Ask Me About Monday, October 5, 2015

Today we began to learn about wind.  We know wind can be strong.  We read a poem called I Am Small.  We played Guess the Covered Word.  Some of the words in the poem were covered up, so we had to use a strategy readers use all the time, and that is to think about what would make sense.  We made a guess and then checked the first letter.  We changed our guess if we needed to, then guessed what the next letter would be and checked the remaining letters one at a time  The person in the poem had a problem with being small.  Ask me to tell you why the person in the poem said they thought they would hold on tight today.  Our copier was not working so I have posted the poem below:

                                    I  Am  Small
The wind is shaking every tree.
The wind is strong
But trees are tall.

The wind is pounding every wall.
But walls are strong
And they won't fall.

I think I'll hold on tight today
I'm small.

Ask me to tell you what words rhyme with tall.  

We read The Wind Blew, by Pat Hutchins.  This story is about a strong wind and the things it blows away.  After we listened to the story, we collaborated to name all the things the wind blew away in the story.

Today we also worked on "reading" wordless picture books.  We read very short, simple stories by Mercer Mayer.  These books have a frog and a boy in all of them, but some have additional characters.  We analyzed and collaborated with a partner to first look through the book to get an idea of the story, then told the story with words from the pictures.  

We thought about how the pictures helped us to tell the story when we had Writers Workshop later.  We made sure our pictures and words matched our story.  We added details to our story because we know the illustrations in books help tell the story, and often tell more than the words!

We ended our day with a collaboration challenge.  We used bathroom size paper cups to build the tallest tower we could.  We worked in our table groups.  We know when we collaborate we are working together to complete one task, and we had to respect the ideas of others in the way we built.  I saw some amazing collaboration today!  It's not easy to build with the paper cups because they fall down easily, but after trying different ways to build with the cups, most teams found a way to make their towers more stable.  Another great outcome of this activity was that we learned that mistakes happen, and even when towers would fall, we could rebuild. You will see from the smiles in the pictures below, that even when the tower was bumped and cups fell, our friends were patient and just rebuilt their tower.  

This is a great activity for families as well.  The bathroom size Dixie cups work best because they are quiet, and if stepped on can be reshaped.  Plastic cups may be more stable, but are broken and not able to be fixed.  
This was the best thing we did all day.  I heard children encouraging each other and helping each other, and the best thing of all is that they were patient with each other because the towers fall if they are bumped.  We will be building with cups throughout the year and will add additional paper building materials.

I did a few updates on our homepage, and will be updating the content pages over the next few days.  I will also be sending out Sign-Up Genius e-mails for conference times, computer lab help, and Mystery Reader.

Enjoy the beautiful, fall weather!
​Juliet