Bumble Bees and Ducks!

Every day it dawns on me that I only have a select few days left with these kiddos, and man I am going to be sad on the last day of school. We have developed such a wonderful classroom community and I cherish all the moments we have had this year! Here are a few projects we have been working on this past week.

Bumble Bee Directed Drawing

As we finish up the year we are working a few final art pieces to complete our art portfolios! This week we drew Bumble Bees and then finger painted them! The students absolutely loved getting to use their fingers instead of brushes and man did they concentrate! It was practically silent while they were painting! It is amazing at how their drawing skills have improved over the course of the school year! I can't wait for you to see their portfolio's so you can see their first drawing of the year compared to their last! AMAZING!

A student draws and colors in her bumble bee.

A student finger paints his bumble bee.

Our wall looks so beautiful with all the different bumble bees!

Duck Writing

We are finishing up our HUGE duck writing project. We have gone through 4 drafts of writing and students are finally working on their final drafts of their projects and are so excited to share them with you! We started back with brainstorming facts and opinions about ducks. Then we put those facts and opinions into a paragraph format. Next we edited their writing for book spelling, capital letters and of course punctuation. Finally we are copying over their edited version and making it into their final draft! It has been quite the process but they have truly risen to the challenge! Here is a photo of a student working on copying over her edited version for the final draft. Also here is a picture of the ducks swimming outside. We had to watch them for inspiration for our writing :)

A student works on copying over her final draft.

Students watching our ducks swim!

Well only 13 days left of school but we are packing those days full of fun and learning! Thanks for joining myself and our class on this ride! It has been a blast :)

Smiles,

Miss Adams

So Many Ducks!

Wow did we luck out in the duck department this year! We had 10 out of our 11 duck eggs hatch! It was a whirlwind of a weekend for me last weekend, hence why I missed posting last week, but the students are so excited about their arrival, as am I! This week we also started our standardized testing and students are working so hard. I am very impressed with all of their growth and progress this year!

Ducks, Ducks and more Ducks!

Last weekend was quite crazy as our ducks hatched early! Two days early and totally caught me off guard! I was able to capture of video of one of the ducks hatching, see below, that the students loved! It shows very clearly how the duck zipped (made small pecks in a circle around the egg) so that they could push the end of the egg off and come out! Now that the ducks are here the kids are loving reading to them, there are also a few pictures below of the kids reading to our final egg in the incubator, and of course watching them swim. We will be making observations about the ducks and their characteristics this coming week as they are starting to get bigger to the point where we can start to see their features very clearly.

Of course our duck study wouldn't be complete without drawing the ducks! Students' drawing skills have improved immensely over this school year and I can't wait for you to see their art portfolio's at the end of the year!

A student reads to our egg in the incubator!

A student reading to our ducklings in their habitat!

A big pile of ducklings! They love to sleep on top of each other!

The ducklings first swim!

A student works on drawing her duck.

A student draws his duck.

Here is the video of the duck zipping and hatching! Excuse my screaming! I was very excited! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O52i8urJKXU&t=1s

Math Practice

As we wind down the year we are working on becoming very comfortable with addition and subtraction in order to have those facts memorized as they move on to the next grade level. In the photo below a student is working on using facts that they know to solve a close fact. We are also working hard on place value and finishing up measurement, time and shapes. It is an action packed time in math!

A student rolls the dice and then adds the two numbers together.

We will be finishing up our testing this week and beginning to wrap up our year, gearing up for our end of year field trips and finishing up our duck research projects! So sit back and enjoy the ride :)

Smiles,

Miss Adams

Crazy about Shapes, Eggs and Plants!

We are ending April with a bang! So many fun hands on activities from building new shapes with our pattern blocks, watching our ducks growing before our eyes and also finishing up our plants unit! We are in full swing until the end of the year!

Geometry Exploration

Working in our shapes study this week students got to build 3D shapes using marshmallows and toothpicks as well as pattern blocks. Students got to experiment and find how many different ways they could put different combinations of shapes together to make hexagon's and then simply build fun pictures to discover how shapes fit together. It was a great week of exploration and using our math vocabulary to explain our learning! 

     

     

     

It's a bird, it's a plane, it's a duck egg!

We are anxiously awaiting the arrival of our baby ducks. While we wait, we are deep into study on a ducks life cycle, how they are growing inside the egg and how to prepare for them when they arrive. This week, as they had been incubating for their second week, the baby ducks were moving quite a bit inside the egg and students actually got to see a few moving when we candled them! It was so exciting and the kids were fascinated that there weren't full size baby ducks inside yet! We have 14 days left and we can hardly wait!

Parts of a Plant

Finishing off our plant study students got to create their own flower using papers that we painted by hand with Mr. V a few weeks back. We started by tearing paper to make the soil and stem of a plant. Then we finished with our sky, sun and petals of the flower, as well as adding our labels! They turned out so beautiful! I love them!

     

    

Well that's all for now, but stay tuned with our duck egg hatching coming soon as well as a fun walking field trip to the veterinary clinic in the next weeks there will be lots of fun things to share!

Smiles,

Miss Adams

Leaves, Seeds and Plants Oh My!

We are off and running in our plants unit, getting our hands dirty and enjoying every minute! 

Here are a few of the activities that took place in our week:

Planting Pots

One of our activities to go through our understanding of plants was a writing craftivity as I call it. Below in the pictures see each page of our flip book, that when assembled all together created a potted plant. The "oohs" and "aahs" once we put them together were hilarious! Now these pots are decorating our classroom :)

Students working on their books.

A completed book.

Soil Sensory Table

During choice time students had the opportunity to practice planting seeds in our sensory table. Students got to look at varying seeds, bulbs and practice taking care of them. The students loved making their gardens, and then making new ones! It was a fun practice for when we start growing our bean seeds this week.

Daffodil Drawing

One area that we explored this week was how to draw "real-life" drawings of plants. It is a hard skill and one that definitely requires practice, but for our first time out I thought they turned out so well! Check out a few of them here:

Well that's all for now, but stay tuned next time to see the beans we planted, as well as some fun math we have been working on in class.

Smiles,

Miss Adams

Community Helpers

Hello everyone! I hope you all had a fun spring break. I am so excited to get back into action, I missed your kiddos :)

This post is all about our wrap up of Community Helpers. From taking a field trip to the grocery store, post office and fire department, to making our mural of Estacada with Larry Verdoorn it was a fun filled week!

 

Walking Field Trip

To start off our walking field trip we began with Thriftway. We got to see in the back stock room, see all the varying departments of the store and the students even got to check out their own goodie bag of items! The students had so much fun and it was a great connection to think about all the community helpers who make a grocery store possible. For example the farmers, bakers, grocers etc.

Students get to see the back storage room in Thriftway.

Then we went off to see the Fire Department. The Fire Chief began by talking with the students about fire safety, the kids knew so much already! Then the kids got to see where the fire fighters sleep when they stay at the fire station. Then students got to see the fire truck and go inside, and see a firefighter put on all of his tools! The students loved getting to see him on with his mask! Finally we got a special visit from the fire dog! It was a great visit.

Students getting to see where Fire Fighters sleep.

Watching Fire Fighter Cody put on his suit.

A student takes photos on the iPad to document our trip.

A special guest visited us at the Fire Station!

To finish off our field trip we went to the Post Office. Inside we got to see the behind the scenes look at the post office boxes, how they sort mail and packages and finally we got to see the lift where mail workers bring in crates of packages off of mail trucks. The students were so excited to see all the packages and hear how much mail goes through everyday!

Getting to see the behind the scenes mail sorting.

The lift where mail carriers get packages off of trucks.

The field trip was such a great chance for our class to see community helpers in action and see the variation in helpers. From a Fire Fighter to a Post Office worker students truly got to see why every job is important to our community.

Estacada Mural

To finish off our study of the community we worked with artist in residence Larry Verdoorn to construct a map of Estacada. Students got the chance to help paint the background of the mural, construct the roads and they also got to make the buildings and trees with the papers we painted a few weeks ago. It was wonderful to hear the kids exclaim "Oh yeah we have to put in City Hall we saw that when we walked to the Fire Station," or "Don't forget the bank by the Post Office!" I loved hearing students make connections to the community based on what we saw on our walking tour. The students did a truly wonderful job and I can't wait to find the perfect place to hang it in our school for everyone to admire!

Larry Verdoorn shows students how to make their houses.

A student uses a picture on an iPad to design her building.

A student recreates a business by looking at a photo on the iPad.

A student working on constructing their house.

The finished mural!

It is hard to believe that we only have 9 weeks left in school! While there are so few weeks left they are truly jam packed with fun experiences and learning for your children. Keep checking back here for updates on the amazing adventures we are having :)

Smiles,

Miss Adams