Classroom Visitor

We had another classroom visitor today!  A pilgrim woman from 1962 came and read us a story about pumpkins.  She taught us about how different life was for her and the kids absolutely loved it.  She did mention that Sacagawea may be coming to visit us soon to tell us about her Native American family. How exciting!

The book she read us was about a square pumpkin.  It was a cute story about not judging someone or something by the way they look.

More of Telling Time

Today we revealed the minutes on a clock.  We talked about how difficult it would be to read a clock if it had both the minutes and hours written on it.  So, as 'telling time detectives' we would need to memorize which minutes go where.  To do this we went back to the original lesson about the clock being a timeline bent in a circle.  We unfolded the hours and showed the hidden minutes.  They noticed the numbers counted by 5's. 

Then we made our student clock again.  This time Jude was our perfectly-short hour hand and Eden was our beautifully-tall minute hand.  The white boards had all our minutes written on them so we could focus on just the minutes.

 

The last step was to take the original boards with the hour numbers written on them and cover up our minutes.  To scaffold their learning I would have them decide which board to "lift" and reveal the minutes (whichever board Eden, our minute hand, was pointing to).  By the end of the lesson we were independently telling time.  We will need to continue to practice this, but they seemed to catch on quickly.  I plan to pass out personal clock manipulatives for them to practice with during our next several lessons. 

Telling Time

This week we transitioned from learning about money to learning about time.  We reviewed telling time to the hour and half hour (they covered this in 1st grade).  In order to make it fun we used a few different "props!" I first used the pool noodle to explain that it is just a number line of 1-12.  We then bent the number line to make a circle.  This represents the hours of a clock face.  I have the hours written on notes with the minutes represented underneath, but we will not add the minutes to our lesson until tomorrow.

 

We then used the students themselves to represent the hands of a clock.  Julia is one of our shorter students so she became our willing hour hand and then Dylan being a little taller became our minute hand! 

Coin Wars Pizza Party

We watched a Magic School Bus episode about Spiders while eating our pizza this afternoon.  We had read a few spider books while learning about nonfiction main ideas and details.  It was such a fun day in class.  What a great way to kick off our fall break!

Pies in the Face

FKE reached their next reading goal so the Student Council members had the opportunity to pie our fearless leaders!  Here are some pictures from this morning!

The Student Council members prepare to pie!

Here it comes!

Oh Yeah!

Right in the face!

It's stuck!

Love our administrators!



All done!

Lunch Buddies

Mrs. Vanderhoof snapped a couple pictures of these cuties while eating lunch today!

Firefighters Visit FKE

Today, the firefighters came to visit our 2nd grade classes. We spent a few minutes going over some good things to remember during a fire and then we went outside to see the fire truck. Some of the important things they talked about included:
1. Make sure your smoke detectors have working batteries in them.
2. Have an escape plan for if your house was to catch on fire. (practice this plan!)
3. Have a meeting place outside that everyone knows to go to.
4. Make sure your student knows their phone number and address to let emergency officials know.
Here are some pictures from this afternoon:

Chief Allen, Firefighter Josh, and Firefighter Nate came to talk to us!

Firefighter Nate had a lot of clothes to put on.  There is no skin visible when he is completely dressed.

They put on all their gear and explained to not be afraid if you were to see someone dressed like this during a fire.

They have bright lights on their helmet so they can see.  You should crawl toward them in a fire so they may help you.

After talking about all the tools on a truck the students were able to walk through the truck!