Book Speed Dating

Well, that's what I call it but I know that the crew just thinks it is fun. We put out lots of bins of books from our classroom library and each child gets one or two minutes to look through each bin of books and then we switch bins. They find lots of new books that they want to read the next time they are in the classroom library. It is a good thing to do periodically throughout the year because kids grow and change as readers and will find books interesting now that they didn't find interesting earlier. We all found many interesting books and can't wait to read them in the classroom library.

Important Dates
10/28 Crew Photos and Picture Re-Takes 9:40 am
10/30 Halloween Costume Parade and Party 9:00 am
11/6 Our crew hosts the Beat 9 am
11/11 No School ~ Professional Development Day for Teachers
11/18-11/22 Climbing Week ~ Sign up to belay here: Fall Climbing 2019. Sign up for belay training here: Belay Training
11/18-11/22 Book Fair
11/25 Vision and Hearing Screenings
11/27-11/29 No School ~ Thanksgiving Break
12/6 Fieldwork ~ More details coming soon
12/23 Winter Break Begins

Expedition

We wrapped up the first case study of our family Expedition this week. We have learned so much about so many families in our crew. We have also learned new math skills when we collected and gathered data about our families in a graph or chart. You can see some of the graphs and charts we created in the photos below. Thank you to all of the families who shared things about their family with our crew. We truly enjoyed all of the presentations! Thanks also to all of the grandparents who shared stories from their lives with crew members. We learned some historical pespectives about our families. We will dig into the second case study of our Expedition after Fall Break. Enjoy your time with your children!

Our thoughts before interviewing our grandparents

What we learned during our grandparent interviews

Geometry

We are currently working on a very short (two week) unit on two-dimensional shapes. We are learning shape names and attributes as well as learning how to compose and decompose various shapes. Later in the year we will return to Geometry with a study of three-dimensional shapes. We will take our unit test on two-dimensional shapes on Friday.

Grandparent Interview

I thought I would explain more about the reasoning behind asking the crew to interview their grandparents or someone from that generation. We want them to see that many things that their grandparents did when they were in first grade are similar to what kids do today as well as learning about how things might have been different. Young children don't have a wide perspective on historical events and conditions yet and so they often go way, way back when they imagine what life was like for their grandparents. We want to try and begin to build some of that perspective in their thinking. Before I sent home the interview assignment, I asked the crew what they thought life was like for their grandparents. Below are some of their predictions. I want them to be able to make adjustments to their thinking as they listen to their grandparents. I will share their thoughts after the interviews, too.

Benjamin's Family

Benjamin's dad, Chad, came to talk to us about his time in the Air Force and in Afganistan today. We learned so much and had a great conversation. Thanks, Mr. Chad!

Important Dates
10/7-10/18 Fall Break
10/21 No School ~ Work Day for Teachers
11/11 No School ~ Professional Development Day for Teachers
11/18-11/22 Book Fair
11/27-11/29 No School ~ Thanksgiving Break
12/23 Winter Break Begins

Wednesday Workshop

For our Wednesday Workshop time this week, Lyam taught us how to make bracelets by braiding yarn, Max taught us some paper folding techniques and Avery K. taught us how to count in French. We have many experts in our crew and we love learning from them. Check out the photos in the album below. I can't even begin to tell you how happy this day made me. While it was messy - all learning is - it was so moving to me to see our young experts take over.

Library - We have library tomorrow. Please help your child remember to return their books so that they can check out new ones.

Crew Experts

Bodey's Family

During RAD, each crew does have some time in their classroom. During part of our classroom time, Bodey and his mom came and did a presentation about their family and their love for travel and their connection to flying - Bodey's mom is a flight attendant. I can't even begin to tell you how adorable it was when they walked in the room dressed as a pilot and a flight attendant. They shared so many cool things about being a flight attendant and a pilot and we got to take a pretend flight, have an airplane snack, earn our wings and make a mini-airplane. I am including a couple of photos of their presentation below but there are many more in our RAD photo album. Thanks Malissa and Bodey for sharing your love of flying with us! We loved it all!