Perfect Performance

 I could not be more proud. The Nursery Rhymes and Pumpkin Play Performance was a huge success. The children are so incredibly proud of themselves and I could not have asked for more. The children worked so hard on their lines, costumes, and set design.  Also, thank you for all your home support. Your practice and participation helped tremendously. The Nursery Rhyme outfits were simply amazing.  We could not have done it without you!

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Here is a copy of a video from our dress rehearsal. There are a few little hiccups that we got worked out for the real performance but with this copy now any siblings, friends, or far away relatives can share in the fun.

Pumpkin Investigations

It is pumpkin time!  We have been studying the pumpkin life cycle and other interesting characteristics.  Thank you for donating pumpkins to our science center.  We ended up with nine  different looking pumpkins.  We worked in groups to pick a pumpkin and do several different investigations.  First, the scientists counted and recorded the number of lines on the pumpkins.

 Next, the scientists measured.  They had to measure the height in cubes and the circumference.  To find the circumference, the children cut a piece of yarn to fit around the pumpkin then measured the length of the ribbon.  There were a few surprises!

Last, we did a sink and float test.  Even though we had read that pumpkins could float, many of the students predicted the pumpkins would sink.  Some of the pumpkins were very heavy!  To their amazement, all the pumpkins floated!  Even if the students tried to hold the pumpkin down, it would still float to the top!  The experiment was a catalyst for a really interesting discussion.  These six and seven year old's were on the verge of some huge science concepts and I just LOVE their curiosity.  Have I told you before, I just think these kiddos are amazing! Thank you again for donating to our learning!

Thank you, PTA!

We are so lucky at Eagle Cliffs to have such a wonderful PTA.  This week, our PTA sponsored a pumpkin decorating contest.  The pumpkins that came in were so creative and clever!  Then, on Saturday, it was the perfect day for trunk or treat!  It was so fun seeing the children dressed up and enjoying the season!

Spiders, Spiders EVERYWHERE!

Creepy, crawly, and an engaging way to get first graders to work on important reading, writing, and math skills: spiders, spiders EVERYWHERE!  We did so many different spider activities I had to divide it up in four separate posts.  In reading, we read both fiction and nonfiction books on spiders.

We worked on retelling a story using the story elements of character, setting, problem, ordered events, and solution or ending.  We took the very familiar story of the Itsy Bitsy Spider and made a story map to include the elements of a complete retell.  Listen to this student use the map to tell all the elements of Itsy Bitsy.  So smart!


Another important foundational reading skill that we practiced with spiders this week was recognizing rhyming words.  We practiced rhyming by playing a game called "Web of Rhymes."  Students had relay race.  They had to run to the "Web of Rhymes" balancing a spider on their heads.  Then, the first graders had to find a rhyming pair.  After the rhyming pair was selected, the racer brought the cards to their score keeper and handed the spider off to the next team mate.  The children had so much fun collecting rhymes, they didn't realize how hard they were working.

Creepy or Cool?

One of our major objectives in writing is for first graders to be able to write on opinion piece.  First we sorted some statements about spiders into fact or opinion.  Then, before we wrote we talked about OREO writing.  In an OREO piece, students state their Opinion, give a Reason, give some Evidence, then restate the Opinion.  The first graders had to choose their opinion: Are spiders creepy or cool?  Then, they were to use the information we had learned about spiders as their reasoning and evidence.  The first graders worked very hard.  Such hard work on an Oreo opinion piece deserves a cookie treat, yes?

The pieces turned out great.  Here are just two examples read by the authors.  One creepy opinion and one cool opinion.  What do you think?

We also made some cute spiders to go with our opinion pieces.  Interestingly, the students were given all the pieces to the spider craft and an example; however, there were NO verbal directions.  Students had to really think about how to order and glue the pieces in order to make the spider.  You should check out our writing and art work in this week's envelope.

 After the students finished their art project, they took a photo of their spider and wrote their opinion as a caption.  These techie students then uploaded their photos to their digital learning portfolio on an app called SeeSaw.  I can't wait to show you their portfolios at conferences.  

Sometimes to get the right photo angle you have to stand up!  Ha!

Spider Math

Spiders were even incorporated into math this week.   Spiders were the topic for data collection.  We surveyed 8 friends to find out if they thought spiders were creepy or cool (more with opinions).  Students had to tally their results and then color in a pie graph to represent the data. The end result, it was a close race but most students in our class think spiders are cool.

Spider Sum Up!

We ended our spider activities with Spider Soup!  The children interactively wrote a recipe for spider soup.  They were creative, silly coming up with the "grossest" ingredients they could.  Ha!  Weren't they surprised when I told them I caught enough spiders to make a whole crock pot of their soup!  All morning long, the children were looking in the pot in disbelief.  "Did she really make our recipe?"

After recess, the soup was ready to be served.  Best comment ever...."It tastes just like chicken!" Love these first graders!

We had such a super spider week.  I couldn't put all the photos in the blog posts so here is a slideshow to show a few more!

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