Friday "Trip"

This week's Friday tip is about our trip to the Lazy 5 Ranch.  We had a great time learning about all kids of animals and getting up close and feeding them!  Although all students in grades K-5 attended, Mrs. Blodgett took the girls in a group, and we men stayed together. (I didn't realize until now that I didn't get many pictures of the students in the other groups- sorry about that!) The weather was invigorating and seasonable while we visited a petting zoo, went on a hay ride, enjoyed an al fresco lunch, went to to a country store, and we even had a spirited game of checkers before heading home.

EEK! Spiders

Our classroom has been transformed into an arachnid habitat!  Did you know that spiders are a symbol of Halloween because in days of old it was believed that they would hide in corners and "eves drop" on  conversations? The spiders would then return to the witch who had sent them and they would report what they learned! The spiders in our room are friendly, but they are listening to what our class is doing. After Halloween, each classmate will have a "conversation" with their spider, and they will need to write down what the spiders observed in class. - It will be interesting to see if the students' spiders remember material from lessons or if they will only remember social tidbits! 

We made the legs out of a solid sheet of construction paper, and then we divided the sheet into 1/8 pieces.  Because we have been learning fractions, this was a fun way to assess cross-curricular understanding.  We then painted paper plates and affixed our spiders' bellies and legs.

Digraph/Short Vowel Drills

Everyday our class starts with a drill of short vowels, digraphs and glued sounds.  The most important part of the drill is saying the correct sound; to insure this happens, every sound is associated with a keyword.