Learning with Passion

While the above is our full mission statement, we often break it down into 3 simpler parts to use with the students. These parts are:

• Learn with passion
• Act with courage
• Change the world

This is the time of the year when first graders come alive with passion for learning and that is why this is my favorite time of the year. I love watching them learn things on their own or connect things we have learned together to new things. It all just seems to explode and they notice, wonder and learn and learn and learn. It is the best!

I have gathered just a few examples of how a few members of our crew are learning on their own and sharing with the crew. There are many, many of these examples and these are only a few of them. Wendy and I are constantly looking at each other with tears in our eyes as the crew shares their learning and thinking with us. They are amazing!

Johanna created a notebook with sections for different subjects. She is planning to create work for each subject and add it to her notebook.

Avery and her brother were home sick so Avery ran a home school for her little brother. They worked on reading, writing and math. For math they learned shapes just like we are learning at school.

Kate was very interested when we learned about graphing. She created some of her own graphs at home and brought one in to share with the crew.

Violet likes to find words to add to our classroom word work charts. She also likes to create her own charts in her small notebook.

Koby found a "bad" word while he was reading a Frog and Toad book the other day and brought the book to me to show me. He told me that since it was a bad word that he just skipped it. I told him that he could read the bad words in his head. (Note: The bad word is "shut up".

Sydney is learning how to break words into parts to help read and write them. She shares what she learns with the crew.

Many members of our crew have become word detectives. The hunt and find words everywhere and add them to their notebooks. They were inspired by several books we read about kids who collect words.

Trevor graphed his collection of Pokemon cards one day after we learned about graphing.

Violet inspired us all again this morning with her high-quality picture book. She told us about the books that inspired her to write this book and we all admired it. Below are just a few shots from inside the book - not the whole book.

Below are a few other examples of the crew's learning that I don't have documented with photos.

• One day when we were learning about two dimensional shapes, I wrote the words "two dimensional" on the white board. Joshua piped up to say that I had made a spelling mistake. He said that we just learned that "tion" spells the "shun" sound and that I had accidentally spelled it "sion". I loved that he made this connection and that led to a mini-lesson on the "sion" spelling.
• Trevor began writing down all of the 2-digit math problems that i-Ready was giving him. He was very proud that he was able to do these complex problems. He currently has pages of problems that he is keeping track of and he has inspired several other crew members to write down their math problems from i-Ready, too.
• Many crew members are completely obsessed with the Press Start series of books. They are about a super hero bunny and his adventures. They were very frustrated with me one day because we couldn't find the 3rd book in the series in our classroom library. We could only find books 1, 2, and 4. There were even tears because one little boy really, really wanted to read it. Ms. Martha has now ordered the entire series for our school library and I think my missing copy has been found but I am not sure. All I know is that they are all back to reading.
• Some days when I call the crew to closing circle, they groan and say, "No!" This is not because they don't like closing circle, it is because they don't want the day to end. This happens a lot on Wednesdays. I can't even begin to tell you how happy this makes me.

There are so many, many stories like this that happen all day long in our room. Even if I didn't mention your child by name, I am sure that I could tell you a story about your child without breaking a sweat. The crew is just so motivated and inspired to learn right now. I just wish you could all be there to see it. It truly is the best!