3rd Grade Building Engineers

Third grade has embarked upon their biggest project of the school year in science class. They are digging deep into the field of structural engineering as they learn some of the basic principals  of creating structurally sound buildings and simple machines.

The students began their engineering unit by conducting research about engineers known for building some of the most well know bridges and tunnels in the world.  

After researching the engineers, the third graders built bridges in the likeness of the structures that the engineers they had researched built. The students built their bridges from plastic straws and wooden popsicle sticks. Once they were finished building they measured the structural soundness of their bridges by placing gram weights and cups of pennies on them to see how much load they were able to sustain. Once the bridges reached their maximum loads and toppled, the students used scales to weigh how many grams their bridges were able to hold. 

Time Traveling in Fourth Grade

Friday, March 9 was our annual fourth grade colonial fair; and wow, was it great!

Looking fancy there!

You too, gentlemen!

Just a group of colonial townspeople ready to serve ye!

An apothecary who knows that a smile is as healing as any of the herbs in her garden. 

The farmers had a bunch of living things hanging around. 

This printer is an expert in her trade. 

Our colonialists were able to run their own booths none stop, entertaining and educating their audience with all their fun facts. 

This merchant was no joke! She had her shop fully stocked out. 

Oh yeah, this apothecary practices healing through scents! 

Close shaves were being offered! 

It was some people's first time at the colonial fair. 

They soon discovered that colonial teachers were no joke. 

See you all next year! 

Second Grade Folk Dancing-Chimes of Dunkirk

As part of the AFS Lower School Music and Movement program, students learn traditional dances from a variety of traditions.

Second graders learned the traditional British Country dance Chimes of Dunkirk. The dance is performed with a jig or reel melody, which has a repeating song form that accompanies the dance steps.

See a clip of their dance below!

Enjoy:)

Building Third Grade Inferential Thinking Through Nonfiction Reading

Third grade students have been delving deeply into researching the panda. They have read read a variety of books, watched videos of pandas at various research centers in China and have read articles about the panda as well. When reading a nonfiction book about pandas, students learned to use the features of nonfiction to help them to access information. The headings, pictures, diagrams, captions, maps, table of contents, glossary and index are some of the features that students have accessed to complete various charts and to write about the panda. 

A recent strategy lesson focused on finding key words in an article about panda communication. Students practiced the strategy of reading a paragraph and finding the key words and then using a highlighter on those key words. They then worded in pairs to read together the rest of the paragraphs, discuss why certain words were important and then to highlight those words. Some of the students even acted out elements of panda communication during their discussion. The next step in the process is to use those key words and their understanding about panda communication to complete an informational sheet. These skills to access nonfiction information utilize and promote the growth of inferential thinking skills.

Lower School Book Club for Adults- April Selection

Join us for our next Lower School Book Club for adults led by Ann Botel-Barnard, our Language Arts Specialist. We are excited to come together to share a love for a great story!

Book: Salt Houses by Hala Alyan

Location: Lower School Library from 8-9am

Date: Friday April 20, 2018

Enjoy a light breakfast and great conversation as we discuss what we loved about the book, what we had questions about and what we could connect to. Feel free to join us even if you have not read the entire book. You will still have a lot to contribute and the discussion will enhance your reading of the book. You are welcome to bring adult friends and relatives that are also interested in discussing this book. This debut novel portrays the displacement of a few generations of a middle class Palestinian family and explores the notion of home. The writing is beautiful and the characters are memorable.

RSVP: Ann Botel-Barnard  abotelbarnard@abingtonfriends.net

Cars, Tracks and Math in First

           Cars, Tracks and Math!

First grade has enjoyed spending time building during free choice.  Students have been using blocks to build race car tracks with ramps and bridges. They have shown great teamwork building, testing and modifying their tracks until cars successfully travel to the end without falling off. 

   

Students are so proud of their tracks and have begun using skills from our "Rolling Along With Links" math lessons which focused on measurement and graphing.  We have gathered a great deal of data from racing our cars! 

After collecting data from our various trials, students organized the information into bar graphs to make comparisons and draw conclusions about their experiments.

Llenadores de cubetas en el jardín de infancia / Bucket fillers in Kindergarten

In Raji and Beverly’s kindergarten class, the students have been learning the Spanish vocabulary to describe some emotions. Kindergarten can be a time of great emotion! There are enormously joyful interactions which result in warm feelings and laughter, as well as  disagreements that result in hurt feelings and sadness. Conversations around kindness take priority. Recently, the kindergarteners were introduced to the concepts of “cubeta (bucket) fillers” and “cubeta (bucket) dippers.” To help acquaint the students with these models we read Carol McCloud’s book,   “¿Has llenado una cubeta hoy? / Have You Filled a Bucket Today?”

The story states that we all carry invisible cubetas around with us, and they hold our good sentimientos (feelings) in them. When someone is kind, our cubeta fills with good sentimientos. When someone is unkind our cubeta empties. When you are kind to others, you are a “cubeta filler”. When you are unkind to others, you are a “cubeta dipper.” Although the book states we each carry an “invisible” cubeta, we thought it’d be much fun to have one we can really see.

After reading the book and decorating our very own cubeta, we talked about the many ways we can each be a “cubeta filler”, not just to our classmates but to everyone in our community. Throughout our conversations we realized that in order for us to be cubeta fillers we first need to learn how to identify our feelings and how to appropriately express them. This notion led us to learn the Spanish vocabulary for some emotions.

feliz - happy

triste - sad

orgullos(a) – proud

cansado(a) – tired

hambriento(a) – hungry

asustado(a) – scared

enojado(a) – angry

This heartwarming book and the conversations that followed continue to encourage positive behavior as students see how rewarding it is to express daily kindness, appreciation, and love. Please ask your kindergartener how they are being “cubeta fillers” and share with them how you too fill “cubetas.”

Here’s a song we made up to the tune of Frère Jacques’, “Are You Sleeping?”

Fill a cubeta, fill a cubeta.
It's easy to do. It's easy to do.
I can fill a cubeta” I can fill a cubeta.
So can you! So can you!

Fill a cubeta, fill a cubeta.

Smile and say, "Hola," smile and say, "Hola!"

You can fill a cubeta, you can fill a cubeta.

Sonríe y saluda. Sonríe y saluda.