More Outdoor Explorations and Flat Stanleys
/There's been a flurry of excitement in our Otter classroom this week! Students brought back their personal Flat Stanleys and loved getting to share photos of their Flat Stanleys around their homes. Through sharing these Flat Stanley photos we got to learn about each other's pets, favorite home activities, sports, and other interesting facts about our home lives. Students were delighted to discover new connections with one another. During a class meeting we discussed whether to send our individual Flat Stanleys out to travel around the world, or whether to keep our personal Flat Stanleys in the classroom and create new Stanleys to mail off. Most students chose to work in a team to create a new Flat Stanley to send out on adventures. Later this week our Flat Stanleys will set off on adventures to ten different states and four different countries. We will continue this project throughout the year. The more places we can learn about, the better! This week students practiced playing Clumsy Thief and Blokus. Card games and board games are a great way to practice numeracy skills, strategic thinking, and social emotional regulation. In writers' workshop this week our class published 15 new stories! We've been writing up a storm and editing like crazy. A huge thanks to our parent volunteers and other guest teachers who have helped with editing all these stories! I'm already seeing tremendous growth in students' writing conventions and penmanship. During our morning meetings we’ve continued to research and discover the answers to student investigation questions. This morning we discussed how steam is formed. Outside last week some student volunteered to help spread bark chips. Others worked together to coordinate performances for the class. This week several students have been interested in using natural materials to create tiny structures, miniature bows and arrows, and tiny fishing poles.
