Student Teaching

Today I found out that I will be in 2nd grade for my student teaching internship next semester. Yay! I can't wait; I love second grade.

Living vs. Non-Living things

Today we studied about living vs. non-living things.



We started out by talking about things the kiddos think might be living, then we listened to a fun song that tells the criteria to see if something is living or not. The kids LOVED the song. They were jamming out.



Here is a link to the video with lyrics on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_aAkuK_8nQ

The criteria is:
needs air
moves/grows
needs food or water


We then talked about what NON living might mean, since that can be a tricky concept for six year olds. They did a fabulous job.


After listening to the song twice, on request, we read the book, "What's Alive?" by Kathleen Weidner Zoehfeld





Finally the students had a chance to draw pictures or write words or living and non-living things and categorize them.

Today was wonderful, and the kids really enjoyed it. I do wish that I had made the children a checklist of the questions they should ask themselves to see if something is living or not. They could check yes or no to see if it is living or not. Oh well, you live and learn, or if you are a rock you don't.

Graphs and Diagrams

How can I be a scientist?

When talking about what scientists do, I wanted to reat the book, What is a Scientist or What is Science, unfortunately Amazon did not want to be my friend and send the books on time. I frantically called my sweet scientist friends, Mike and Udi and asked them to tell me what a scientist does. I then wrote my own super short book. The kids loved the fact that I knew people who were scientists and that they helped me write a book.

We made a chart about what a scientist does and how they can be scientists. One precious little girl told her family about our science poster and said they will be making one at home.

This idea came from an AMAZING blog: http://thefirstgradeparade.blogspot.com
The kids kept on asking if I drew my science man. For some reason they think that I can't draw. Silly kids. I tell them all the time that I am good at a lot of things and super duper smart. Also I have super sonic hearing and sight ;)

Pumpkin Unit

As a big orange globe on the end of a vine
You can take me and make me into a pie
As a Jack O'Lantern I am famed
Now it is time for me to be named.

What am I?

We used our five senses to discover more about pumpkins

We learned about the life cycle of a pumpkin and then we made pumpkins out of two orange paper plates and yarn. We glued life cycle cards to the yarn so that we could retell the story.

This is my pumpkin. The kids made it orange by writing a fact about pumpkins on orange slips of paper and gluing it to my pumpkin. This idea came from: http://mymontessorijourney.typepad.com/my_montessori_journey/2010/11/pumpkin-life-cycle.htmlWe made predictions about what the pumpkins would look like on the inside. The next day we opened them up and found out. The kids were so excited. I don't think I have heard so many squeals and "yuck!" in my entire life.

My little friends then predicted which pumpkin had the most seeds.

In math the next day we got into groups of 3 and counted the seeds in a small, medium, and large pumpkin. One group counted by 2's, one by 5's, and one by 10's. Each group made a poster of how they counted and presented it to the class.

Books we read during this unit:
Pumpkin Pumpkin by Jeanne Titherington
Seed, Sprout, Pumpkin, Pie by Jill Esbaum

It's Pumpkin Time by Zoe Hall

Pumpkins Pumpkins Everywhere by Kimberly Carey

How Many Seeds in a Pumpkin by Margaret McNamara