Hour of Code Week

This week students at ABS celebrated Hour of Code Week! Students learned how writing code can help to send messages. In the library students pretended they needed to write code to help R2D2 find his friends on a grid. Students used numbers and arrows to tell R2D2 which way he needed to go on the grid so he would land on specific squares on the grid and find his missing friends. One student would write the code and the other student would pretend to be R2D2 and move around on the grid.

We also sent time in the computer lab learning to use simple code to control Minecraft players. This allowed the students to put in specific commands which told the character to complete tasks such as chopping down trees, build a house, and sheer sheep. As the students moved through stages the code they needed to write became more complicated. It was really fun seeing kids take risks and move their way through the program independently. It wasn't always easy, but they were motivated to keep trying until they got it. Students are encouraged to go to code.org/learn on their own and try to do some more coding. Many students also had an opportunity to do some coding with Mrs. Rogers this week.

Pumpkin Decorating Contest

 

The students at Allen Brook School filled the school buzzy jar again! As a way to celebrate we had a school wide pumpkin decorating contest. Each class got one pumpkin and we were asked to decorate it any way we wanted. Our class decided to design a scary pumpkin. We were worried that it would be too hard for all of us to carve one pumpkin so we decided to paint it and use other materials from around our classroom to decorate it. Students took turns sharing different design ideas on the board, and we finally decided what we wanted it to look like. Then we figured out what we had, and we got started! Everyone got to do some part of the the decorating, whether it was painting, gluing, adding glitter, etc... it was a whole class effort. In the end our pumpkin didn't win, but we sure had fun making it!

Here are some of the other pumpkins other classes at Allen Brook decorated. They all really looked amazing!

Buttered Toast Party

After finished all 6 Mercy Watson books, and 2 Tales from Deckawoo Drive, our class decided to have a buttered toast party to celebrate. For those who haven't read these books, toast with a great deal of butter on it is Mercy's favorite treat. In fact she likes anything that has butter on it; popcorn, butter candies, you name it!

The buttered toast was delicious! It made the perfect afternoon snack to go along with our readers' workshop. You may even notice that some students are rereading the books on their own now.

Rather than just buying bread and butter from the store, we decided to make our own butter. It was super easy. All we did was fill a jar with heavy cream, salt, and one marble to help with the mixing. Then we took turns passing the jar around and shaking as hard as we could. Within 5 minutes we had delicious creamy butter!

Pumpkins

This month we have been continuing on with our unit on Vermont Farms. As part of this unit the students have been rotating through workshops. The workshops have focused on farm to table, farms long ago and today, what we farm in Vermont and how those farms help us, and life cycles. Since time was limited we ended up choosing one thing that grows on a farm to focus on when discussing life cycle. Since it is October we chose the pumpkin. Students were learn more about animal life cycles later in the year. In class we went through the life cycle together, and then the students created their own version of the pumpkin life cycle. Many students didn't realize that pumpkins started out green until they reached their adult stage. Check out this video that takes you through the different stages of a pumpkins life cycle!

"Reading Gives You Superpowers!"

 

On Thursday all 2nd graders were invited to Williston Central to see a presentation by Dav Pilkey, author of the Captain Underpants series. Pilkey spoke to the students about his experiences in school. He talked to them about how his school experiences influenced his characters and ideas for his books. It was interesting listening to him talk about how when he would get in trouble during school he would use his time to make up stories and create comic books. He said he loved making his friends laugh, and they all found his comics really funny. This was the start of him becoming the author he is today. 

The 1st grade students were disappointed that they were not able to attend the presentation, but they were very excited when they learned that Dav Pilkey sent over to ABS capes for everyone! One of our classmates brought in some Captain Underpants books to share with out class, and I know everyone is excited to read them!

Hopes and Dreams

For the past week or so students have been working on their hopes and dreams for this school year. Students are really given the chance to think about what they want to get out of 1st or 2nd grade. These aren't hopes and dreams for things they would like to get (ex. a horse), but what they hope they can achieve this year in school. Students were encouraged to really think about if they could do more of, or get better at, one thing this year what would it be. Students came up with ideas like becoming a better reader, writing more detailed stories, doing more engineering tasks, reading longer books, etc. Their hopes and dreams will be displayed in the room all year so that come June they can look back and see what they hoped for at the beginning of the year, and reflect back on how they did. For our hopes and dreams project this year we made balloons. I thought about the idea of releasing a lantern or balloon into the air and making a wish, and thought that might be a fun way to represent our wishes for ourselves this year. The students helped to make the paper used to make the balloons. We used shaving cream and food coloring. These materials helped to give the paper a tie-die look. The students were so excited to come in the room and see themselves hanging around the classroom. They have been enjoying reading each others' hope and dreams, and seeing that many of them are working toward similar goals. I have heard some students say things like, "Your hope and dream is to be a better reader? But you are already such a good reader." and their classmate responding, "Yes but I can always get better, and I want to start reading chapter books this year." Come check them out if you have the chance.