Thursday, 10/6/16

After a review of the phonics charts, the Chicken Group learned two new special sounds this morning. They learned the "oy" in boy and the "oi" in coin, and more importantly, learned when to use each. "Oy" in boy usually occurs at the end of a word while "oi" in coin usually comes at the beginning or in the middle.  I used the Letters and Sounds Test (#4) in class to assess how each student is doing so far. I will keep using the tests in class, not as a formal "test", but to help me gauge their needs.  This will help to me adjust the lessons as necessary.  

 

The class also played a clue word review game with flashcards.  They will be learning new special sounds in tomorrow's video lesson, and they promised to do their best during the lesson!  This way, we can keep using some of our class time to do fun group activities instead of having to learn sound in class!  We used whiteboards for our spelling review, rewarding correct answers with a single skittle... which was enough to be VERY excited! I am going to adjust the spelling schedule so that we take our tests at home on Friday and introduce a new list on Monday. This will allow us to do more with the words in class, as they have already looked at them on Monday at home.

The Guinea Class first reviewed each spelling word verbally.   This class's words are significantly harder and longer than the Chicken Group, so it takes longer for us to work through them! They used their lists to help them choose words and place them on graph paper, making their own crossword puzzles.  The class will be finishing up the poem, The Duel, over the next couple weeks. Today, they began working on the background for their video, and they will be working more on this next week.

In vocabulary, the students played a game where Mr. Jim called out the definition, and the students would say the correct word from their list. They also got to play their favorite game, "Think on Your Feet".  The class completed the first lesson of this new vocabulary list. They will be working more with these words over the next couple weeks.

In history class, we began with a study of ancient Rome. Now, we are focused on the beginning of Islam.  The students are learning how this religion began as a historic study, and hopefully this will give them a better understanding of the history of the region, and the Islam religion itself.  Knowledge of the history and beliefs of different faiths will help them to better understand the world in which we live, and will help them to understand international relations and events. 

In grammar class, the Cow Group reviewed the parts of speech. Most people have recited the pronoun list to me for a prize! It is not a race, so anyone can recite the list to me at anytime! We reviewed different types of verbs, action verbs, linking verbs, helping verbs, and state of being verbs.  We also reviewed common and proper nouns. After giving examples of different proper nouns, the students learned about initials and abbreviations. Each student pretended to be a doctor, writing their full name, their name with title, and their address (correctly abbreviating Road or Street).

After a review of the different types of adjectives and how to use an 's to turn a noun into a possessive adjective, the Horse Group learned all about articles today. They learned that articles act like adjectives, as they describe nouns.  The kids diagrammed sentences with adjectives, as well! I am working to help them develop good habits with diagramming sentences, so that as sentences get more and more complicated they are able to break things down in the easiest possible way!

Both groups took turns reading out loud out of their favorite books and reading today. They have really enjoyed Mr. Jim's reading of Dr. Doolittle! On Tuesday, they wrote stories about the parrot in the book, which helped them not only with writing skills but with listening skills as well.

 
After math independent study, we had a fun activity involving our science lesson.  The students have been learning about plate tectonics, and today they were able to see how divergent, convergent, and transform plate boundaries work.  They used graham crackers on a bed of icing to simulate the plates on top of the mantle. We worked through each type of boundary, and I really think it gave them a better understanding of the different types!