonight.

Hey gang, there are two pieces of information coming home tonight.  One is an information letter about chaperoning our Boston trip in the spring.  I have already heard interest from 3 parties (Josh Scribner, Denise Roy, and Scilla Gilbert), and we are looking to form a grand list by Wednesday 1-20-16.

The other piece of information is a permission form to travel to the Town Clerk's office.  This mini-trip will be happening on Wednesday 1-20-16, and we will be going at 1:30.  If you are able to join us, have a level 2 background check, and would be willing to drive some students down that would be great.  Please let me know as soon as possible so I can get transport organized.  

Thanks,

Dave

A very exciting week!

As usual we have had a very exciting week.  We have pushed into our investigation of division, moved into some research and informational writing, and been learning about electricity.

All of the above a very interesting, and the students are putting great effort into all of it.  However, this week we are also launching a genealogy unit with the help of Natalie Kinsey-Warnock.  She will be here for 7 full days over the course of this month, helping us investigate the stories that are embedded in our extended families!  For this work students will be talking extensively with you and your extended family in order to unearth these stories.  The first portion of this is in the form of a family tree.  Each student has one in his or her resource folder.  Please, over the coming weeks help them fill out as much of it as you can.  If you have questions about this, please drop me a line or an email!

Also this week there is a letter with an update about our Boston trip this spring.  There are new dates in this letter as well as information if you would like to accompany us.  Please check it out, and again, if you have any questions please let me know.

I hope you have a restful weekend!

-Dave

Working right up to the December break!

As usual this update will be a composite of student reflections on the week.  We are really chugging along and making progress everyday.

We did awesome stuff with electricity and ukers are now bringing home their ukes. In library we are using pixler.

This week we did lots of work with division and models. We also did some work with electricity and it’s source and how it works. Well that’s the week. bey bey

This week we were playing the grinch game in p.e it is one of my favorite games. We had a chex mix sale, I saw one person who got like twenty bags.

What I loved so much about this week is that I got to bring my Uk home to practice and show my parents what I have learned.  I also loved this week because in Art we did a lot of x-mas projects.

This week, we started a new topic, electricity. So far, we have learned about full circuits, and cells (batteries) by watching a video. We also learned about motors, with an article from The Way Things Work. A website taught us more about circuits, and Mr. Willard taught us about bulbs, light, and, heat. We have also experimented with circuits, using, “aligator” clips, a power source, and either a motor, or a bulb.

We started electricity and learned a lot about it like how a motor and a circuit works.

This week we got checks mix. There was a line around the corner. Students were getting checks mix for their  parents, themselves, and their younger siblings.

This week we worked on electricity and yesterday we also tryed to make are lights light up and my partner was Kameron and we liteup 1 light bulb than we liteup 2 and we did that one and than we did 3,4 and we got up to  and that was fun and I love what we were doing.

This week we started a unit (to take place of reteach) on electricity. Again I was not there yesterday (Thursday,) but, this time I was going to an eye doctor appointment. I also shared two times this week.

Have a great weekend!

-Dave

More authentic reflections from the week.

As has been the pattern, much of the content for this post will come from authentic student reflections.  I will be copying and pasting their work with as few edits as possible, as I prefer to show the true authentic work.

We are getting ready for the December break, and as is the custom here at EMES we will be having a gifts fro giving workshop on Dec. 21.  Below is a link to sign up if you would like to volunteer with this event.

http://www.signupgenius.com/go/10c0a4aacab2daa8-gifts

If you are interested in volunteering just follow this link, and choose some times that work for you!

Also this week, you will notice your student(s) coming home with some of their work, this is so they can show it off!  This is always fun and please try to remind them to bring their notebooks back to school on Monday.  

We worked furiously on our book posters.

This friday my class is playing the grinch game. My teacher just has to play the grinch game in a good way.  I like to be a hoo not a grinch because all the grinch's do are kick around hula hoop to make people bring the light bulbs back to the mountain.

At recess today i'm going to play football we pick teams with team captains I hope i'm on my brothers team.

I am so excited for pe because we are playing the grinch game I love it because there are some grinches a max and hows dawn in howvil.

I really liked reteach this week, because I learned a lot! I also liked reteach because I got to do a lot of writing.

This week we were working on are book posters and I did me poster about The One And Only Ivan and we also are bringing are Abenaki project home and i cant what to bring are Abenaki posters home and I love my Abenaki project.

This week, we finished our posters. We have been working on them all week. Yesterday (Thursday) I could not finish them because I had a doctor’s appointment.

Have a great weekend!

-Dave

The first week of December!

This post will be a conglomerate of authentic student reflections from the week.  I have done some editing for spelling only, as to preserve the essence of everyone's thoughts.

This week, I was absent on Monday, it is bad because I missed school, but it is good because I finished Catching Fire! I checked out Mockingjay at the library, but I have had trouble starting it. First, my brother was playing his video game music when I started to read it. Second, I was on the bus and I couldn’t concentrate because my friend was listening to my favorite song with earbuds, and I wanted to listen too. That leaves me with chapter three.

This week we had the same sub that we had the week befor. His name is M.r Mich he was a nice sub. We also presented our abenaki posters. My poster looked had a boat, bow and arrow and a picture of a abenaki shooting a deer. My story of the abenaki started out like this….. ‘’Boom!’’ A gunshot rang out through the woods. The abenaki were out hunting again.

Ukers are finished there uk's (and added new strings). our Abenaki mini-unit is finished and the was a fire drill and assembly.

I was in florida most of the week, and I don’t have a lot to say here. We had a cool fire safety talk!

This week I was very excited!   The class had an museum walk on our abenaki work.    Plus this week we were getting ready to work on some poster and that willard kid is doing pretty good on his.   I herd that we in pe are going to play basketball.   Speaking of basketball on thursday was the first basketball practices it was very exciting!   That was the most exciting thing this week bekas I have  been practicing for a long time.

This week we had the fire drill for safety.   The firefighters came in to teach us and we learned how to be safe in a fire drill.    They also taught us that if a fire were to go off in our house we stay come and to be alert.  What i’ve been tring to tell you is that don’t cook when your alone or with your older sibling.

Today we had a fire drill! After the fire drill, we went to to the gym for a assembly with the firefighters for fire safety. It was really interesting to hear about how you can cause a fire. For example, you shouldn't have a toaster under cabinets because if your toaster burns, the fire will go through the cabinets  and you will have a fire in your cabinet! After the whole assembly,the firefighters surprised us with little prizes. You could get a glow- in the dark frisbee, or you could get a water bottle. I personally wanted the water bottle. You could also get this color pencils and if you rub them, they will change a different color. I got a blue with white built into the pencil, I also got a purple with hot pink built into it. And finally I got a rubber bracelet with words on it that says “Practice Fire Exit Drills!” It has been a fun day so far!

there was a fire drill. there was a assemble.my foot felt like it was parlisd bekose it was aslep.

-Have a great weekend!

-Dave