Passing of the Cans!

Dec 12, 2016
3 min read

Good Evening!

This past week we sorted, graphed, and counted the cans that were donated from our class to Harvest Hope and shared in the passing of the cans. Each day the kids were excited to be chosen to either sort out the new items, add them to the graph, or record the final new count. At the end of the week we celebrated with the passing of the cans. As a class we collected 196 items so thank you so much for your generosity. Here are some pictures from the event and from some of our other math explorations:

We also we explored stories looking at who is telling the story and how this might change if the voice changed. We asked if the story were told by a different character, how might it be different. We talked about setting, main characters, and point of view. We also talked about author’s choice by exploring different forms of storytelling and why the author might want to portray their story in that form. We read aloud a script, read lyrics from a song, and talked about how the Nutcracker told a story through dance. We also compared and contrasted a song, book, and video form of There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly.

This week we will be continuing this study of storytelling to look at different formats of books such as through diaries and letters, picture books, and chapter books to develop our sense of authorship and author’s choice. In the next few days I will be conferencing with each of them and sending home some of their writing. They will be helping me fill out a conference form based on our conversation looking at whether they are using capitalization when needed, spaces in between their words, etc, and forming ideas of how they can grow when we return. I will send this home and will keep a copy for my records so we can reflect on it later.

At the end of the week we will be reading stories of the winter season. I have books talking about giving and celebrating with friends and family in a variety of different ways. If you have any stories from home about celebrating this season or a particular holiday please feel free to send these in. They can accompany the books I already have on the different traditions generally represented within the classroom. On Friday, we will read the gingerbread man, a story which has been told traditionally at this time of year, and wrap up our week decorating gingerbread cookies.

Friday is our last Sandhills library trip for a while because the library is closing and will reopen down the street in the Village of Sandhills. On the original calendar we were scheduled for February 3rd but now it looks like It will not be open to us until Friday the 10th. Stay tuned on what the updated schedule will be but know we will not go in January.

Our next gathering is February 10th.

You will notice this week’s reading log only goes until Thursday and contains a few math problems. This is intended to just be for this week and be returned Friday. Thank you and have a great night.