Captain Caaaave-Man

Health- We continued our introduction on health, and learned about different external factors that effect our health.  The students and I discussed the ways that heredity, culture, environment, media, technology, and peers affect us and our health decisions.  We zeroed in on media, with a lesson on advertising.  To demonstrate the false claims that saturate media advertisements, the students played a little game.  Each of them wrote two true facts about themselves (that could not be something that can be seen, such as hair or eye color), and one false statement.  They were encouraged to write a believable lie, to trick their classmates!  The three statements were written on an index card, and taped to their backs.  The students read each others' cards, and quietly guessed which sentence was false.  If they guessed correctly, the card-owner had to write their initial on the guesser's card.  If they guessed wrong, the guesser wrote his or her initial on the card-owner's card.  The goal was to see how many initials you could get.  We discussed how some false claims in advertising are easy to spot, and some are much more difficult.  This lead to a great discussion on different issues with misleading ads for health products and services.  We will do more with this lesson during our at-home assignments!

Spanish- We will begin our Spanish class each Tuesday with a "working" snack time.  Ms. Cindy began today's class by teaching the kids a song that they will be singing while they wash their hands.  During snack, they will be showing off at-home assignments, listening to a Spanish song, listening to Ms. Cindy, etc.  Today, they showed off their personal posters.  They told a little about themselves, showed off their self portrait, and explained what they hope to learn in Spanish class this year.  The class then hit the floor to sing songs, play games, and listen to a great little Spanish story. 

I am in LOVE with the fun, relaxed learning environment of our Spanish class!

Art- Today was all about texture.  Ms. Nancy took out the class' finished block of plaster of Paris.  She broke it into pieces, which would be the students' "cave walls".  Then, the class used acrylics, as well as their homemade paints from nature, to decorate their walls.  They worked on adding texture with different sponges.  While they waited for these to dry, they Ms. Nancy had them start on a different texture project, using crayons.

Social Studies- The class brought in their printout on the Causes of WWII.  They worked in small groups on a crossword reading comprehension exercise.  They are learning about the 

It is only week two of class, and we are still working on expectations, and learning to learn in a group setting.  It takes a while to get the hang of things!  Skills that we are addressing are staying focused on the task and controlling excessive talking.  If we stay on task, we get things done... and if we get things done, we can have more fun!

Starting next week, I will send home an index card with each child, that will just give a little insight into their day.  They will hopefully be chock full of positive comments each Tuesday, but it will give me a consistent way to communicate with parents about their child's areas that need improvement.  Although we are here to learn Spanish, art, health, and more, it is so much more important to learn how to adapt to different learning environments!