What is the Name of Your Chocolate Shop?

The students in room 8 have been working on a special PBL project. PBL or Project-Based Learning is a dynamic classroom approach in which students actively explore real-world problems and challenges to acquire a deeper knowledge.

Students in our class have been working on creating their very own chocolate shops! Now, we are not eating chocolate, but we are using what we know to solve real-world problems that a store owner may have when opening up his/her own chocolate shop.

Last week, we began our PBL project by sharing what we know about chocolate and what we want to know about chocolate. We watched a cool video about how chocolate is made. You can check it out by clicking on the link below.

http://www.history.com/topics/valentines-day/history-of-valentines-day/videos/how-chocolate-is-made

We then did some research, by completing a tally survey where we asked our peers what way they like to enjoy chocolate. We made observations on what way was liked the most, least, and so on.

Students also had the opportunity to brainstorm and come up with a name for their own chocolate shops. Ask your child what he/she named his/her chocolate shop!

Today, students discovered that we need to have options for customers that may not like chocolate. We brainstormed options and students had to determine which non-chocolate option they would like for their chocolate shop. Then, they had to look back at their data from their tally research to decide which kinds of chocolate they would have in their shop. We discovered that it would not make sense to have a way to enjoy chocolate that not many students prefer. We had to pick 4 chocolate options and 1 non-chocolate option to have in our chocolate shop.

Students then had to determine how to display their chocolate in their stores. Everyone has 10 tables to display their chocolate. They had to figure out how many tables they would have for the five options they picked. When they were done drawing their tables and labeling the food item, they wrote the fraction for the tables with the food item compared to the total amount of tables. For example, if 3 tables had chocolate cookies, then the fraction would be 3/10 for chocolate cookies.

Finally, we had to determine how we would display the chocolate on a tray. We learned that we need to have an equal amount of items in each row and column on the tray. If I have 3 rows of 4 cookies, it would look like the following on the tray:

XXXX
XXXX
XXXX

We learned about how we can use repeated addition to make an array. We also made the connection and discovery of repeated addition to multiplication. I could add 4 + 4 + 4 = 12 or 3 X 4 = 12.

This Week in Room 8 (5-23 to 5-27)

ELA:
Essential Question- How can I describe a connection between two individuals, events, ideas, or pieces of information in a text? 

• This week we continue our discussion on various versions of Cinderella. The students have done a tremendous job comparing and contrasting different features in the text. We have been noting the similarities with the key features in most stories. We are taking our learning to the next level by creating our very own Cinderella stories with the key features we have been discussing. I can't wait to read the final projects! 
• We will be learning more about the different countries represented in the different Cinderella stories. We will explore maps and learn about where the country is located in relation to the United States.

MATH:

• This week we will continue to learn more about fractions in relation to a group of objects. For example, we will be creating 1/4 with a group of 8 balls. The number of balls for 1/4 would be 2 balls.
• We will continue to learn more about telling time. The students have been working on telling time to the hour and half hour. We are going to extend our understanding by telling time to the quarter hour and to the minute.

SCIENCE:

• We are learning about different patterns we see in the world. We have observed patterns in day/night, days of the week, months of the year, life cycles, and so on.
• We are working on a project with the phases of the moon.

Other Important Info:

• Friday is an early dismissal day at 11:40 a.m. Please make sure to send in your child's dismissal plans if the plans are different than a normal Friday. Thanks!

Pizza Fractions, Geoboard Creations, and "Getting Along!"

Last week, we learned about fractions. 

Fractions are equal part of a whole.

In this activity, we divided our pizzas into equal parts, mixed up our pizzas, and wrote the fractions we saw on each whole pizza!

We used our Geoboards app on our iPad to create and write fractions.

In our Book Club activity, we read two books about "Getting Along."

We practiced retelling our text to a partner and determining what was the same and different between  the two books.

Check out your child's Seesaw and Kidblog!

Time to Post Photos!!!

Thank you for showering me with appreciation last week.

Each kind message means so much to me.

THANK YOU!

High Touch High Tech came to 1st Grade to teach us about 

sound!

We made our own musical instruments.

We tried making high and low pitch sounds.

We made high and low pitch sounds using cord attached to cups.

We even felt the sound vibrations when we held on to the cord!

We used tuning forks, cups with saran wrap, and salt to make observations

on the vibrations from the tuning fork.

Afterwards, we blogged about our experience.

Check out your child's Kidblog posts!

This is one of my favorite "action" shots from this school year. 

I love how the students are all engaged with the activity; however, no one is sitting at a desk.

We really like our flexible seating!

We used our knowledge of 2-D shapes to compose new shapes.

We wrapped up the project with a Pic Collage. 

Ask your child to show you!

We learned about paragraphs and when new paragraphs start.

Students worked together to find the different paragraphs.

Way to Synergize!

We finally made it to see Cinderella After the Ball!

Our class LOVES to blog!

We wrote about our field trip.

Check it out!

Last Friday was Kindergarten Round-up.

We had each kindergarten class drop in to find out more about 1st grade.

Our class told each group our favorite things about 1st grade.

Then, we showed them some of our favorite apps and projects!

Maker Time!

We constructed 3-D shapes using glow sticks, play doh, and plenty of tape!

We had to begin with the end in mind, seek first to understand then to be understood, and synergize.

Wow- we used a lot of habits while engineering our creations!

We used Explain Everything to document the number of faces, edges, and vertices for each 3-D shape. We posted our learning on Seesaw.