“Today at Choice, I was playing Magnetiles. Then, I cleaned
up a little bit and went to art. I made part of a book for my mom and dad,”
reported Marley.
“Today at Choice, I played Legos. I built a ship. It looked
kind of like a plane and kind of like a motorcycle,” reported Max.
“Today we started learning about immigration. Immigration is
when people move from a country to another country. People move to new places
for many different reasons.”
What a big week we had! We started learning about
immigration via the essential questions:
1. Who came and who comes to the United States?
2. How and why did/do people come?
3. How did/do immigrants change the places they moved to?
4. Why is it important that we study immigration?
We looked through our theme books and wrote the titles of
the books that contain information that might give us ideas about how to begin
answering some of these questions. Job partners read to each other from the
books; younger readers described pictures and more experienced readers read headings,
tables of contents, and some text. Next, we read a book about how every family
is different and that evidence of a ‘typical’ family is hard to find. We
learned the Continent and Oceans song, but we’ll need more practice before
we’re ready to perform it for the rest of the school at Community Meeting!
Next week, we’ll draw pictures of a memory of a family
tradition or event and write a short paragraph to go with it. When the Family
Heritage Questionnaires are returned, we’ll use the information to help up make
Trees of Life, in the Mexican tradition, for showing the members of our
families. Here are some fancy trees of life; ours might include names of our
family members or symbols to represent them.
We will also learn about one way
that immigrants change the places they move to (EQ 3) by reading folk tales
from China, Mexico, Russia, West Africa, and Ireland.
We are super excited about our field trip to Angel Island on
Tuesday, October 20. This trip, including riding the ferry and a tour of the
‘immigrant-processing center’ offers students a full immersion simulation of
some of the challenges thousands of Asian immigrants to California experienced
in the 19th and early 20th centuries. This trip is taxing
on the students and adults who attend, but ‘walking in someone else’s shoes’ is
a very effective means of gaining empathy, acceptance, and compassion while
learning about the places and American multi-culture that we all share.
In next week’s blog, I’ll go into more detail about our
goals and activities related to Writers and Readers Workshops. In the meantime,
here are the plans for September 28 to October 2 in the Sea Classroom.
Bonus: scroll to the end of more great photos of your students learning to be scientists!
Monday - September 28, 2015
Morning Meeting
Theme:
1. Read Family Pictures
2. Brainstorm scenes with your family
See
how the drawings fill the paper; We will do this drawing in steps
Communication
Workshop:
10:30-10:35 Agenda and agreements
10:35-10:45 Writers ML1: have you been thinking
about your writing goals? write your writing goal on this special paper and
tape it into the front cover
10:45-11:00 Writers ML2: "use graphic
organizer to write your special people." model step by step process- WW pg
15
11:00-11:15 Writing time: you do it!
11:15-11:25 Read aloud
11:25-11:35 Readers ML-show rotation of
literature groups and how to record then read, how to summarize, and discuss.
11:35-12:00 Readers rotations-How will your
group decide on how many pages to agree to? Agree to an in-between number of
pages? Vote? Majority? Rotate
getting to choose how many pages?
Practice: What worked well?
Math Workshop:
12:40-12:45 Review agreements
12:45-12:55 ML: today we are going to do some
sorting. What are some things you can sort?
We are going to write our names on these cards.
2 min
Come back. Discuss attributes of my name. Students
write post its of 3 attributes of their names using the writing on the white
board.
1:35-1:45 What went well for you today?
Class Meeting
Class Meeting
Choice
Blog: Maya
Cards: Montesino
Tuesday - September 29,
2015
Morning Meeting
Theme:
Continue family portraits
Communication
Workshop:
10:30-10:35 Agenda and agreements
10:35-10:45 Writers ML: today we get to start
writing in our Writers Notebooks! Use your special person and notes about what
happened to start your story!
What's a good way to start? I remember one
day...
10:45-11:15 Writing time: start your first story!
11:15-11:25 Read aloud-first person voice
11:25-11:35 Readers ML-show Goals for RW; -
teach recording sheet and rotation schedule
11:35-12:00 Rotations-all read
Math Workshop:
Read agenda and agreements
ML: today we will sort our names. 2nd grade math page 26
Citizen Science:
Think of the two ways you collected data. Which
one seemed to work best, and why? and why? MLM create a sentence stem to
scaffold this talk and writing to fit in science notebook; add under line of
learning if possible
CQ: How did you
include someone today?
Wednesday - September 30,
2015
Morning Meeting
Citizen Science:
9:00-9:30 Try a third strategy of recording
biodiversity
9:30-10:00 PE
Library
Library
Capoeira
Community Meeting
Thursday - October 1,
2015
Morning Meeting
Theme:
Read folk tale
work on family portrait and paragraph
character
setting
plot
Communication
Workshop:
10:30-10:35 Agenda and agreements
10:35-10:45 Writers ML: compliment your writing with an arrow
sticker! What does the writing show that good writers do?
10:45-11:15 Writing time:
11:15-11:25 Read aloud/author share
11:25-11:35 Readers ML-teach an open sort
11:35-12:00 Rotations-all read again
Math Workshop:
agenda and agreements
CGI JRU with blocks on floor (tools not toys;
use them as long as they are respected) 10 min. extension- write a problem on
the back after solving all three number sets.
Ask someone to show their strategy on board
(w/block and w/ equations)
ML: teach the Adding and Subtracting Game
Play with a partner
Share "What math skills did we practice
today?"
Class Meeting
Choice
Class Meeting
Choice
Blog: Naima
Cards: Navarro
Friday - October 2, 2015
Morning Meeting
Theme:
9:00-9:40 Continue family portraits
9:40-10:00 PE
Communication
Workshop:
10:30-10:35 Agenda and agreements
10:35-10:45 Writers ML: MLM WILL ADJUST TO
FOLLOW THE STUDENTS’ LEAD RE: IS IT TIME TO INTRODUCE A NEW SKILL OR MORE
PRACTICE
10:45-11:15 Writing time:
11:15-11:25 Read aloud/author share
11:25-11:35 Readers ML: punctuation as road
signals - reread a section of a
special book
11:35-12:00 Rotations
Math Workshop:
Agenda and agreements
Dot talk with 10 frame multiple equations
ML: How to play Sweet 13
play with partners
What did you notice about the game you played?
Friday Courses: First Friday
courses
Blog: Nicholas
Cards: Pasquini
Biodiversity counts using different methods:
count within a hula hoop or 12 inch quadrat,
walking around, or sitting in one spot.
Which is the best for the job?
