Sneak a Peek at CCS Break

These girls are showing off some of "Devin's busted dance moves". I'm half offended, half flattered :)

"The Shopping Cart"

Here they've become marching soldiers. "Hut-2-3-4, Hut-2-3-4"

Our Growing Library

I introduced about a dozen exciting, new titles to our library this morning. They were instantly swooped up into book boxes. There is so much excitement around reading in this classroom! I love it! :)

Readers, Writers, Mathematicians, Ambassadors, Poets

We're so excited for our field trip to the Poets in the Galleries program at the de Young on 10/16 and 10/23! Thanks so much to the drivers who signed up with Genevieve. And, of course, thanks to Genevieve for organizing that for me. The 5th/6th and 7th/8th grade classes have both completed the program and the feedback from Evan and Javier is so exciting. 
http://deyoung.famsf.org/education/poets-galleries

Reading

We’re digging into our Dear Mr. Henshaw texts! We are working our way through the book, reading independently, listening to me read aloud, and reading aloud in small groups. Students are investigating the character traits that define Leigh Botts, Mr. Henshaw, and Leigh's parents. We’re searching for the meaning “beneath the surface” of the text for a more complete picture of the characters. Students ask themselves questions like, “what does this passage say about who Leigh is? What matters to him? Why? How do you know? What evidence can you find in the text?”

Next, we will move on to analyzing the ways that Leigh’s life experiences inform the character traits we've identified.

As we read, we keep track of the words that confuse us, that are difficult to spell, that are interesting, or that we might like to try and use in our own writing. We put them up in our “Words that make us wonder” wall and revisit them regularly. 

We are also writing letters to our favorite authors, a la Dear Mr. Henshaw!

Students continue to enjoy time with their independent reading books as well.

 

Ambassador Workshop

We have successfully completed three parts of our four-part Ambassador Workshop series! Throughout the year, the students rotate through the weeklong position of Team 34 Ambassador. In that post, they are responsible for really stepping up as leaders. The Ambassador facilitates the class meeting, reports back their observations of whether or not the class successfully upheld their social contract during the afternoon specialist classes, and greets visitors to the classroom. We’ve been working on greeting visitors with a welcoming smile, eye contact, and a firm handshake. 

Writers’ Workshop

We’re on the final leg of our personal narrative writing unit in which the students use everything they have learned about effective personal narrative writing to draft and ultimately publish their best writing. The writers have been living like writers, seeing the fiber of their lives as worthy of recording. Now the students have selected what they feel is their strongest small moment story, the one that says the most about who they are and that they are most excited to share with readers. They are creating a new draft that utilizes everything they’ve learned. We will be developing and revising these particular stories until the end of the unit.

Math

In 3^rd grade math, we are deep into our review and strengthening of subtraction skills.  We model and build numbers with base ten blocks and explain how that relates to the algorithms we use to solve equations efficiently on paper. The students are feeling challenged by subtracting across zeroes. (2000-333=?) These numbers require the most precision and planning ahead and demonstrate strong executive function and understanding of regrouping.  We are also working to gain more automaticity with simple one-digit addition and subtraction facts.

In 4^th grade the students are deep in their work with multiplication. As with the addition and subtraction facts that came before, it is so crucial that 4^th graders develop automaticity with the multiplication facts so that when we can move into multi-digit multiplication, they can focus on developing clarity with those important algorithms. We use Making Math Real’s 9-lines visual imaging technique to image the math facts. We continue to do some modeling of multiplication with arrays and grouping and we are currently reviewing addition and subtraction with regrouping.

Poetry Club 

During this morning’s Poetry Club, the young poets listened to mentor poetry by Tennyson, Ric Masten, and Valerie Worth that modeled important strategies for generating poetry. They then chose a big topic/idea that gives them big, strong feelings. They then chose a small object or moment or detail that holds the big feeling for them to write, write, write about.

Here are some powerful examples:

As I read the words

they swim off the page

and swirl around in my head

to you

it may just be a dusty piece of paper

but to me it’s

an amazing story.

Time for this

time for that

time flies by

the hands

so easy to read

yet when you really think hard

it is so hard

like watches

on wrists

and clocks in homes

and clocks and time don’t grow on trees

valuable

you could say they are

and I would totally agree

Back and forth

across

the charge

the spark of light

on the world

of blackness

Revenge

Sometimes it swarms around you like

Like a mosquito on a

Warm night

Then one

Bites you

And you want to give it

Some revenge

Do you hear the big ideas and the small moments/objects that hold the feeling? Amazing!

Non-Violent Communication

Trish will be subbing for me only during core at the end of the day tomorrow. I will be on campus, meeting with our school's Non-Violent Communication mentor, Kathy Simon. 

According to the Center for Non-Violent Communication, "Non-Violent Communication (NVC) is based on the principles of nonviolence-- the natural state of compassion when no violence is present in the heart. NVC begins by assuming that we are all compassionate by nature and that violent strategies—whether verbal or physical—are learned behaviors taught and supported by the prevailing culture. NVC also assumes that we all share the same, basic human needs, and that each of our actions are a strategy to meet one or more of these needs. People who practice NVC have found greater authenticity in their communication, increased understanding, deepening connection and conflict resolution."

As a staff, we started the year with a NVC workshop with Kathy, focused specifically on conflict mediation. Kathy is meeting with all of the teachers throughout the day tomorrow to discuss our ideas about the ways NVC can fit into our specific classroom contexts. As always, I look forward to gaining new strategies for communication and conflict mediation and finding new ways to teach the students to communicate and share space with one another. 

Sept. 27 Notes

We've been thinking about and sending love to our friends at services and in reflection for Yom Kippur. We're excited to see everyone back today. 

We also had our first student-facilitated class meeting on Tuesday! Congratulations, Dylan! The facilitator noted that it was more challenging than expected and required a lot of quick-thinking, focus, and leadership. 

Ultimately, the class passed a motion to name an official 3rd and 4th grade class mascot. It took thorough discussion and a lot of honest listening. With effective facilitation and compromise they eventually came to the consensus that our class mascot should be....

a plush watermelon and a plush pencil sewn together!!!!

The watermelon represents one of our strategies in personal narrative writing: we write about small, significant "seed" moments, rather than huge "watermelon" stories. The pencil represents our hard-working nature and creativity. Of course, this sounds a little silly, but it was a beautiful, completely student-driven compromise and I feel VERY proud of the class. 

During Wednesday Poetry Club we looked at a series of poems written in a basic prose format and then with the intended line breaks for comparison. The students noticed the ways that the intentional use of line breaks can add drama, emotion, and power to poetry. The way a poet uses lines sort of 'tells' the reader to read the poem a certain way.  The students then looked at a published poem, Safety Pin by Valerie Worth and organized it into the lines that they would have crafted. Next, they broke out into private workspaces and created some really strong writing. We ended the workshop with sharing before Julie picked them up for art. 

In math, we had our first 9-lines multiplication imaging workshop with the 4th graders and the 3rd graders are strengthening their multi-digit addition and subtraction with regrouping. 

Wednesday was the first Student Council meeting of the year. We elected representatives from our class in an in-class election. Vivienne, Gloria, and Hugo each showed tremendous courage and poise during their speeches. The election results were that Hugo will represent our class for the year and Gloria and Vivienne will share the responsibilities of the other representative. I couldn't be happier with the stellar representation my students have on the Council. Congratulations to everyone! 

We wrapped up our studies of From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler before the cabin trip. Almadin remarked that the ending was "like a firework show. The surprises just kept on exploding!" Today, I'm starting our next read-aloud unit on Beverly Cleary's Dear Mr. Henshaw. It is a powerful, engaging modern classic about a boy named Leigh who wants to be a writer. He sends letters to his favorite author, Boyd Henshaw. When Leigh's teacher assigns a book report, Leigh sends Mr. Henshaw a list of questions. Mr. Henshaw writes back some silly answers and a list of questions for Leigh to answer. At first Leigh is upset about the idea of doing "extra work" and is reluctant to open up. However, with his mother's insistence, he responds to Mr. Henshaw and we learn about Leigh's complicated relationship with his mostly absent father, his struggles as a new kid in a new school, and his sadness and confusion about his parents' divorce. He also shares his feelings of being lonely and misunderstood by his peers, his difficulties with some of his school assignments, and his important relationship with his dog, Bandit. Leigh is a very relatable, sympathetic character and I welcome the thoughtful discussion that his story will certainly inspire. I look forward to incorporating written responses to the text, character mapping, and vocabulary studies to our novel study. It's exciting to introduce the kids to a wonderful author with a very readable writing style. 

I have a couple extra copies of the book in the classroom if anyone would like to borrow it and read along with us! 

It will be so great to get together tomorrow at the Autumn Celebration BBQ! Please come pick up your child at noon in the classroom and enjoy the BBQ together. 

NatureBridge Outdoor Ed 2012

Wow! What an incredible trip!

When I think back on the three days that I spent in the Headlands with your kids, I’m amazed at how cohesively they approached their time together, and how engaged and grateful they were for the unreal series of experiences that unfolded for us. Lindsay, Peggy and I are putting together a slide show that we’ll show in the community room on Tuesday (tomorrow) morning at the start of the school day. Please join us if you can!!!!!!

Here are my highlights from the trip:

• The impossibly fortuitous timing of the Marine Mammal Center’s release of three rehabilitated sea lions back into the wild. Our naturalist, Karen, set the scene beautifully by explaining that, “people are at our best when we’re caring for others.” It was very emotional and inspiring watching the sea lions run back to the sea, vibrating with joy. I was touched by how clearly the kids understood that this was a true gift to experience. A “life moment” indeed. The MMC put up a slideshow of the event. There are some shots of us in there!

http://www.marinemammalcenter.org/about-us/News-Room/2012-news-archives/cousteau.html#.UF6KkY7PpUQ

• Our naturalist told us again and again that “this NEVER happens!” We saw so much wildlife! A bob cat, river otters, bottlenose dolphins, muchos raccoons, red tail hawks (one soared over the sea lion release as if to commemorate the occasion), a grey fox, cormorants, a pocket gopher, herons and egrets, and more!

• I loved the rock sorting and identification activity that Karen led on Rodeo Beach. The students used dichotomous keys to identify the rocks, including the bright orange carnelian stones that we can use to make peaceful wishes for the world. We tied the activity back to their studies with Lindsay in science as they took a kinesthetic approach to identifying the three main rock categories; metamorphic, igneous, and sedimentary.

• I loved our hike to the old-growth eucalyptus “listening tree”. Look at how genuinely the kids engaged with the tree and really LISTENED to what it had to share.

• We played active, eco-themed games led by a local high-school student.

• We were fantastic helpers to our kindergarten buddies. We helped them move their gear in and out of the dorm, get their food in the dining hall, and brush their teeth in the evening. I’ve always loved that important part of our school culture.

• We enjoyed lemonade from Viv’s generous lemonade stand! No one should be for sale!
 http://makeastandlemonade.com/

• About half of the group got to see the Space Shuttle Endeavor get a piggy-back ride from a 747 overhead, but some of the students were already in the Time Tunnel, clambering through a verdant maze of willow thickets. 

• We weave, weave, weaved our lanyards!

• And perhaps most importantly, we feel more connected than ever. Go team! 
J

A million thanks for Eric and Michelle for joining us and supporting the kids and me in countless, gracious ways.

I’m excited to get the kids back in our classroom and continue to grow our community here on campus. We have so much inspiration to bring to writers’ workshop and experiential contexts for science and math. Here we go!

I know this is a long post, but I just quickly wanted to share that I spent the weekend at a math teacher training through the Making Math Real Institute and I’m ready and raring to go for the upcoming multiplication studies in our room. I learned a new multi-sensory approach to teaching the multiplication facts that supports students who are big picture processors, linear processors, visual, auditory, and kinesthetic learners, and everyone in between.  It builds strong symbol imaging so that the learners will be able to pull out their math fact files efficiently with mental pictures. It also sets us up for a more fluid transition to the more advanced fraction work that we'll do in 4th grade. It was great to connect with a new community of creative math teachers. http://www.makingmathreal.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=96&Itemid=125

Just one day left!

We're almost ready to head out on our K-4th grade adventure. Time is running out to let me know any important ways I can be supporting your child on the trip, so please let me know if there's anything extra I can be doing to make sure this trip is full of growth and fun.

Since the 3rd and 4th graders will be acting as older buddies to the Kindergartners on the trip, we spent some time with Peggy's class today. Our class stepped up to teach them some of the team-building games and challenges that we've done in our class.

Here are some highlights from recent life in the 3rd and 4th grade...

• We've started working in our Math Expressions workbooks. The students know that they can expect me to choose the pages and projects that I'd like them to work by considering what they need right now in their math learning. This means that students are working on some of the following skills...
• multiplication fact review
• arrays and other multiplication modeling techniques
• division and deepening understanding of its relation to multiplication
• place value
• writing numbers in both expanded and standard form
• addition and subtraction fact review
• addition and subtraction with regrouping
• We are continuing our work with personal narrative writing. The writers are incredible at finding specific, small moments to write about that they remember with crystal-clarity because they made them feel something. They are working on zooming in to include the details that make their narratives engaging and personal. They are remembering to tell their stories in a step-by-step way by watching the movie of the memory in their minds, rather than telling about a memory. I love watching the young writers see their experiences as being valuable and worthy of being captured in writing, because they are!
• Last week, we had a meeting facilitation workshop in which the students practiced their skills for taking over my job as class meeting leader. They practiced selecting topics for discussion that are important to the group and calling on speakers with our "hands" technique. They worked on repeating back a synthesized version of the discussion so that the speakers feel heard and the class has clarity. They worked on using some specific clues combined with their intuition to decide when the group is ready to vote and likely to have consensus. I imagine that it's clear, but I'm so inspired by this part of the 3rd/4th grade program and I already see such impressive growth in our classroom democracy.