Domino Fun

 We will be using dominoes to help us focus on our math facts for the next few weeks.  We learned the traditional Dominoes game.

We are also learning how to be good sports.

Good game!

Owl Inquiry Day!

We have had lots of wonders about owls, porcupines, mice, and owl pellets as we read aloud Poppy, our chapter book by Avi.

Since we had so many wonders and questions, we had an Owl Inquiry Day!

Room 408 loves Research Workshop! We started by brainstorming lingering questions we had about owls:

We reviewed all our sources and started our research by studying photos, reading books, or researching on our ipads on PebbleGo and Epic.

We also explored an owl skull...

...and weighed owl pellets on a balance.

We made connections and collaborated about our learning.

Of course, we always recorded our new learning!

We gathered together to share our learning and answer our questions.

Finally, the time came that we have all been waiting for: dissecting owl pellets! We found it morbidly fascinating.

We found lots of cool bones inside, along with a *lot* of fur.

When we found a bone, we used a diagram to help us identify what kind of bone it was and what kind of animal it came from:

The owl inquiry has been one of our favorite days, so far!🦉

Popsicle Stick Measurement

 In Math Workshop we are learning about nonstandard measurement and using popsicle sticks to measure length.  We learned that when we measure, the units we measure with shouldn't have any gaps and they should be as straight as possible.  Mathematicians are very careful and double-check their work to make sure it's accurate.

Part of the Common Core Standards for math engages kids with measurement by using nonstandard units to understand that length means a number of smaller same-size units laid end-to-end with no gaps or overlaps.  This will help us understand measurement more deeply later when we use the standard measurements of inches and centimeters on a ruler.

Here we are working with our partners, measuring like mathematicians!

We record our estimates in our booklets before we measure.

 Then, we compared our estimates with the actual measurements to see if we had a reasonable estimate.

We measured *lots* of things in our classroom with popsicle sticks.  

 We even measured each other!

What could you measure with at home that is a nonstandard unit?

Our First Learning Mural!

 On the first school day of each new month, we will reflect on our learning from the previous month.

Our brains are growing more than we realize!

First, when we do a learning mural, we brainstorm all the ways that our brains grew in the last month.  In this case, this is our brainstorm list of all the ways our brains grew in September:

We were amazed to see how much learning we have already done in just 21 days!!!

Next, we chose a topic to create, and invited someone to collaborate with us. We talked about our plan, first.

Then we work on that one topic and collaborate to create a representation of that learning, using the materials in our classroom.

We made a label to add to our projects to make our learning clear.

When we finished one project, we crossed that off the list and chose a new one.

We are going to watch a few short ant videos--even ants collaborate to get work done!

 Here is our first completed Learning Mural!

What has been your favorite part of learning so far this year?