Gardening

Thanks to the amazing spring weather this week, we headed outside to plant our cool weather seeds (lettuce, kale and spinach).  In our second case study about plants, students have been learning about what plants need to thrive and the parts of a plant.  

This week, students learned about what grows best in Colorado and sorted fruits/vegetables by warm weather and cool weather crops.  Students then decided what they thought we should plant in the garden.  Each student wrote a persuasive paragraph to convince our 1st grade crew on what we should plant.  Strawberries were a crew favorite!

During the warm day, we discussed how gardeners must tend their garden.  Each student was tasked with pulling weeds and turning the soil before we could plant.  The students took ownership and pride in their hard work.

Students were so excited to get to plant and look forward to harvesting our healthy lettuce, spinach and kale.

Plant Parts

We have been learning all about plants and the parts that they have.  What better way for our first grade botanist to share his/her learning than through play.  Botanists collaborated with a small group to use pattern blocks to show the parts of the plant.

Each group used their own creativity and perspective to make a variety of plants.  Students had 30 minutes to collaborate together.  Our collaboration muscle is getting really strong.

Both students and I thought that this was much more engaging assessment than a worksheet.  I loved to see the creativity, critical thinking and collaboration.

Sharing Our Learning

As helminthologist, we decided to teach our kindergarten friends all about earthworms.  After much discussion, our crew decided that writing an all about book would help our young friends learn best.  Each student embraced the challenge of writing a high quality all about book.

We realized that some of our kindergarten crew are readers who "read the pictures" instead of reading the words.  So, we thought about this question:

What do I need to make sure is in my picture to help my reader?

We looked at some mentor texts as well as high quality examples from our own first grade crew members.

After 2 weeks of hard work, we reviewed our own books and also got peer feedback on our high quality books.

We finally celebrated our hard work by reading our books to Ms. VP's kindergarten crew.  First graders were so excited to take their books home to celebrate with their families.

Collecting Data

First graders have really enjoyed our next math unit all about collecting, representing and analyzing data.

Our first step was to figure out - What is data?  Why do you collect data? How do you collect data?  

We asked several survey questions and worked to represent the data many different ways.

Students collaborated with a partner to ask a survey question of their choice.

Students had to figure out how to accurately represent their data.

Once students collect and represented their data accurately, they were given the challenge of analyzing the data.

 Mathematicians used language such as:
From this data, I know that more students in our class like ice cream than donuts.
From this data, I know fewer students like the New England Patriots.
I know that 26 people answered my survey questions because I used an equation to add the students who like pink (12)  and the students who liked gold (14).  I wrote 12+14=26

The World is Our Garden

This week we kicked off our spring learning expedition, The World is our Garden.  Students traveled around to the outdoor classroom and through the various first grade classrooms to wonder and notice.

Students looked closely at the compost bin.

Students read the posters that last year's first graders created to teach our community about garden organisms.

Students looked at plants and wondered about the plant parts.

Students explored various sizes of rocks.  Students got to sift and observe the different sizes.

We will be working hard to answer:

What helps our garden thrive?

Collaboration

Students in our crew define collaboration as working together and listening to each others ideas. 

We have been working hard to collaborate in small groups.  Through discussion protocols using a talking stick, we talk about:
*pieces of high quality work
*accuracy and/or strategies of a math problem
*excerpt of a text

From these great discussions, students are coming up with criteria lists for math problems, close reading, and high quality writing.

We also had a collaboration challenge with our YO Buddies.  Partnerships were given one piece of paper, one pair of scissors and one glue stick.  They had to collaborate to make the longest chain they could.

 Our fourth grade buddies were excellent role models of actively listening and coming up with a plan before starting the challenge.  It was interesting to see what the partnerships came up with.

Students are practicing actively listening and openly sharing ideas.

100 Days Smarter

This week we celebrated the 100th day of First Grade!  Students came dressed like they were 100 years old and enjoyed a small parade with our other first grade crew members.  

In math, we enjoyed collaborating to build with 100.  This led to great conversations and reflection of collaboration, counting accurately and counting efficiently.  

In reading, we read 100 books as a crew.  We were so proud of our stamina.  Each student reflected on how they have grown as a reader after 100 days of first grade.  This was a great time of celebration!

It was so much fun making our 100th day snack containing 10 of 10 different items.  I was so interested to hear how they counted (by 1s, 10s, handfuls).  

Lastly, we ended the day with writing about what we will be doing when we are 100 years old.....

*I might be dead.

*I will continue to sing and dance.

*I will be sitting by the beach

*I will be living at Lincoln Meadows.

What a great day!