Cinnamon Ornaments

Students were eager to get started on our latest ornament. The cinnamon has filled our room with the most wonderful fragrance. "It smells like cookies in here," they say.

We turned our craft into math and reading review. We measured, counted and read the recipe together. Students took turns photographing, combining ingredients, measuring, and stirring.

We each used Ms. Pace's cookie cutter to cut out our own gingerbread man. We will have to wait several days for the dough to dry so we can put them on our tree. In the meantime, we'll be sniffing the aroma of cookies. {grin}

We're really excited to get these on the tree!

Synergizing Researchers

First graders in Ms. Wilson's class are using the Mac Air lab to research animals of their choice.  We will be researching them for the remainder of this week and adding our new learning to our research notebooks.  We are so excited to use our school's newest technology with the help of Mr. Massey.  We're also synergizing with the Research Center and Ms. Quinn's computer lab.  We have really become researching machines! 

Check us out in action. 

Collecting non-fiction books of our choice from the Research Center.

Here we are working hard to collect facts from our non-fiction books to add to our research notebooks.

We have highly anticipated using the Mac Air lab to do research on this website.  Feel free to research other animals with your child at home.

Ms. Quinn helped us use World Book Kids in the computer lab to add even more information to our notebooks. 

We are happy animal researchers, and can't wait to share our new learning with you. 

Rudolph the Candy Cane Reindeer

On Monday we were excited to see what our new ornament would be. The excitement was evident as students worked hard all day long.

Students collected their own materials for the project. They were instructed to gather 2 candy canes, 1 brown paper square, 2 eyes, 1 red pom pom, a piece of tape and glue.

Our finished products have been added to the tree! 

We have more than 80 ornaments on the tree now.

Icicles

We used pipe cleaners, laundry soap, and warm water to make sparkling icicles.

This was an easy ornament to make... all we did was swirl our pipe cleaner around our pencil. Then, we hung our swirls in warm soapy water to sit all weekend long. When we came back to school this morning to our surprise we had beautifully, sparkly icicles.

Our tree looks wonderful! We have so many ornaments already.

We are still working like elves once we finish our schoolwork. Today we are wrapping up a project we've been working on for several afternoons. We won't reveal too much, because there's a surprise involved. {grin}

Our project started with homemade salt dough. We made an impression in the dough using our handprints. The lunch ladies baked our creations while we worked hard in the classroom. Next, we borrowed paint from Ms. Walter in the art room and added some color. The rest is a secret. We can't wait to share these ornaments with you, parents!

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Christmas

We have been busy elves. We made a class goal to be proactive all day long so we can make ornaments for our tree at the end of the day.

We have been enjoying our glittered pine cones, and today we began making toboggans.

 

We had to follow careful instructions to ensure we ended with a toboggan ornament. We carefully tied yarn around recycled paper towel rolls and knotted them just so.

 

 

7 Habits Happy Class

During recess today suddenly Ms Pace and I noticed the class synergizing and organizing their own game of Duck, Duck, Goose. Everyone was thinking win-win as they gladly accepted more classmates to play. No one argued or got upset (proactive students in action) as rules were explained; they were seeking first to understand each other. Everyone slowly joined the game, leaving the playground behind, a few at a time. When someone new joined the game all students included them in the circle, keeping the end in mind. We were so proud to see the entire class involving everyone and sharpening the saw together.

If you're keeping count that's using 7 of the 7 habits during recess!

Ms. Pace and I delighted in watching you all play.