One Week Until the Hatch!

Our chicken eggs have been in the incubator for 13 days now and a week from tomorrow we expect them to begin hatching! Today in class we candled the eggs again (shining a very bright light through the eggs to see what is happening inside) and at least 9 of our 12 eggs look promising. At this point in incubation we expect to see the majority of the egg looking quite dark when candled if the chick is growing well and getting bigger but if an egg is too clear we expect that it may not hatch. Only time will tell! We expect the chicks to hatch next Tuesday and they will be with us in the classroom for the rest of the week. On Friday afternoon between 2-3pm we will have a chick celebration where families are welcome to come to class to meet the chicks and see some of the work we have done learning about them. After school on Friday the chicks will head back to the farm at UVM! If you are free on Friday afternoon come pay us a visit in first grade!

Voting Today!

Have you—and all of the registered voters in your household—voted yet? Polls are open 7 a.m. - 7 p.m.

Pass it on, because every vote matters!

Vote Tomorrow!

Colchester residents, please remember to vote tomorrow between 7am to 7pm. The teachers and students all thank you!

Egg Turning

Today was day 6 on our egg hatch calendar in class! Fertilized chicken eggs take about 21 days to hatch and we in first grade are expecting our "due date" to be May 20. The day our eggs arrived Nurse Kelly helped us wash them then set them in the incubator. She also taught the class all about how to properly wash our hands before and after touching the eggs to keep both ourselves and the chick embryos safe from germs while we learn about them. Each day since, a pair of students has had the job of being our "official egg turners." A mother hen in a nest will turn her eggs several times each day to ensure that they embryo inside forms properly so, with the absence of a hen in our classroom, the students are taking turns rotating the eggs to help our chick embryos grow properly inside. The students have gotten very good at lifting the lid of the incubator just enough to turn the eggs carefully while still keeping most of the hot, moist air in (the incubator is 100 degrees inside). In photos below you will see the eggs being cleaned when we first got them as well as photos of the eggs in the incubator and some of our egg turners. The badges in the photos say "official egg turner," and "I turned and egg today, ask me how."

4 Winds

Last Thursday our two 4 Winds parent volunteers came to class and taught us a wonderful science lesson about squirrels! We learned about the different types of squirrels found where we live and were able to explore the foot prints, skulls, and pelts of squirrels and other animals we could compare and contrast them with. Lastly we had the chance to go outside and look for evidence of squirrels nesting, gathering food, or walking around the woods near our playground. Thank you to our two volunteers for taking the time to come in and teach us a great science lesson!

Haiku Deck

Our class is trying out a very cool app called Haiku Deck to create presentations showing some of our learning from our recent Mexico unit! First we reviewed our class' Venn diagram of similarities and differences between the United States and Mexico. Next the kids worked on story boards where they used a paper graphic organizer to write out what they want to put on each slide of their presentation. We also created a class example of a story board then used it to create a class example of a Haiku Deck Presentation so that kids would have an idea of what their final projects will look like. Tomorrow we plan to use the story boards to create individual Haiku Deck presentations showing  each student's work. We hope to embed these in each student's individual blog for everyone to see! Below are two photos of kids working on story boards as well as the Haiku Deck example we worked on together as a class.

Which Came First, the Chicken or the Egg?

In first grade, it is the egg! It is time for our favorite science unit of the year; The Life Cycle of a Chick! Our twelve fertilized chicken eggs arrived today and have been set in the incubator on our counter. Each first grade classroom has its own incubator and dozen eggs. In about 21 days we should hear these four classrooms filled with the sounds of many peeping chicks! Today our class watched the two video clips below, one being an imovie I made last year explaining chick hatching in first grade, and the other being one of my favorite Youtube clips of a chick hatching from an egg. We learned about the incubator, care of the eggs, and what to expect over the next month as we wait for them to hatch. Stay tuned for much more chick information and photos to come!

Chick Hatching Clip

Mrs. Kelly's Class 2013 chick imovie