Down under...

We started our week with our Australian animal painting.  A special THANK YOU goes out to Jas's mom, Carl's mom, Catherine's mom, Rock's mom, Kueffer's mom, Teddy's mom, Tommy's mom and Bennett's mom.  They were excellent painter helpers and we could NOT have completed this activity without them!

Dingo painting

Red Kangaroo

Salt Water Crocodile

Koala

Emu

Duck-billed platypus

Salt water crocodile 

 Frilled-neck lizard

While some were painting, the others were working on a tic-tac-toe board in the commons.  Everyone was very productive and worked hard during this out-of-the-ordinary day!  Tuesday through Thursday we continued with our usual tic-tac-toe boards and began our Australian animal research. Take a look below at our busy week:

Working away while others in the classrooms were painting their animals.

Following the chart to answer language arts skill related questions with Mountain Language.

Listening center about Sydney, Australia.  We love reading non-fiction.

Starfall.com review of "aw" words.

Building sentences with Australian words.

Building spelling words with magnetic letters.

Creating and illustrating "all" words.

Journal writing about the Australian flag.

 Cut/paste Australian animal sentence builder

 memory Australian animal game.

Listening center about Australia.

Venn diagram...koalas vs.humans.

We began discussing the Aborigine people of Australia and their many customs and traditions.  We also learned that Australia has 6

states and 1 territory. We also began learning about the Great Barrier Reef this week as well.  Ask your child how many different types of fish there are in the GBR and what country is the same size as this amazing wonder of the world!

In math this week we started with a review of time and then we moved on to begin our study of fractions. It is nice to study fractions and time together as they realize you can divide a clock into equal parts and put those parts back together to make a whole hour! Your children are doing so well with these concepts!

Pizza making with fractions!

It is fun to learn how fractions are a part of things we LOVE to eat!!

Making fraction books to show that every fraction is a PART of a WHOLE!  This also helps to demonstrate equivalent fractions.

Thursday's visit to the rainforest!
....thank you, third grade, for the very interesting facts about all the different animals in your rainforest. We spotted the sugar glider and a frilled lizard, too! What a treat!

The 3rd grade teacher, Ms. Stark, showed our class the pictures she took when she visited to the Australian rainforest!


It was so nice to have some of our 3rd grade siblings there to help us tour the rainforest!

In hands on science we explored more of the coral reef.  We learned about polyps and how they're formed.  Then, using salt, liquid bluing, coal, food coloring and water we created our own reefs.  We will have to wait, just like in the real reefs, to see them change and grow over time. 

SPELLING

We will not have a spelling test next week because of our short week. We will send home new spelling words next Wednesday.

REMINDERS

Thursday/Friday March 3rd and 4th- Parent/Teacher conferences-NO SCHOOL for students

*****Please note that your child's Australian animal is due back to school by Monday, March 7th!

We have had a great week! We are anxious to see you all next week at conferences. See you soon. Have a great weekend!

1st Grade Teachers