Water, water, everywhere…
This week, we left the shore for open water to explore the euphotic zone! This is the layer of the ocean that gets the most sunlight. We learned that this layer is closest to land, which means it is closest to humans, and the Alphas know that where there are humans, there is trash! The euphotic zone is where over half of our oxygen comes from; it also contains 90% of all marine life — which makes its proximity to humans a little scary.
The continents are ringed in the light blue of the euphotic zone…
Alphas, making their own depth maps of the ocean!
We also learned about a creature many of us see at the seashore: The Portuguese Man-of-War! While it resembles a jellyfish, it’s NOT one – in fact, a man-o-war is a colony of little critters that belongs to the siphonophore family! It floats on the surface of the water, dragging its long tentacles behind, and its sail-shaped body catches the wind to help it travel. Those tentacles sting anything they come in contact with in hopes of a good meal – several Alphas knew people who were stung by man-o-wars – OUCH!
Watch out for those tentacles, Malin!
We learned about two important ecosystems in the Euphotic Zone: The Kelp Forests and the Coral Reefs. Both require help in undoing the damage humans have done to them — the Kelp Forests needed otters to be protected, and Coral Reefs need something to be done to stop global warming!
(Here’s a video of what Texas Parks and Wildlife have been up to in the Gulf of Mexico (we watched to the 5-minute mark): Texas Reef
Alphas have learned about a lot of invertebrates on the seashore, tidepools, and the euphotic zone, so we turned our attention to another important phylum: vertebrates! Fish are the most abundant vertebrates in the ocean. We learned that even though there are thousands of unique shapes, sizes, and colors of fish, they all have similar body parts. Alphas got to put their knowledge to work when we did our make-a-fish challenge! One of our classroom agreements includes respecting people and things, so we try to respect each other’s creations with this little motto: If you didn’t make it, don’t change or break it. Well, this challenge challenges our attachment to our creation too. When we work collaboratively, it can be really difficult to share the actual design and crafting with members on our teams. Alphas worked on each team member’s “fish” in a round robin sketching frenzy! They had 3 to 7 seconds to work on one part of each fish. We love how they turned out!
Speaking of “collaboration”…check out how these Alphas came together to create coral reefs!
First, we divide up the clay…THEN we anchor it on the substrate…
This week in Math…
Ms. Emma’s Math Wizards…
Revisited counting coins! After letting it marinate for a week, these mathematicians were ready for the challenge of adding in quarters.
Playing scoop and tally!
Sorting “spending” and “income” cards after a nice, long discussion on how adults make money and what they might spend it on. They even examined Ms. Emma’s credit and debit cards and considered why she might use one over the other.
Sorting coins! They are such great helpers…
They did some “shopping”…
And checking out some very cool coins!
Ms. Kim’s Mathletes…
This week we practiced doubles playing Double Decker Bus, we learned a LOT of shape names that tell you how many sides a polygon has – from “tri” to “deca!” AND…best day ever…we got new Math Workbooks to practice adding and subtracting.
This week in ELA…
Ms. Kim’s group…
We crammed a lot into our short week! We learned some new High-frequency words, we shared our P&P poems, we learned a LOT of cool question words, we read “Tyger, Tyger,” by Wm. Blake, and we wrote our own questions for a tiger…
Ms. Emma’s group…
Learned that sometimes poems ask questions! They loved listening to “Tiger Tiger” by William Blake, then creating their own question poems! We used some rather thought-provoking images to inspire our silly questions. They especially enjoyed learning about the sinking house in Paris…
We took pride in sharing our riddle poems and guessing each other’s colors!
And LOVED visiting the library to pick out new books…
We also studied a few new high-frequency words, learned about synonyms and antonyms, and practiced our handwriting.
