Thank you to everyone who came to conferences! I really like having the time to meet parents and delve deeper into what makes each child tick.

I hope you noticed some of the heritage art projects, the book projects, and, of course, the Celebrate Board. Now it's time to send all those cool things home! I need to have everything all cleaned up so we can start our remote-operated vehicle activities. Don't forget, though--we look forward to the November Celebrate Boards!

We do need some things to come in to school right away:

• both field trip permission slips
• $6 for the play (that goes directly to the office, not to me)
• any more book projects or heritage art projects--they are now officially late (kids owe a Kragen buck a day until they get them turned in and there's no way I'll be able to get them all fit in on Monday)
• the Market Day business expense form, which MUST be signed by a parent and turned in by MONDAY (it's officially late too)

We went over due dates for November this week. I reminded the class that the calendar for the year is on this website (the top of the elementary page) and nearly every due date is on the calendar. Printing out the calendar and posting it is a great strategy. Crossing things off as they get finished is another helpful strategy. And due dates are posted in the classroom as well on bright pink paper. (It's not like I try to hide them!) I encourage students to copy the dates into their 3-ring binder as well.

This week we made and tested motor boats in science. We tried to make the boats go faster and carry more weights. Orange group carried 36 rubber erasers in their little boat! That was the record for the class.

We also did electrical circuits:

• complete/simple
• closed and open
  
• series
• parallel 

The coolest series circuit had 12 light bulbs, 11 batteries, and 13 wires. When we got done assembling it and it lit up, the class burst into "Jingle Bells."

The coolest parallel circuit was very bright. If one bulb got unscrewed the other stayed lit.

Another thing we did in science was spinner art using a little motor and 3x5 cards. We observed what blocks of colors looked like when they were spun together. Red, yellow and blue made a light pink like a kind of medicine. Red and blue made a magenta. Pink, green, and orange made orange with a purple outline. Light blue on the edges looked clear almost when it spun.

In an effort to make as much of the science fair project be an "at school" project as possible, I have had the students working in the computer lab for 45 minutes each day all week so they could get a solid start on the first parts of the project:

• background research (some students are close to done!)
• list of works consulted (no one has started this part yet, and I will be doing lessons on it next week)
• question
• hypothesis
• procedure
• material and equipment list

I signed up for time in the lab for next week too, at least for Monday through Thursday, so they could continue those parts of the project. 

The background research and list of works consulted should be done by October 15. The rest of the preliminary work should be done by October 23. My goal is to have all that written work done at school.

Doing the experiment is something that will have to happen at home, and of course they will have to keep their written observations and they have to keep track of their data in their journals at home. They will have the entire month of November to complete their experiments.

​Meanwhile we have done exercises in class to review how to organize paragraphs for expository writing--for any informational writing. 

BTW, you might also ask kids about Superman pose.

And my math group might want to talk about equations. And why you want to keep them equal on both sides. (He he he.)

 It's especially important that all parents check their children's papers this week--every Friday, of course, but this week even more than most. The office has essential papers that we need returned ASAP. Unfortunately, the bottom of the gray form is cut off. PLEASE NOTICE--You need to sign and date the bottom of the gray form. Thank you so much!

Everyone got their genre worksheet turned in and then eagerly signed up for the book project of their choice. Those are due in the next three weeks--students sign up to present.

Students are doing short writing exercises: a descriptive paragraph about a special place, an opinion piece about dog food (based on articles they read). I get them on the computer all the time, partly in an effort to increase their word-processing skills. By the time the SBA rolls around, I want working on the computer to be old hat.

My math group finished their first chapter test. The average grade was 87%. The tests will come home with all the papers on Friday. The 7th grade math group is nearly done with their first chapter too.

In math today I showed the group a trick for subtracting without borrowing. The kids LOVED it. I said the real key would be if they could explain it to their parents. One of them asked for the picture from the board to help, so here it is.

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Our textbook has about three pages dedicated to World War 1. I checked out a dozen books or so from the library, a couple of encyclopedias, added a couple more books of my own. Then I got students reading all the different sources, looking for the answers to just a few questions:

• What were the causes of the war?
• Why did the US enter the war?
• How was the war fought and won?
• How did the war end? What were the consequences or impacts of the war?

The students started the week knowing virtually nothing about the first world war. Ask them what they know now!

Come by the classroom and check out some of the cool drawings of squash the kids have done! You can click on any of the blocks below to see some samples.