Math Voicethread

We have been practcing giving evidence to support our thinking across curricular areas. For example, when we read a series of Frog and Toad stories we cited evidence in text to support what we thought were Frog's and Toad's character traits. In math we recently created criteria to evaluate math fact apps on the ipads. We decided on four criteria, or pieces of evidence, that would allow us to decide how good an app was. We would have evidence that an app was "good" if it was 1)fun, 2)easy to use, 3)helped us practice the skill (in this case additon and subtraction), and 4)checked our answers. Students worked in partners to evaluate math apps based on our four criteria and we came up with a list of 5 apps that our class thinks are "best." Each student chose the one they liked best and responded to a voicethread using evidence to tell why they think their favorite app is one of the best! This was a great project and the voicethread is such a neat way to sum up our result! You may click through the images shown on this voicethread to see screenshots of the 5 apps our class likes best, if you want to look for these on an ipad at home!

Voicethread!

Our class learned how to make a voicethread yesterday! A voicethread is a great way to use technology (we used ipads) to quickly share what we know about a topic by recording our voices. We decided to make a voicethread where each student shared what they think is the most important fact about Mexico. This is our first attempt at a voicethread, so please excuse the background noise on some of the recordings! We now know how to make our next one sound better. Stay tuned! Click below to hear our voicethread. Below it are some photos of the kids at work recording their voicethread responses.

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Salsa!

Our class is wrapping up our theme study of Mexico and starting a new writing unit on "How-tos" (procedural writing). To join the two in a fun way, our first "how-to" was "How to Make Salsa!" The students helped me follow the steps in a great kids book titled, How To Make Salsa, giving us the chance to familiarize with the structure of procedural writing as well as the chance to try making Mexican food! Our salsa turned out very well and I sent the recipe home on Monday if you are interested in trying it out at home! Here are some photos from the project (the kids were sitting in front of me watching me follow the steps in the book).

100th Day

A week ago Wednesday was the 100th day of school at UMS! Students in our class did reading, math, and art activities all throughout the day focused on the number 100. We made math necklaces where we grouped cereal pieces into labeled groups of 10 all the way to 100. We challenged ourselves to see what we could do in 100 seconds: how many times we could jump in place in 100 seconds, how many times we could clap in 100 seconds, how many times we could write our name in 100 seconds, etc! All four first grade classes took turns rotating between 4 stations, one in each of the first grade classrooms, working on different 100th day projects. In one room the kids built with groups of 100 things, in another they made crowns with 10 streamers each covered in 10 stickers or dots, in a third they used paper cut outs of the number 100 to make a giant picture, and in our room they made a "gumball machine," painting 10 dots in each of 10 different colors to fill the machine. Below are some photos of our day!

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Sombreros

We are wrapping up our country study of Mexico and had some fun making sombrero paintings! First all of the students had their photo taken wearing a big sombrero, then we made big, colorful somebrero paintings. They came out wonderfully and you will see them all hung outside our classroom when you come in for conference day. Here are some photos:

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Flynn Field Trip

On Wednesday all four first grade classes went to the Flynn Theater in Burlington to see a version of the book Skippyjon Jones enacted on stage! This was a very fun trip. In the stories, Skippyjon is a Siamese cat who has a very active imagination and pretends to be "El Skippito," a swordfighting Mexican Chihuahua. This play was especially exciting for us because first graders are currently studying Mexico as our theme unit and the children have learned many of the Spanish words Skippy uses! Thank you to all of the parent chaperones who came with us to the Flynn on Wednesday!