Busy Day

During reading today some of the kids were ready to take their reading test so we got our our activotes. Some of the kids are also free to read on http://www.raz-kids.com/ and advance at their own pace. Read! Read! Read!

We are lucky to have Mrs. Straughan volunteer in our classroom.

Here she is helping a group study their spelling test. Since the lab is closed for OAKS (3-5th grade) testing, we will be doing our test on paper this week.

We started a new chapter story today. We are reading "Marly", a book that JD bought for our classroom at the bookfair.
Each day we sketch and jot a quick summary of the story.

Mrs. Thorne came in and shared a wonderful story with us.

We talked about how to say we're sorry. We learned that there are three parts to an apology.

1. Look the person in the eye and tell them that you are sorry.

2. Tell them what you are sorry about (be specific...for pushing you, teasing you...)

3. Ask them if there is anything you can do to make it up to them.

TM and JC had the opportunity to role play an apology with the puppets.

Late in the afternoon, JC lost his third tooth!

He was bubbling over with happiness!

We both love the "window" it leaves in his smile.

And to top off a great day...the High School brought us each a doughnut as a thank you for bringing in so many coats during the "Coats for Kids" program.

Thursday night is our Parent Club's Basket/Art auction.

Dinner is at 5:30 followed by the auction. I hope you can come.

Here is what to look for...our poems!

Lost My Camera

Hi Everyone,
I wanted to let you know that I haven't forgot you, I just miss placed my camera after all the Halloween fun. I did find it tonight and will make up for lost time on Wednesday.
We finished our poems and have them on a CD for the Basket/Art Auction that is coming up this Thursday evening. I hope that some of you will be able to attend and perhaps go home with this special project that we had so much fun with.

Big Pumpkin Video

By special request, we are posting our Big Pumpkin play, for your viewing pleasure. The performance lasts about seven minutes. Please turn on your sound.

Happy Halloween

We had the most exciting day every!

We started off by reading our very first pen pal letters.

They were great letters and they also sent us some spider rings. How fun! After lunch we got into our costumes and had some fun with dry ice.

Here EN is catching a "boo bubble".

JB got his bubble and it popped right in his hand.
Justin caught one and is about ready to get another one.
Then we went outside and made Halloween screamers!
We put a hex nut inside a balloon and then swirled it. It makes a great sound.

We saw some wonderful costumes today.

This is BB. Is he cute or what?

Then it was time to sample some of this wonderful and FUN food that everyone brought.

AR and her mom made these Frankenstein rice crispy treats.

EN brought in yummy carmel apple slices and LS brought in brownies.

JB and his mom made popcorn balls, mmmm.

We took pictures by the witch's brew for our photo albums.

Then it was time for another experiment.

Here we made a crystal ball and then waited for it to burst and have the fog land on our hands.

Even though this photo isn't in focus, I still really liked the boys faces.

Big Pumpkin Play

The Big Pumpkin play is a tradition in my room. Each year we read the story, make the background, and then dress up to act the story out for our McKay kindergartners and first graders. We had a great time and it was really fun to perform for our friends and families. Here is JD as the ghost.Here is the cast as... "first they pulled hard and then they pulled harder but that pumpkin just SAT!"

"Drat!" said AP.

Here is another group after their performance. I just love to see children working together and having so much fun.

TK made a great bat.

EN as our mummy.
DC as our vampire.

KC was our witch for two of our plays. She did a great job!

Here they are trying to pull the pumpkin off the vine. Looks like good teamwork to me.

Here is our final group of actors for the day. It was a lot of fun watching the children perform.

AG as our witch.

BB as our bat.

Happy Halloween everyone!

Wacky Wednesday

Boy we do "Wacky" good. Look at these crazy boys!

Oh my, the girls are just as WACKY!

Clothes backwards, miss matched, hair as wild as I have ever seen!
This morning we started getting ready for our Halloween party by making pumpkin pie.

It was nice to have AP's mom come in and help. Thank you!

First we put in a vanilla waffer,

Then we added the sugar and spice...

and filled the cups and put them in the oven. Yummm.... we can't wait for Halloween.

Planning For Our Performance

Here are AS and KC busy writing poems that we will be recording and placing on a CD for the basket/art auction.

This afternoon we drew a huge house for the background of our play that we will be performing on Thursday and Friday. Everyone is welcome to come watch. If you are unsure of when your child will be performing, send me an email cschimel@pendleton.k12.or.us and I will let you know.
Everyone is getting along so well, it really is fun to do these kinds of projects together.

After coloring it with color crayons, we put a dark wash over it to make it look like it was dark out.
During reading block a few students finished illustrating their books that they wrote. Here are KS, JB, and SR sharing their story with us. It was a spin off of the Three Little Pigs. It was really cute.