ANOTHER BUSY WEEK

Language Arts:
This week we focused on point of view and it's meaning as it relates to people and to literature. We read an excerpt from Later Gator by Lawrence Yep in our Critical Reading and Writing Daybooks. After reading part of the story, told by a boy named Teddy, we rewrote a part of the story from Teddy's father's point of view. The learners' rewrites were very creative and showed a clear understanding of "voice" in writing and how that changes with point of view. Beware... your child may be asking for a pet alligator!

Explorers:
The beautiful and thought provoking book, Encounter by Jane Yolen, was read aloud to the class. It's about Christopher Columbus' first meeting with the Taino, through the eyes of a Taino boy. It lead to some interesting discussions. I then read excerpts from Christopher Columbus' journal about his 1492 voyage. They were surprised to hear some similar events and how different the perspectives were. For homework this week, learners practiced this skill by writing a journal entry as if they were an explorer.
We worked on gathering information from written articles about specific Explorers in small research groups. We also continued to work on our Explorer trading cards. They will be up in the room if you would like to learn some interesting facts about California explorers. The learners used reading materials to access information about the explorers. It was a nice activity to work on finding important information in text.

SEL:
We had a lovely class meeting where many people gave learners very genuine, meaningful compliments to others in the class. Everyone was aknowledged at least as a class. It was a warm way to end Tuesday.

Magnets:
Students quantified the obsevable magnetic action of 1 to 3 magnets and a paper clip in an experiment entitled, "How close can you get?". It was a review in measuring in centimeters and millimeters as well. We also completed an activity testing magnetic strength through magazines. The learners were quite impressed with their strength. Next week we will begin to look at magnetic poles.

Math:
This week learners played math games and continued working on their math menus. We completed an assessment and are going to start looking at fact recall over the next coule weeks. I have noticed the learners have a variety of great strategies for solving problems and are enthusiatic about challenging problems. This creates a nice environment for taking risks in math. Next week math volunteers start!

Have a terrific weekend!
Elysha and Lale