Happy Earth Day!!

Each year, our school celebrates EARTH DAY with fun rotations! Here's a peek at what we did today:

Paper Towel Rainstick

Recycled Relays

 Recycle Speaker

Story Time & Snack

Peel Crayons to Make New Crayons

Book Swap

 Pavers (each grade made one for our outdoor area)

Learning Our 50 States

In 4th grade, our students will be expected to learn all 50 states and their capitals. To get them started, we are introducing the states this spring.  One of the fun ways we are showing off the states is to collect postcards from (hopefully) all 50 states. We are not doing a normal postcard challenge with other schools, but simply asking family and friends to ask their out of state acquaintances to mail our class a postcard.

Here is the information I sent to my parents:

Hi Parents,

We will soon begin our study of the states in our wonderful nation. To add a little fun, we would like to receive postcards from all the states. This is where you come in! Please contact (call, email, facebook.etc.) any friends or family that live in other states and request a postcard. Below is an example request:

 

"Hi there! My child's 3rd grade class is studying the 50 states of our country. They would like to receive a postcard from each state. Please send a state-theme (e.g., Kansas postcard might have a sunflower, California might have a beach) postcard to our class. If you are able, please include a fact about your state on the postcard. Please mail the postcard to Moonlight Elementary, Attn: Mrs. Brown, ___________________. Thank you!"

 

I will update you with which states have come in and which we are still missing. Thank you so much for helping with this fun project!

Mrs. Brown

 

This email went out Monday and we are looking forward to receiving mail from around our nation. We have a map to color in the states we have received a postcard from. Hope to share positive results soon!

Disappearing Peeps!

Welcome!! We are experimenting on the effects of various liquids on Peeps! We are testing water, vinegar, apple juice, soda, and laundry detergent. The students are recording the changes they see each day.

Day One

Day Two

almost completely gone!

Egg Drop

Each of my students created an invention to protect a raw egg from a 9 foot drop. They were SUCH creative little kiddos! In an unprecedented turn of events, all but one egg survived the fall. This has SERIOUSLY NEVER happened before in six years of teaching!

Check out some of their projects:

Geometry: Polygons & Angles

Our next Math Expressions unit covers Polygons & Angles. To help the students "see" these more often, our third grade team taped down some polygons and angles to our carpets.

I use these in a couple ways:

1. We have gone on "Right Angle Hunts" where we look carefully at each shape or angle to determine if there is a right angle. My students have also learned the geometry words acute and obtuse. They love sounding so smart using these grown up math words!
2. I have also called on students or groups of students to "Find the ____" (trapezoid, rectangle, obtuse triangle, etc.). Once everyone is in their places, they have to discuss as a small group what makes their shape/angle unique and unlike the others in the room. Each group then gets to share about their shape/angle's attributes.

Oogly - Clay Monster Creations

Each year, the Oogly Lady comes to visit our school. She is a wonderful artist who brings such unique creations from my students! I love to see what they make.

The students start with a ball of clay and create a pinch pot. This pinch pot becomes the mouth & body of their Oogly monster. Next, a nose and eyes are added. With a little bit of rolled clay, the monster has legs and arms. My students get very into the details of their monsters, adding teeth, hair, a spiky tail, etc.

The Oogly Lady takes our monsters with her to fire them in the kiln. Meanwhile, we write a fictional fantasy story about the creatures. The Ooglies are a prized possession and are kept for many, many years!

Leprechaun Madness - Lots of Pictures!

Today is an inservice/work time day for teachers and next week is Spring Break. That means any St. Patrick's Day celebrations had to be done this week instead of next!

We started out telling the students that last year a leprechaun reeked havoc on the third grade. He destroyed our classroom in his search for gold! This definitely got the students' attention. We designed traps to catch the leprechaun and had a STEM-related discussion about how they intended on catching the little rascal.

We set the traps on Wednesday evening, I locked our classroom door on the way out so that no one could mess with them. On Thursday morning, our classrooms were a disaster! We checked each trap, but the slippery little leprechaun escaped us again!

The clean up process begins...