Today, after the usual morning festivities, we had a guest reader – Leo (our Star of the Week) brought his mom and a favorite book (Sweet Dreams, Honey Bear – complete with a puppet in the middle of the book!) in to read to us. After that, we sang our song of the day (“Alice the Camel”).
Then we moved on to Reader’s Workshop. We continued our study of non-fiction text features. Today we learned about what an index is for, as well as what a glossary is, and how to use them both. The kids then went off to read, both independently and with a buddy.
After reading, we had Writer’s Workshop. Today the mini-lesson was about strategies to use when writers want to use a word that they don’t know how to spell. We added some high-frequency words to our word wall, and several of the kids used them during their writing time. Our end-of-workshop share was about the strategies that each of them used to write tricky words.
After writing, it was time for lunch and recess, and then back up for Read Aloud. We read a bit more in ¨Cam Jansen and the Mystery of the Stolen Diamonds ,” and left off in a really suspenseful place – stay tuned for how it ends tomorrow! After a couple of chapters, we headed down the hallway for Media class in the library with Mrs. Hennen.
When we got back to our room, we kept on with our introduction to geometry in Math Workshop – the kids used pattern blocks to fill in outlines, once again to help build a concept of space and to develop their spatial sense.
After Math, it was time for Science Lab. Today we worked on separating the different parts of a vial of sand – they observed the sand, and then we added water and shook the vials. No accidents, by the way – thank goodness for secure caps on vials! ☺ Tomorrow we will see how the murky, muddy, dark water looks after it has settled – we’ll see some sediments, and learn about what sand is made of.
After all of that, it was time to pack up and head home!
P.S. Sorry that all of the links are to Amazon - I;m not actually trying to get you to buy anything - it's just the easiest way, usually, to get a picture and description of a book or object. ☺
