Bananas, Vacations, and More!

My how the summer is flying by! While I had planned on posting once a week that just didn't seem to happen. We started some new projects.. I had a vacation thrown in there and with getting everything ready for a week-long absence I completely overlooked updating you all with our wonderful pieces of work.

Two weeks ago my kiddos took on the tower challenge. They were tasked with building a tower that was at least 1 meter tall and could hold some weight. They were judged in three different categories: height (10 points possible), appearance (5 points possible), and weight (10 points possible). The students soon realized that the challenge was being able to fulfill those requirements when only given 30 straws, 50 paperclips, and masking tape. Students had three periods to work on it. Monday was used as a planning/building day. Judging took place the last ten minutes of the day on Friday. We had a little difficulty judging the weight but thanks to the brilliant minds of the students we came up with two different options. They could have a ziploc bag hung or a paper clip box sat on their structure. We then added pennies in groups of 5 until the structure could no longer handle it. After everything was said, done, and assigned point values the winners were selected and posted!

The Tower Challenge Winners!

Last week I went on a glorious vacation! It was a week worth of relaxing, beach time, puzzles, driving, sight seeing, and great company! There is no place like Cape Hatteras and I can't wait to go back.

Fresh crabs!

Photo Op with my mama!

While I was away enjoying all the beauty that Hatteras could offer, my kids were at school powering through another science experiment. Previously, they tried to both speed up and slow down the ripening/rotting processes of bananas. This time around there were just observing the rotting process brought on by the addition of yeast. They got to see how the bananas changed and even witness some chemical changes as the bananas produced gas in their bags.

I am now back from vacation and ready for my last week here. I'll be sad to be away from my kids in the mornings but they are getting a healthy dose of change and another great teacher. (Lucky them!) For this last week we are focusing on engineering. Groups have been switched around a little. They were then tasked with creating a K'Nex creature. Within their group they split the responsibliites. Architects are the only members allowed to look at the plans/instructions. It is their job to then go back to their groups and give the builders directions. Builders are the only members allowed to actually touch the materials. It has been an eye opening experience and today is only the first day. Students learned how important it is to give good directions and how criticcal it is to be able to follow these directions.

Day 1 Progress

Day 1 Progress

I am positive they will learn how to better work with each other. I am also positive they will finish these creatures.....eventually.  :)

Here's to a 4-day camp week filled with building, talking, listening, and working together!

Summer, Summer, Summer Time

While summer hasn't officially started, Summer Break has! This summer I am working with the Northview Summer Camp that is put on by our wonderful and talented After School Programs. This is the same camp I worked last summer. This time around, however, I'm doing it a little differently. A little change is good, right?

For the month of June I am teaching 4th through 6th graders in the morning! This is a big change from my 6/7 year olds. There are two other teachers helping with this task, however, and I have had a blast slipping in to this new role. Between the three teachers the students are working on Math, Reading/Writing, Science and Technology. When they come to my room we have been splitting their time between science (MWF) and technology (T & TH). It's been great to see what these students are capable of.

My afternoons are similar to last summer and will be my all day normal for the month of July. I am up in the office answering phones, getting students, and holding down the fort. According to one student I am "training to be an office worker". :)

Science

My goal is to have them work on a different science experiment each week. They've been doing them in groups which has been wonderful and challenging all at the same time. I forget that conversational skills and working with others are still things that need to be taught and practiced with older students. These have been things we have tried to incorporate into our daily activities. 

The first week the students worked on balancing the sides of a tug-of-war game. They had to figure out what changes to make, hypothesize what would happen, and then write an observation after it was tried. I don't think any of them had ever put that much thought into what they assumed was a simple game of tug-of-war!

This week they have been working with bananas! No, I didn't let them eat them (although many of them asked if they could). They have one bag where they are trying to slow down the ripening/rotting process, one bag as a control with nothing added, and another bag where they are trying to speed up the process. Last week the groups decided what to add to the bags. Amongst the added details we have: water, constant light, ice, old food, grass, leaves, sugar, salt and foil. We have one more observation to do on Monday. Look how they're doing!

Bananas Galore!

Nice and yellow :)

Technology

This summer we are working on coding! Many of our activities are done on the code.org website. This site has allowed students to be added to different classes so I can monitor what they are doing.  Students can then work at their own pace through the different activities. Accompanying the activities are videos with directions and explanations by various famous persons and technology gurus. It puts the activities in a format the students want to "play". Who wouldn't want to play a version of Angry Birds where they are in control?

We have also done some unplugged activities. These activities have taken us into the world of coding without the use of our devices. We have learned how to write code for different cup stacks. This was one of the first activities we did. Students looked at pictures of different cup stacks and then had to write a program using the provided symbols. Students then acted as robots and read the code to see if they could recreate the stacks. Now students make their own stacks and write the codes.

These are the only symbols they could use.

Our last unplugged activity involved abstracting out the differences in zombies. Once that was done they could use their zombie catalog to write their own program to recreate the zombie they pictured. This was a wonderfully scary project.

Monster parts from the Monster Catalog

Here's to whatever crazy we can get into next week!

School Update

Wow! Time sure has flown by. It seems like it was just last week that I was pulling this blog together. Obviously my internal clock is way off! Since I started the blog a lot of events have happened.

- I made it through another wonderful year with a GREAT group of 1st graders! We had a handful of changes throughout the year but we toughed it out together. These kiddos kept me on my toes and I left work each day exhausted. We had a lot of behaviors we learned to work through and there were times that were definitely harder than others. My kiddos worked hard and each of them grew as an individual. I wouldn't have traded any of them.

-I began working with second grade as well as kindergartners in the afternoons. I have been working with a group of kindergartners for the past year and a half with our After School Program. This past school year I got the chance to work with a second grade group. I thoroughly enjoyed the chance to see some of my students from the previous year as well as tackle topics that we don't normally cover in 1st grade.

- I had a chance to finally do some of those pinterest projects I've been meaning to do.  Our room got a little more organized and a little more colorful! We also tried having an owl theme. Turns out, this theme was more for me than it was for them. By the end of the year all of my kiddos thought I LOVED owls and that's why I had "put them all over the room". Either way, it added color, helped keep us grouped up and gave me an easy way to identify my room amongst all of the other classrooms.

I try and stay organized......It helps to eliminate clutter at the very least :)

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-My students participated in a Sock Drive. This started as something my class decided to do but it quickly spread to involving the entire school! My kiddos made signs to hang around the school. We also kept a running total outside of our door. Our collection number was announced on the morning announcements and students stopped by constantly to ask how we were doing. In the end we were able to collect almost 180 pairs of socks to donate to people in need in our community. I made goals for my students along the way. By the end of the collection they had suprased every goal I had set. We celebrated by having an Ultimate Sock Party! This meant watching a moving in our socks, while eating snacks (which they had to earn), and tie-dying a pair of socks to take home! They had a blast!.

Their beautiful posters we hung around the school.

Yeah for socks!

-I got nominated as my building's teacher of the year! I then turned in paperwork and interviewed with a panel and was selected as the 2015 Elementary Teacher of the Year for USD 383! I cannot explain how appreciated I felt. I submitted my packet to the state and will find out in September if I have made it any further. This will definitely be a topic I talk more about in upcoming posts.

While I missed a ton of great opportunities to blog I also spent a ton of time melding with my kids. This group challenged me mentally, physically, emotionally, and professionally. I emerged a stronger teacher at the end that school year. Here's looking to my next group. :)