Kindergarten Graduation

So I think you all know I started the year off teaching Kindergarten.  I have to say that I am so incredibly thankful for that experience!  Those kids brought a smile to my face each and every day and I was so impressed with how much their little brains absorbed during the short time I was there! 

I was invited to come to the graduation of the kids that I started with and I was so incredibly excited to see all of them!!! I couldn't believe how big they were and was so excited to see all of them!  Here are a couple of photos from their graduation procession ;)  It was absolutely adorable and I will always remember these kiddos!

I had the privilege of having 2 classes, a morning and afternoon class.  Here they all are!

The program was so adorable!  The kids had their little graduation hats and they sang some adorable songs!  It was such a cute program!  Good job to all of the kindergarten teachers!  The kids were great and looked so cute!

When I Grow Up...and other Health Topics!

I was struggling to find one more health assessment to complete with the kiddos, so I decided that I would let them have the choice.  They had to either choose the topic of "When I Grow Up, I want to be...," Bones, or pick a chapter.  A lot of the students picked the "What I Grow Up project," and I was so impressed!  Below are a couple activities that stood out to me!  Check them out!

Chloe's creation!  She wants to be a dentist!

Taylor's study of bones!  She labeled them all!!

Indy 500

Every year, the 4th grade classrooms have a study about the Indy 500.  We watched some video clips last week about the Indy 500, about how the cars are made, about the drivers, and about the history of the race.  After watching the videos and studying a little bit on our own, we created a timeline from when the race started, all the way up to this year.  I had the kids research a 10 year time frame and they each had to write 5 facts about the race.  They had fun doing this and they really learned a lot about the history of the Indy 500!!!

Our Timeline of the Indy 500

Check out all of the years!  They each had 5 facts listed!

Some of the resources we used to find all of our information!

Poetry Portfolios

So I hope all of you had the opportunity to check out the students Poetry Portfolios.  Overall, I was quite impressed with their understanding of poetry and I really hope they continue to write it and study it.  Poetry is such a great form of expression and the kids really got into writing it!  Here are some of their final projects.  We created a poetry portfolio and it had to include 5 original poems.  Check out some of their Imagery Poems and final Poetry folders!  They all did such a great job!

Taylor's Poetry Portfolio

Joey's Imagery Poem, it was about our classroom Poet Tree!  LOVE IT!!!

Bryce's Poetry Portfolio

Bella's beautiful Poetry Folder, she made the adorable flower attached!

Dylan's Imagery Poem about Nature.  Love his take on nature and the beauty of it!

Final Design and Motion Projects!

As mentioned in a previous post, I did not really like the final assessment activity for the design and motion unit.  After a colleague presented me with a roller coaster video and activity, I got to thinking, this would be a GREAT assessment for the kids to create a roller coaster.  They not only had to create one roller coaster, but also had to create an entire amusement park!  They had to create all aspects of the park, including kiddie rides, food vendors, and a variety of other activities!  They had to figure out the pricing of each activity and decide how their park would be "laid" out.  Where should the bathrooms be?  Where should the kiddie rides be?  Where should the food vendors be?  ETC.

I have to say that most of the students did a pretty amazing job.  They understood that to design a roller coaster is a pretty daunting task because EVERYTHING  has to be just right so that it can go from start to finish and not have any problems!  They understood friction and how it correlates with motion and they even understood why the design of something affects the motion of that particular vehicle or contraption.  I took some photos of my favorite parks.  The kids got creative and a couple of them created 3D parks!  The one below was done by my "artist" of the class, RJ.  He created an army themed park including tanks, a watch tower, and even an American Flag ride!  Check it out!!!!

The kids really only had to create maps for their parks, check out my favorite map below!  They included everything in their park map, including their food vendors and kiddie land!  LOVED all the details they put into their map!!!!

Design and Motion: Design Challenge

During one of our final lessons in our design and motion unit, the kids were given a design challenge.  We learned about lunar vehicles and some of the things that were needed to design a lunar vehicle.  We found out that the moon does not have gravity, therefore, our vehicles needed to have a little more weight on them so that they wouldn't fly off into space.  However, they also needed to be designed so that they would fit into the "space ship" going to the moon!  The kids were given 30 minutes and had to design their vehicle so that it would carry lunar rocks (our wooden blocks).  The vehicles had to carry at least 3 blocks and travel a distance of at least 39 inches.  Check out some of our creations!  Most of the groups did a really great job!  Not to mention they carried a lot more than 3 blocks!  We also had to draw our vehicles too!  The drawings were pretty great and included a ton of detail!  I was very impressed!  Check them out below!!!!