Water, water, everywhere…
Dove deeper into the ocean (600 feet deep) into the twilight zone! Alphas learned that very little light reaches the dysphotic zone, which makes photosynthesis inoperable and plants obsolete. We explored many critters that live here, but focused on two enemies. The sperm whale vs the giant squid! While oceanographers have not captured video of the battle, tentacle marks left on sperm whales offer some evidence as to what might occur in the dark. One video animated a model of how sperm whales use echolocation to find their favorite food. Alphas collaged the great battle and depicted many epic battles between giant squid and sperm whales!
Students also learned that in World War 2 when sonar was being developed, scientists noted that the seafloor made a dramatic up and down motion twice a day. Turns out it wasn’t the sea floor at all! They discovered for the first time that the largest migration on earth was happening as billions of Twilight animals moved up into the euphotic zone to feed and then descended 12 hours later back into the depths.
The nautilus, one of earth’s “living fossils”, are of the cephalopod family. They are one of the creatures that make this journey every night. Imagine running a marathon up to a feeding ground and running it again to get home – that’s what these creatures essentially do to get food. So, the alphas made a migration of their own….
And were rewarded for all of their hard work with a snack!
To appreciate the unique and beautiful qualities of the nautilus we experimented with drawing and watercolor techniques to create our own.
Alphas also took pride in showing off their Euphotic zone creatures…
And in case you haven’t seen it…
This week in Math…
Ms. Emma’s Math Wizards…
Learned a lot in two days! We explored double-digit addition and learned about a handy trick to make adding big numbers MUCH easier. Alphas learned the hard way that solving an addition problem with the tools they currently have is pretty tricky…
It takes a lot of time and effort to count out 35 marbles, then count out 47 marbles, and then count them all together…
Luckily, by placing digits vertically and adding using place value, those big addition problems become much more manageable. Once they got the hang of it, we added in regrouping. Look at these Alpha’s doing Beta math!
Playing Race to the sea!
Ms. Kim’s Mathletes…
We learned a LOT about measurement in our abbreviated week! We played a few rounds of “Counterexample” where Ms. Kim made an outlandish claim, and students gave a counterexample to prove her wrong. Alphas LOVE to share their knowledge and dig up evidence to prove their points. They are also getting very good at “respectfully disagreeing!” One outlandish claim was that all squares are the same size, which was pooh-poohed by a dozen children racing around the room, pointing and pulling multiple examples of squares of different sizes. They were able to let Ms. Kim know that size had nothing to do with the definition of a shape. WELL DONE Mathletes! This helped introduce the concept of measurement. We used some nonstandard tools of measurement to measure our journals and our rug.
WOW. We got wildly different results! The kids thought it would be terrible if Ms. Kim wanted to replace our rug, which measured 10 of her feet, and the carpet maker, Justin, used HIS feet to measure and make us a new one…
Maybe our math class could fit around Justin’s ten-foot rug, but there’s no way our entire class could!
We then measured our journals using our standard tool of measurement: The Ruler. Our results were not wildly different at all. It took a bit of practice to make sure we were able to use our rulers correctly when we measured things that were longer than 12 inches, but we did a pretty good job when things were smaller!
Red crayon: 3” | Number card: 4” | Tuning peg: 1”
This week in ELA…
Ms. Kim’s group…
We used our senses to think about things in our world in a poetic way. When we use sensory examples to explain things, our audience can connect with our words in a physical way. We worked on a group poem about a color…can you guess what it is? How do you think our Mad Poets feel about this color?
We had a chance to write our favorite lines in our journals, practiced handwriting with some goofy riddles, and cozied up with some good books and good friends, too…
Readers and writers all! Whelan’s rockin’ the poem writing, Atlas is hyper-focused on his book, and Jude is determined to get that Daniel Johnston song down in his journal!
Three friend found a quiet corner to share their books…
Ms. Emma’s group…
Explored diamante poems! This is the most strict poem form we have learned about, which can be very daunting for these creative minds. The students used a guide to create their own diamante and had fun coming up with “ing” verbs to describe their nouns.
Thinking VERY hard about a good adjective for a fish…
Enjoying Dogman at the library….
In Other News…
Ms. Emma’s Big Day!!!!
Alphas sharing their love for their teacher as she makes her way around the sun…
(teachers get to count by tens…because nobody needs a dizzy teacher)
