Dinosaurs and Field Day!

On Tuesday we used little dinosaurs and clay to create our own fossils and on Wednesday we designed dinosaurs using the letter D!

During group time we have been working really hard on developing conversational skills with friends by practicing asking and answering questions and by paying each other compliments. The kids really love this and are getting very good at it. You might try something like this at home during dinner time to provide more practice. 

The highlight of the week was Field Day - we had so much fun and participated in so many activities. I will let the pictures tell the story!

And of course, it wouldn't be field day without a refreshing treat at the end of the day!

Dinosaurs...

We are becoming real dinosaur experts! We have so many great fiction and non-fiction dinosaur books to read and enjoy. One of them was called, "If the Dinosaurs Came Back". We created some art work just like in the book!

We learned about triceratops and we know that he was an herbivore (plant eater). We also learned about tyrannosaurus rex - he was an carnivore (meat eater). His teeth were long and sharp. We made teeth the same size as his!

We also looked at a copy of a dinosaur footprint. It took 22 of our shoes to fill up this dinosaur footprint. 

We also began reading "Charlotte's Web", our first chapter book read aloud. This is a new experience for our class, and it really stretches our listening skills, our attention skills and our thinking skills. Many of the children really are interested in the different characters we are meeting as I read this book to them. I strongly suggest reading aloud at home, and would encourage you to try a chapter book with your child too!

Next Monday there is no school for Memorial Day. Friday, June 1 is our Field Day. We will be outside for much of the day participating in different fun events. Your child should wear shoes for running and should apply sunscreen at home. Hats are allowed. We will come inside throughout the day to cool down and to take breaks. On Tuesday, June 5 we will go on our field trip to the WL Outdoor Education Center. There is no cost - we were awarded a mini grant from the Foundation for Excellence that will cover the cost of the bus and the field trip. Your child should dress for the outdoors that day and bring a sack lunch and drink - we will eat our lunch at the Outdoor Center. 

Our butterflies are here!

Our first butterfly emerged from her chrysalis on Monday at lunchtime! Her wings were crumpled looking and wet. For a long time, the butterfly sat with her wings folded. She needed to dry them off before she could try flying. 

On Tuesday, we went into the computer lab to complete our I-Ready assessment. We worked very hard and gave it our best effort!

When we returned from lunch on Tuesday, we had a second butterfly! We added a piece of watermelon to the environment and some fresh lilacs. Soon we saw them flying all around their cage!  

On Thursday, we took all three butterflies outside to the playground to set them free. We let them out of the cage near a lilac tree - and they flew right over to it!

On Friday we joined all of the classrooms at Loon Lake to create a garden stone for our school to celebrate our 50th anniversary. We made a butterfly themed stone!

To finish up our insect life cycle unit we made some edible art! 

Ask your child to tell you about this!!!

Next week we begin our dinosaur unit! 

Watching our chrysalids...waiting for butterflies!

On Monday morning we moved our three chrysalids into a larger home so that our "butterflies to be" will have room to fly when they come out of the chrysalids. 

On Friday we added some orange slices and flowers to the cage, just in case our chrysalids open up over the weekend. 

We learned about a few more insects this week - here are our busy ants!

And just look at our awesome butterfly art!

Our social skills lessons included discussions about calming down when we feel angry. Deep breathing helps lower blood pressure and heart rate so we really focused on slow belly breathing when we practiced.
We also talked about the feeling of jealousy and how we can use positive self-talk to calm down. This strategy is important because it engages the thinking part of the brain - and unlike negative self-talk, it helps to calm down strong feelings. 
I wanted to wish all of the mothers a very happy and well deserved Mother's Day! You all do a wonderful job and your children all love you very much! (They tell us!!) I hope your feel surrounded by love this Mother's Day! 

Our growing caterpillars...

We were so immersed in science this week! We are becoming real insect experts, and we love watching the changes in our caterpillars each day. Although there were 5 caterpillars, only 3 of them have grown and seem to be thriving. On day 1 they were 1/2" long and on day 8 the biggest one was 2" long. We could tell that they were eating because their food was all churned up. We also knew that they had molted because we could see their furry little skins on the bottom of the jar. On Friday, the biggest caterpillar hung from the ceiling in the shape of a J...we knew that meant he was ready to shed his skin one last time. Sure enough, by lunchtime he was a chrysalis!

While we were waiting for our caterpillars to eat and grow and change into chrysalids, we had time to investigate ladybugs and fireflies. Our writing reflects some of our learning. We learned that ladybugs are helpful insects, and fireflies produce their own light (bioluminescence) to communicate with. 

Here is how we displayed our ladybug art in the hallway!

We have been reviewing all of our coping skills, and really working hard to use them when we feel disappointed or frustrated. It is hard work, but every day I see progress! We are also working on feedback. Being able to listen to information about what we are doing well and about what we might want to do differently is important if we want to help children make positive change. I model many "glitches" or mistakes that I make so that the children can offer ideas about coping skills I can use. When I make a mistake, I also name my feeling...you can try doing this at home too. So often our students believe that other people, and especially adults, never make mistakes or encounter "glitches". They need to see that we do, and we want them to watch how we handle it. We also need to restrict the urge to "fix" everything for children - instead, look at little problems as opportunities to practice using those coping skills. If we solve everything, kids are deprived of those great, real life chances to learn and grow and manage strong emotions. 

We made these giant butterflies on Friday. We used balls in a box to paint the wings, and then added the white spots. These look great flying around our classroom!