Checkers!

As part of our studies of life in Colonial Times we have begun to play a few games.  This week we have played checkers and we plan to learn to play dominoes.  Our studies have included discussions about how the American Flag has evolved, how many states are in our country, and what some of the American Symbols are.  Do you know what Uncle Sam stands for???  U.S.?
We met Felicity, an American Girl, as we read about her experiences when young people in America were deciding if they were Loyalists or Patriots.  Some of the students debated which they would have been.
We are looking forward to our trip to Boston next week when we can see some of the architecture and structures we have learned about that are still there.  We will also see some of the flags we have learned about.  Of course we are also looking forward to seeing the swan boats and Ducklings statue.

Kindergarten Nature Walk

Ms. P. visited Pine Glen today and took us on a nature walk.  We discussed living vs non-living things and then found them in nature.  We really enjoyed seeing, hearing, touching and smelling all of the living things.

We saw frogs, caterpillars and bugs.  We heard various animals when we stood very quietly.  We were able to touch some moss and noted how wet it was because it holds water and we even smelled a leave.  It was minty, just like the smell of mint gum!  Ms. P. was particularly excited about two findings.  We found an endangered plant..........pink lady slipper.  AND, we found 2 kinds of animal poop!  Ms. P. determined that it belonged to deer and coyote and explained to us that this discovery was evidence that the animals are around.  Further evidence of a nearby den were the paths (or run) formed by the animals walking on the same path every day.

We did collect an assortment of non-living and living items to bring back to our classroom for further study.

We saw many frogs.  Maybe they were the ones that were released as tadpoles last spring?!

How do we know if it will be a butterfly or a moth?

What does endangered mean?  

Endangered Pink Lady Slipper

When you tear the leave in half you can really smell the mint.

Ms. P is holding deer poop!    She broke the small pellets apart and helped us to study them. The deer are vegetarians, so it was mostly plants. The coyote poop was full of animal fur and bones.  They are carnivores.

Butterflies!

After watching and studying the butterfly life-cycle in our classroom, we released 7 butterflies on Wednesday.  It was very exciting to  see them fly off to.

Science Center Animals

The science center has been very generous this year, sharing a large assortment of animals with our class.  We currently have parakeets named Pumpkin and Columbus,  and a crayfish.   In addition to helping us learn about the various animals and animal families, and responsibility  in caring for them, they help us to do our work and stay quiet during the day.   The parakeets prefer a quiet classroom and they make a bit of noise if we get too loud!

We can not wait to see what animals visit us next week.

Technologically Literate

The students in room 101 are quite a technologically literate group.  We have been using the desktop computers, i-pads and touch it boards to reinforce and practice our reading, writing and mathematical skills.

The really fun thing is that going to use these tools is perceived as a fun reward.  So students remain focused in their other tasks in order to get to the tasks that utilize the technology.

Mr. Musselman's Magnets

Mr. Musselman of the Burlington Science Center was in to visit the Kindergarteners of Pine Glen and share with us his magnet program.  We learned how strong magnets can be and discussed many of their uses.  Magnets stick to metals like iron, cobalt and nickel.  Note: nickels only have a small amount of nickel in them (they are mostly copper), so magnets do not stick to them!  He showed us many different kinds of magnets and told us various stories about them.  Be sure to ask your children about the North and South pole of a magnet and the story of the cow magnet.

We are going to the circus!

Ladies and Gentlemen............room 101 is heading to the circus.  We do have a a few clowns of our own in the classroom!

Thursday, May 10

Room 101 had a very busy day today.  Visitors to the classroom during our morning meeting helped resolve a few of the technical problems we have had recently will our Touch it board and computers.  They quickly realized what a wonderful room we have and decided to check out our collection of books.  THANK YOU Mr. Villano, Mr. Cunha and Mr. Allegretto.

 Workboard time was busy as we have begun to work on our end of the year books.  Mrs. Hoyt and Mrs. Parnell have students remembering how to write the numberal words.

 We also demonstrated our artistic skills as we worked on self-portraits.

Both mathematics and ELA skills are reinforced on the iPad.

 Before sitting down to write in our journals, we checked out the stages the caterpillars were in.