Friday, October 19, 2012

This Week In Review...

First graders finished up their reptile activities this week. They listened to a story about Turtle's day and then worked on a writing activity to share what turtles have, are, and can... Many of their activities are kept in their Science notebooks for you to see later. It is a nice safe place for all of our thinking. We also made a crocodile to take home. We learned the difference between an alligator and crocodile and sang a song to share at home. We also finished up with a reptile quiz. Great job, first grade friends.

2nd graders worked on weather once again, but this time we focused on temperature. We came up with a great list of things that are hot and things that are cold. We then learned how to read a thermometer. We saw what happens when a thermometer goes in different temperatures of water. We recorded different temperatures in other parts of the country.

3rd graders are learning about the three types of rock: sedimentary, metamorphic, and igneous. We viewed a variety of great rocks and then worked on understanding the definitions. We will be categorizing rocks next week and checking for hardness.

4th graders continued to work on circuits. We experimented with opened and closed circuits and built schematics. We used our new vocabulary to understand the components and what every circuit needs to work.

5th graders floated their lifeboats this week. They tested their control boat the Titanic. Then they tested the other 4 boats they made to see the maximum capacity of each of their boats. Next week, they will compare the different boat sizes to the different boat companies to see if other groups were able to get similar results.

Thursday, October 11, 2012

This Week In Review....

First graders have been learning about Reptiles this week. They can tell you that reptiles are cold-blooded and even explain what that means. Reptiles lay eggs (almost all of them), are either turtles/tortoises, crocodilians, snakes and lizards, and tuartaras. Reptiles have dry, scaly skin and shed their skin as they grow. Our first graders got to see a molten snake skin and even a rattle snake rattler and head.

2nd graders just finished their air unit and took a quick quiz. We then started to focus on weather. We went outide and with our new meterology skills, we created a weather report. Each 2nd grader will be working on our weather calendar in class as we continue to study air in a new way.

3rd graders used their their geologist skills to observe their vials as well as crystal evaporation dishes. They were able to determine the ingredients of our mock rock. We learned a lot of new words to help us observe rock properties. Next week, a quick quiz on properties of rocks. Check out the study guide on the third grade link.

4th graders are focusing on electricity and circuits this week. We are connecting D-cells which is our source to the enery receiver, our lightbulb. We understood that a circuit is a pathway which electric current flows. We actually created that flow in class. We took a test on magnets to see what we remember about our magnet unit.

5th graders finished up their section on swinger/pendulum systems. We took a review quiz to see if we could transfer what we learned to a new experiment. We then created a fleet of ships based on the Titanics lifeboat disaster. We are testing a control, our 3cm boat and how many passengers, pennies it can hold. We made connections in history. Next week, we will test our fleet of 5 boats to see the carrying capacity of each boat.