This week in Trillium we had a lot of new adventures and some surprises. Monday we got to go outside to enjoy the sunshine and use watercolors to paint a dragon to celebrate Chinese New Year. The sunshine also gave us the opportunity to explore the garden. Some kiddos had fun pulling weeds, others were digging and finding worms and others helped to prune the Autumn Joy plant and take it to the compost. The kids were so excited to be in the garden and can not wait until they get to do it again. Then we celebrated Chinese New Year as part of our study of cultures by reading a couple of books and getting some treats. The kids each got a tangerine to represent good luck and money as well as fortune cookies and chopsticks. The kids got creative and used the chopsticks for their tangerine pieces and enjoyed reading their fortunes.
Tuesday we were inspired to learn about the different types of money including dollar bills and coins our classmates brought in to support the Penny Drive for Leukemia put on by Derek Pederson for his 8th grade project. The kids enjoyed sharing their knowledge of money with each other and learning from their classmates that some of our presidents like George Washington and Abraham Lincoln are found on our currency. This led to a great discussion about why we celebrate Presidents Day. Throughout the week we explored counting how many of each coin came in the rolls from the bank. We also began to explore counting nickels by fives, dimes by tens and pennies by ones or grouping pennies by fives or tens to make it easier. We also played a game where students had a partner and ten pennies. One partner reveals some pennies and keeps the rest behind their back and their partner has to guess how many are hidden to make ten total. This was a fun way increase our understanding of different ways to make ten.
We had a school wide recess with our 8th grade buddies this week which everyone seemed to enjoy. The big surprise was our Valentine lunch and crafts. This was a huge hit and went off well thanks to all of the parents who helped keep the secret and worked hard to prepare it, helped with crafts and cleaning up. Thanks so much for your support, memories like these will last a lifetime! The 8th graders continued to give Trillium a surprise when they snuck it to wish us all Happy Valentines and created handmade, heartfelt cards, for each of their buddies that the kids loved having read aloud as a group! We also learned some Valentine related signs during our sign language time with Lauren. We read The Way I Feel and then each student chose an emotion and drew a picture to show what makes them feel that way. We read the book There about a boy's thoughts about his ideas of adventures to an imaginary land and then we drew pictures to accompany our own stories to an imaginary land of our choosing and shared them with our classmates.
This coming week we will continue to collect money for Leukemia all due this Friday 2/19. We will have an assembly on Wednesday to begin Jump rope for heart. Stay tuned for more information. Hopefully you all got to enjoy the three day weekend with your families.
Thank you,
Lori
Tuesday we were inspired to learn about the different types of money including dollar bills and coins our classmates brought in to support the Penny Drive for Leukemia put on by Derek Pederson for his 8th grade project. The kids enjoyed sharing their knowledge of money with each other and learning from their classmates that some of our presidents like George Washington and Abraham Lincoln are found on our currency. This led to a great discussion about why we celebrate Presidents Day. Throughout the week we explored counting how many of each coin came in the rolls from the bank. We also began to explore counting nickels by fives, dimes by tens and pennies by ones or grouping pennies by fives or tens to make it easier. We also played a game where students had a partner and ten pennies. One partner reveals some pennies and keeps the rest behind their back and their partner has to guess how many are hidden to make ten total. This was a fun way increase our understanding of different ways to make ten.
We had a school wide recess with our 8th grade buddies this week which everyone seemed to enjoy. The big surprise was our Valentine lunch and crafts. This was a huge hit and went off well thanks to all of the parents who helped keep the secret and worked hard to prepare it, helped with crafts and cleaning up. Thanks so much for your support, memories like these will last a lifetime! The 8th graders continued to give Trillium a surprise when they snuck it to wish us all Happy Valentines and created handmade, heartfelt cards, for each of their buddies that the kids loved having read aloud as a group! We also learned some Valentine related signs during our sign language time with Lauren. We read The Way I Feel and then each student chose an emotion and drew a picture to show what makes them feel that way. We read the book There about a boy's thoughts about his ideas of adventures to an imaginary land and then we drew pictures to accompany our own stories to an imaginary land of our choosing and shared them with our classmates.
This coming week we will continue to collect money for Leukemia all due this Friday 2/19. We will have an assembly on Wednesday to begin Jump rope for heart. Stay tuned for more information. Hopefully you all got to enjoy the three day weekend with your families.
Thank you,
Lori