Ms Aja's Classroom

Saturday, October 31, 2009

Happy Halloween

Here are the highlights of our week:

-We modified our rat maze and let the rats try again. Hazel got faster but Alice did not complete the maze.
-We worked on turning Creative Play into a forest. We even made trees and rivers.
-We invented fishing poles and went fishing.
-We did pumpkin seed math.
-We had our first Music Makers session with Ms. Shelley
-We read with our college buddies.
-We went on a nature walk to collect leaves, pine cones, acorns, and more.
-We did leaf art.
-We used digital microscopes to examine nature items.
-We found and examined two caterpillars.
-We had our Halloween parade.

View more photos from this week in our Oct 26-30 Photo Gallery

Monday, October 26, 2009

Rat Maze

Today’s Blog Message
Written by Michael
Dear Families,
Today we decorated a forest jungle in Creative Play. We put rivers with blankets. Then we wrote our family message. We timed the rats going through the rat maze. 
Love,
Michael

Today we welcomed a new student into our classroom community. It was great to meet you today, Petey!

This morning we got to test our rat maze. We put Hazel in the rat maze first. We quickly found out that our maze had a slight design flaw: the walls were too short. Hazel immediately climbed over the block wall and out of the maze. We had to keep putting her back inside the maze walls. With our help she reached the muffins at the finish line in 2 minutes and 19 seconds. She got faster her second time through the maze.  It only took her 1 minute and 19 seconds the second time. Alice had more difficulties getting to the finish line.  We had to help her along about twenty times.  We decided to modify our maze. We discussed changes that we wanted to make to our maze and during center time several engineers were working on it. We are working on making the maze slightly less complicated for Alice, and we are making the walls taller. We are going to continue remodeling the maze tomorrow and time the rats going through it again soon.

Here’s a peek at our modified rat maze. We are still in the process of making taller walls.

We began turning our Creative Play room into a fall forest. We watched a video and looked at photos of woodland habitats. We began to plan what things we would like to see in our forest. We will continue to learn about fall, forests, leaves, and forest animals in the upcoming weeks. 

VIew more photos from today in our Oct 26-30 Photo Gallery

Thursday, October 22, 2009

Community Time and Rat Mazes

We started our morning with Community Free Choice Time.

For lunch we got to eat the Stone Soup and pumpkin muffins that we made. Yummy!

This afternoon we worked together to design and construct a maze for Alice and Hazel. On Monday we are going to time Alice and Hazel going through the rat maze.

View more photos from today in our October 16-22 Photo Gallery

Stone Soup

On Wednesday we got to read, write, and play with our college buddies.

We also read Stone Soup stories and then discussed similarities and differences between versions of the story. We each brought in a vegetable to make our own stone soup.  We washed our veggies, cut them into small pieces, and added them to a pot of water. We added in chicken bouillon for flavor and a stone, of course. Then we let the soup simmer for 40 minutes.

View more photos from Wednesday in our Oct 16-22 Photo Gallery

Tuesday, October 20, 2009

Stone Soup Tomorrow!

Please remind your child to bring in a vegetable to make stone soup tomorrow. Thank you! 

Pumpkin Exploration

Today we continued with the new schedule, and all of the classrooms were able to explore with pumpkins.  We baked pumpkin bread, built a hay maze with boxes and played with Gak at the sensory table. 

At the end of the Writers Workshop we used the document camera to display our work in writing booklets.

View more photos from today in our Oct 19-23 Photo Gallery

Monday, October 19, 2009

New Schedule

Blog Message
Written By Kaleb
“Today we had special centers with the preschoolers and dolphins. We went in the creative play to have a pumpkin patch and we went in the atelier to paint. And we also made necklaces and we were baking muffins.
Love,
Kaleb and The Whales”

As explained in our Weekly Whale Watch newsletter, today we implemented our new schedule.  From 9:30-10:45, the entire school (minus the Whale classroom and outside) was available for students to explore.  Each area of the school featured a different week-long activity for students to participate in, with all activities centered around this week’s theme: Pumpkin Patch/Fall.  Creative Play was transformed into a pumpkin patch, complete with a store to purchase pumpkins and a hay maze. The atelier featured fall art and science activities, as well as a self-serve snack center.  The Shark classroom had a fall beading activity, and students discovered math and measuring concepts through baking in the Dolphin classroom. Students were encouraged to move freely from area to area, following their natural interests for as long as they wished before moving to a new center.  Multiple teachers in each center facilitated discovery by asking students to purposefully plan their activities, expand their thinking, problem solve with peers, and reflect on their learning.

As usual, we also had classroom centers, Treasured Reading Time, Writers Workshop, and time with Alice and Hazel.

View more photos from today in our Oct 19-23 Photo Gallery

Saturday, October 17, 2009

Pumpkin Patch

On Friday our whole school got to visit the pumpkin patch. We had so much fun choosing pumpkins, riding boats and trains, and playing in the hay!

View more photos from our field trip in our Pumpkin Patch Photo Gallery

View photos from Thursday in our Oct 12-16 Photo Gallery

Wednesday, October 14, 2009

Meeting Alice and Hazel

Today’s Blog Message
Written by Ronin
“Today Alice and Hazel came. I got to pet them. We met new buddies. They read with us.  We also got new books in our classroom library. The books are Halloween and autumn books. My favorite one is the one about a little old lady who isn’t afraid of anything. I also like basketball books. We painted Alice and Hazel. I liked it.”

Meeting Alice and Hazel

We met our college buddies today.  Every Wednesday for the next few weeks these college students will come read and write with our class.  It’s great to have one-on-one attention and time to work on our literacy skills!

In the atelier we sketched and painted realistic illustrations of Alice and Hazel.

We watched a short video clip of a rat going through a rat maze.  Soon we will draw plans to construct our own rat mazes!

Jack was our star of the day. Here’s what we learned about Jack:

-Jack’s favorite bug is a lady bug.
-Jack has a Spiderman scooter that he is selling.
-Jack has a bike that is black, white, and blue.
-Jack likes to play legos.

Brendan was our star of the day recently too. Here’s what we learned about Brendan:

-Brendan’s favorite food is peanut butter cups, Red Robin food, mac and cheese, and starburst
-His favorite shoes are flip flops and sandals
-His favorite thing at school is legos
-His favorite sport is basketball
- He wants to be a Anikan Skywalker for Halloween

View more photos from today in our Oct 12-16 Photo Gallery

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Pet Photos

First, I would like to thank all the families and friends for posting blog comments yesterday. Students were thrilled to see the loving messages from their loved ones.  Students excitedly composed replies.  Unfortunately, due to a laptop error we lost some of the reply messages.  Our students would like to tell you not to worry because we will be posting the replies tomorrow during school. They are so excited to be writing real messages on our blog.  Please continue to read our blog and leave us comments.

Today students were thrilled to share their pet photos using the projector.  We discussed different types of companion animals and found out that several students have pets named Duke.

During centers today we labeled our Stone Soup drawings in preparation for making Stone Soup. Since this is such a busy week with a Pumpkin Patch field trip and Alice and Hazel arriving, students decided to postpone Stone Soup until next week. We will keep you updated. During Writers Workshop today we practiced using alphabet sheets to help us record the sounds we hear in words. We are writing more and more words in our stories! In the atelier today some engineers designed marble structures while scientists experimented with color mixing.

Our star of the day today was Whitney. Here’s what we learned about Whitney:

-Her favorite candy is lollipops.
-Her favorite volcano is a butterfly volcano.
-She has a pet cat.
-She likes to play house.

VIew more photos from today in our Oct 12-16 Photo Gallery

Monday, October 12, 2009

Painting Stone Soup

Today was another fun, busy day in kindergarten! Ms. Katie was sick today so Alice and Hazel weren’t able to join our classroom community quite yet.  We hope they will be coming in on Wednesday! We started off the morning by choosing new community jobs.  Look at the photo below to determine your child’s job for the week.  We read another version of Stone Soup and we wrote interesting stories during Writers Workshop.  In the atelier we painted our ideas for making Stone Soup.  This Thursday we will be making Stone Soup during class.  Each student will bring in a vegetable or spice for our soup.  We can’t wait to taste our delicious Stone Soup!

View more photos from today in our Oct 12-16 Photo Gallery

Saturday, October 10, 2009

Library and Tie Dye Art

Daily Blog Message
Written by Ewan
“We did tie dye. I was the star of the day awhile ago.  We go-ed on a field trip to the library. We checked out new books for the classroom.
Love,
Ewan”

Friday morning we realized that our classroom library books would soon be due.  As a class we gathered the books to be returned and decided to take a walking field trip to the library.  Since we had so many books to return, we all helped carry the books to the library.  At the library we spent time enjoying wonderful literature.  Then we each chose a new book to check out for our classroom library.  We each got to check out the special book we chose using Ms. Aja’s library card.  After returning to school we added the new books to our classroom library to enjoy for the next three weeks. We love to read!

Friday afternoon we had the opportunity to tie dye tee shirts with Mr. Mark.  We can’t wait to see how our shirts turn out!

View more photos from Friday in our Oct 5-9 Photo Gallery

Thursday, October 08, 2009

Lola’s Blog Entry

Daily Blog Message
Written by Lola
“Dear Families,
We decorated pictures of ourselves on the Smart Board.  The pictures of Mr. Danny and Ms. Aja were so funny! I was the star of the day. I clipped on a star and my friends were asking me questions.  We made special name tags.  My name was Sleeping Beauty. During Treasured Reading Time I read a song book.
Love,
Lola”

Here’s what we learned about Lola today:
-She likes barrettes
-Her favorite food is pasta
-She’s going to be a kitty cat for Halloween
-Her favorite game is Star Wars
-She likes cats and dogs

View more photos from today in our Oct 5-9 Photo Gallery

Wednesday, October 07, 2009

Blog Reading

Today Blog Message
Written By Ella
“Today we had circle time and we had recess. And we had snack and I was the star of the day.  And I was happy. And we had lunch and it was my first time being the star of the day and we made stone soup on the board again. And we had a lot of fun.
Love,
Ella”

This morning we used the projector to view our classroom blog.  From now on we will check out blog each day to see if anyone left us a comment.  Then we will write responses to each comment. Incorporating the blog into our daily routine will allow students to reflect on their learning and use words to express their ideas. We will use blog comments as a part of our daily language and word study. Please leave us comments by clicking on the blue comments link at the bottom of each post.  Thank you!

During story time today we read The Remarkable Rat Manual written by last year’s Whales. Next week we will be welcoming two companion animals named Alice and Hazel into our classroom community. Feel free to stop by and read The Remarkable Rat Manual with your child before or after school.

During Treasured Reading Time each day students and teachers spent time reading special books.  Some of us read the words and others read the pictures. We also love retelling and acting out stories!

During centers today we finished our Stone Soup pictures on the Smart Board.  We added all kinds of interesting things to our soup like carrots, parsley, beets, and radishes. We are enjoying reenacting the story of Stone Soup and using a new piece of technology.

Our Star of the Day today was Ella.  We got to study her name and ask her interview questions. Here’s what we learned:
-Ella likes puppies, kittens, and Halloween.
-Ella also likes Christmas.
-Ella once got pinched by a father ant.
-Ella’s favorite book is Eloise.
-Ella’s favorite game is Tic-Tac-Toe.

View more photos from today in our Oct 5-9 Photo Gallery

Tuesday, October 06, 2009

Smart Board

“We played at recess.  We read Stone Soup and drew pictures on the Smart Board.  We also read about a book with an Little Old Lady Who Was Not Afraid of Anything.  We have our own community jobs and everybody helps.  For movement we did stations to exercise. 
Love, Ella”

As Ella mentioned we read a new version of Stone Soup today and then we were able to use the Smart Board for the first time.  Small groups were able to create their own images of Stone Soup, and collaboratively work together to include everyone in the process of learning how to use a new piece of technology. 

Every student helped out in the classroom by doing their Community Job, and during creative play all friends helped to clean-up the blocks at the end of the day.

View more photos from today in our Oct 5-9 Photo Gallery