Our Week in Review

Even though it was a short week, it was a busy one in Room 24!

In writing, we continued to work on our Ivan poems, and finished publishing our narratives.  We also completed a narrative writing assessment.

In Reading we finished up some of our Ivan activities, and focused our reading on non-fiction.  We have read about Gregor Mendel and about Mexico, focusing on non-fiction text features such as bold/italic print, captions, headings, maps and tables.  We have been learning a lot in both science and social studies, and about how to read non-fiction in a different way than fiction.

On Thursday we learned about "ojos de dios" or God's Eyes.  This is common craft done in Mexico. Together with Mrs. Williams' class, we created our own God's Eyes.

Today we had a very special treat!  Our Creative Arts Friday was highlighted by Mrs. Tracey!  She came to our class and taught us all about the Aztecs (from Mexico).

 We reviewed a bit about their history and discussed their artistry.  We drew some Aztec suns, focusing on imagery and emotion.  We then drew our suns on foam board.

 Mrs. Tracey helped us with ink and a brayer, and we created some Aztec sun prints!  We learned about Mexican poet, Octavio Paz, and  wrote some free verse poetry in his style.

We will mount our suns with our poetry soon! Thank you, Mrs. Tracey for such an awesome day!!!

Poetry Spotlight

Here are two poems written today about the sun prints.

There's a sun

among the trees

that smiles at me.

And I smile back.

                          ~Emily 

Sad Sun

Tears are dripping

down my burning face

as the rain falls

I grow weaker

and lose my light.

It is soon dark.

                      ~Sarah

From the Teacher's Desk

The next few weeks will be busy with preparing for our tests in science (Heredity) and social studies (Mexico).  The children have all of the necessary materials to begin studying for both tests.  They have been reminded to bring their materials back and forth to school/home, so that they are able to participate in school activities as well as study at home.  Students should also be preparing and practicing for their November speech.  The speeches will be given in front of our class on November 26th.  If your child will not be in school on that day, please contact Mrs. Merten, so that arrangements can be made.