Saturday, April 30, 2016

Spring Things

Hi Parents and Families! It's been a busy few months and this is the first weekend I've had to sit down and update our blog. March and April have been full of fun things in Room 203. 

Read Across America Day
Thanks to everyone who came to our birthday party for Dr. Seuss! This is one of my favorite nights of the year. It was so wonderful to see so many families celebrating the amazing works of Seuss together. 









Dance Showcase:
Thank you also to everyone who came to our dance showcase! Ms. Gregorio does so much work to give our kids a chance to show off their amazing moves. We used dance videos from gonoodle.com that we do a few times a day to give our bodies the chance to move around and make it easier to focus on learning. I LOVE watching these kids dance and hope you all enjoyed it just as much as I did. 





Cat Party:  If you were at the dance showcase, you got the chance to stand up and dance to the (very fun) song "Cat Party"! Our kids love this song so much that when we filled our marble jar the last time, they wanted to have a cat party of their own! Thanks so much to all the parents who sent in snacks to share! 






Earth Day:
Many parent volunteers at Lincoln helped make our Earth Day really amazing! We got to make seed balls, see how solar power works, and drink green smoothies! We also spent the week preparing to go "Zero Waste" in our classroom by analyzing what we put into our trashcan, and trying to redirect all that we could. Most of what goes in there is tissues (unavoidable!) and food wrappers. We saw some really cool alternatives to single use packaging, like this sandwich wrap and snack baggy! Let's keep it up as much as possible! If you'd like more info on going zero waste at home, check out http://www.zerowastehome.com/



 

You can read more great ideas for helping our planet by looking at these books hanging under our hall heads. 




Geometry: 
In math, we are starting to think about Geometry and fractions, and are having lots of fun building polygons, and starting to think about equal shares. 




Science:
We've started our last science unit of the year.... Properties of Matter! This is a fun unit where we investigate the way matter changes state, and soon we'll have lots of fun observing chemical reactions! So far, we've learned how solids can dissolve into liquids (making Kool Aid) and then watched that liquid turn into a solid as energy is taken away (frozen popsicles!) We also compared the changes in state of two different types of ice... frozen water and frozen carbon dioxide (dry ice). One melts, and one does something else! Ask your student for the word we learned that describes a solid turning into a gas! Hint... it starts with an "S"! 









Finally, I'd like to send another big thank you out to the parents (and grandparents!) who have volunteered in our classroom this year! Many parents are in our classroom every week playing math games, taking reading groups, checking work and giving out stickers, and providing one on one writing help. Many other parents have volunteered throughout the year for things like the 100th day or Holiday party. We appreciate all of you SO MUCH! Involved parents are a big part of what makes our school so exceptional and such a rewarding place to teach. Thank you, thank you, thank you! 

Thanks for reading our blog! There will be another update towards the end of the year with all of May's goodies. We are so close to second grade!