WORDS*WORDS*WORDS and WONDER fill 4th-grade writing journals

WORDS*WORDS*WORDS and WONDER fill 4th-grade writing journals

As the fourth grade finishes their poetry unit they are deciding what to edit out, how to line their poems, and how and whether to punctuate or capitalize. They have spent hours pondering the things they want to remember, people and places they hold dear, objects, their inner life, questions they have about the world and images they’ve seen. Students have been learning about different poets, listening to and watching spoken word performances and attending to each other as they shared their poems. They have taken all their knowledge about figurative language and descriptive writing and have created poems that are funny, introspective and moving. The students are currently working on creating chapbooks of their poetry.

Thousands

The seat is warm

the book is open

with a thousand words in it.

I start to read

and the pages

fly away like white doves.

~ Hailey

 By Imri

~Violet

Little Gasparilla Island

The abandoned beach, the lost, colorful shells,
Tramping through the dirty sand,
Dried coconuts lying around.
We get home, so happy,
Warm lights, warm food, warm cookies,
Warm laughter, warm blankets.
Way, too, hot, nights.
Happy kids’ bunk, far from the parents.
So we can read at night without “Lights out!” coming through the door.  
Me, me and my cousins.

The gentle blue waves.

The full giant conk I pulled up from the sea,

And in the rush of happiness, lost.

The wet towels we bundle in, laughing.

Walk home.

~ Hattie

~ Leila

New York Ways

When the clock ticks it makes a big click.

When the sirens shout we all scream about.

When I look at the green statue, it looks so big even from far away. It would be so relaxing if I could look at it all day.

It has a big crown and doesn't frown.

It has a big smile even after all its days and that’s what I wanted to tell you about the New York ways.

-Patrick

The Cottage

I heard cracking of the old cottage house going click clack.

When I opened the window I felt the cold breeze run through my veins in Virginia.

I lay on my hard bed looking at the scratched up ceiling while I waited for my cousins and family to get up.

I saw the sun rising slowly through the light sky.

I loved the big cottage.

~Ethan

Storyteller and Puppeteer Visits Second and Third Graders

The second and third grade students were delighted by a visit from storyteller and puppeteer Marilyn Price.  Marilyn brought a variety of puppets with her and began her time with us by introducing the students to the different types of puppets.  These included string puppets, rod puppets, shadow puppets and even puppets made out of recycled materials, such as box puppets.  The third grade students in Jeanne's class were excited to show Marilyn the puppets that they had recently completed for their re-telling of the Chinese zodiac story.


After telling a few different stories using both hand puppets and other tools from her craft as a storyteller, Marilyn gave each student a blank puppet.  She then showed them how to manipulate the puppet in realistic looking ways.  The students especially enjoyed making the puppet look like it was climbing a tree- without an actual tree- and having it settle in to sleep.  She also talked with the students about ways to decorate their puppet with facial features and clothing; in her conversation with the students she was very clear that the puppet was theirs and that there were no mistakes that would be made when decorating the puppets.

It was wonderful to see students in both grades respond with such joy as Marilyn told stories and taught them how to to work their puppets.  The second graders are currently working on learning stories to tell for their upcoming storytelling night, and the third graders are working on creating their puppet show for China night, which made the connection to Marilyn's craft all the more meaningful.

Kindergarten Travels to the Morris Arboretum

Over the past few weeks, the students have been exploring seeds, mud, ants, worms, beetles  and noticing the new greenery and buds on our AFS campus trees. Students have garnered new information as they work to be stewards of our amazing planet! We have observed trees closely, read books, and looked at many ways that trees are important to us and the Earth. The students have been gleefully sharing to anyone that will stop to listen, that trees give us oxygen to breath, provide shade, and can be shelter for animals.

Planting a perennial to take home

The excitement was in the air in the kindergarten classrooms and on the bus as we prepared to learn even more about trees at the Morris Arboretum. Once there the students planted a perennial plant to take home, tested their knowledge with a Jeopardy game, matched tree bark and learned about the parts of the tree and the importance of the root system.

Matching Tree Bark

Some new concepts learned on our trip included the parts of a tree, the function of the roots of a tree, things that damage the root system, and different foods that come from trees.        . 

Demonstrating the importance of a tree's wide roots

Visualizing how far tree roots extend- to the end of the tree canopy

One of the many beautiful Morris Arboretum views

Exploring a decomposing log

 What a beautiful day to be outside exploring and learning more about trees! After lunch, we continued to explore the grounds by visiting a temporary art installation called "Loop de Loop" and by running and climbing on the "Out on a Limb" permanent structure.

"Loop de Loop" art installation on the arboretum grounds

Link for "Loop de Loop"  Stick Sculpture and artist Patrick Dougherty https://vimeo.com/329649484

Exploring "Out on a Limb"

Balancing on the "Out on a Limb" net

Morris Arboretum kid writing

Back at school, the students put their new knowledge down on paper with words and illustrations during a kid writing activity. Be sure to ask your kindergarten steward the newest facts that they have learned about trees!

The Morris Arboretum is a beautiful space to enjoy throughout the year. Many of the students asked if we could come back! Maybe the Morris Arboretum would be an exciting weekend adventure to look into with your family. For more information, please see the following link:

https://www.morrisarboretum.org/

Estudio de baile latinx en 4º grado / 4th Grade Latin Dance Study

To provide the fourth graders an opportunity to learn more about Hispanic and Latinx culture, a dance study took root and has since become a tradition in which the students are ecstatic to take part. To start our journey, the students viewed introductory videos on YouTube. These videos introduced the fourth graders to some of the many different styles of Latin music, where Latin sounds come from, and what cultures they draw on. They also familiarized the students with some of the most popular categories of Latin music such as salsa, merengue, cha-cha-chá, and tango.

After viewing the clips, the students were invited to break into groups. Then, each group was asked to pick from one of five popular Latin music genres; salsa, bachata, merengue, tango or cha-cha-chá. Once the group agreed to a specific dance type, a YouTube video was recommended that included a demonstration of the basic steps to their dance of choice. The goal was for the students to learn the basic authentic steps to the dance and choreograph a dance presentation with their group. To boost the fun, they were encouraged to add their own sabor (flavor) to their sequence of steps. Afterwards, demonstrate it to the class.

A portion of the Estudio de baile latinx (Latin Dance Study) is a writing component where the students research the history of their dance genre including the country of origin and its people and culture, the types of musical instruments used, and some of the famous Latinx music artists. Their found facts are then shared with the larger group.

The fourth graders have been working very hard (and having much fun!) at learning these steps. The culminating piece will be an assembly presentation to our Lower School community to introduce, ¡El ritmo latinx! (The Latinx rhythm!)

"Out Of This World" Visit

Second grade had an "out of this world" visit from one of our Upper School science teachers, Jordan Burkey. Jordan brought in moon rocks and talked to us about the moon. In the process we learned about the different phases of the moon such as half moon, full moon, waxing gibbous and waning gibbous, crescent. Jordan explained that the surface of the moon was a powder consistency almost like flour but you could still walk on it. There is a famous boot print that was left on the moon and it was left by Buzz Aldrin. A lot of people may think that it was Neil Armstrong but it was not! Apollo 11 was the first mission to land on the moon carrying three astronauts, Neil and Buzz got to walk on the moon and Michaels stayed in the spaceship and orbited the moon till they were finished. They landed on July 20, 1969 which was 50 years ago! We also learned about some more famous astronauts such as Mae Jemison and Yuri Gagarin.

We learned when a rocket launches the rocket becomes smaller and smaller becuase sections of the rocket detaches because this allows the rocket to travel more quickly through space and to use less fuel.  The astronauts sit in the very front piece of the rocket called a cone. He also went on to explain the process of retrieving the Lunar Lander also getting the astronauts off the moon.

Lastly, we were able to see real moon rocks! One of the rocks was made out of lava, the white rock is from the mountains, the brownish white  were made out of soil. Jordan also shared with us that there is nothing on the earth that is as old as the rocks that we saw. The rocks were believe to be around 4.5 billion years old. We also learned that they rocks were really expensive! They were worth 10 Million dollars.  The rocks were encased in glass because they were never touched by human hands because of the oils and they were not exposed to the air in fear that they would be damaged.

"I really enjoyed the moon rocks because we have never seen any thing as cool as that. We have only read about it!"

"I enjoyed it because i didn't know that much about the moon now I know more about the different astronauts and rocket ships.

"I thought that Jordan did a really good job at teaching because he made me feel really curious and want to keep learning! "

3º Grado diseñan su país / 3rd Graders design their country

An interest to create their own fictitious country prompted a study of lugares (places) in third grade. The students were provided with plenty of interactive activities that exposed them to the vocabulary for places in the community such casa (house), oficina de correo (post office), escuela (school), tienda (store), cine (theatre) parque (park), museo (museum) and much, much more.

As a culminating activity, the third graders were invited to design their own país (country) to include nombre, capital, líder, locación, población, clima, fiesta nacional (National Holidays), and bandera (flag). Then, they drew a picture of a particular ciudad (city) or barrio (neighborhood) in their country, labeling all major buildings in both inglés y español.

Using a script to introduce particulars to the class, each student got the chance to share their country’s name, special places to visit, most popular dishes and other information they’d like so as to persuade the audience to visit their país.

In collaboration with our astounding art teacher, Amanda offered the third graders the opportunity to design a city using recycle and craft items. The students were encouraged to label their building in both inglés y español. Their incredible work will be displayed during our STEAM Night coming soon. Make sure to look for them!

¡Adios amigas y amigos!

Measuring in Kindergarten

“Why do we measure things?”   We posed this question to the kindergarteners  during one of our combined math classes  recently.   It sparked an interesting conversation.   We soon realized that having the ability to measure things is actually quite important. One student remarked that there would be no way to put a roof on our classroom if the builders didn’t know how big to make it. 

We begin this unit of measurement using non-standard  measurement tools such as paper clips, dominoes, magnatiles, and counting cubes.   They begin measuring each other, and then we guided them into measuring specific objects around the classroom.  When two people measured the same thing, but got very different answers, we all  tried to figure out  The mystery of this discrepancy.   We soon realized that one of them was using   Big square magnatiles,  while the other child was using much smaller counting cubes to measure.   Needless to say, this provided a good segue into discussion of standard measurement,  which our  curious and industrious kindergartners are now busy exploring and practicing!