Jack O'Lantern Carving

We got together with Ms. Siperstein's class and made a graph to decide how to carve our pumpkin. Click on the new link at the top of our blog to visit Ms. Siperstein's blog and see photos of our awesome classes working together!

How To Plant A Pumpkin In A Pumpkin!

We had a discussion about our pumpkin planting project yesterday. We talked about the materials we used, and the procedure we followed. Then kids did a great job drawing and writing all about it!

 A small pumpkin is the first thing you need. The second thing you need is to cut the top off. Take the pulp out and put it on a plate. Make the seeds separate from the pulp.
by Micah

Our pumpkin's cut. Scooping out seeds. Planting seeds. Put in dirt. Our pumpkins at the window.
by Nathan

You need a pumpkin. Cut the top off. Take seeds out. Put seeds in the pumpkin. Put the dirt in.
by Evan

We got a pumpkin and we cut the top off. Our moms cut the tops. We scooped our pumpkins. We put our seeds into our pumpkins.
by Liam

We cut the pumpkin and we put the seeds on a plate. Then we put dirt in the pumpkin and we planted the seeds in the pumpkin. And we put the pumpkin in the window and watered it and the pumpkin will grow!!!
by Emily

The pumpkin. Cutting the pumpkin top off. Getting the seeds out. Putting the dirt in.
by Christopher

First a little pumpkin and plate and spoon and baggie. Then an adult cut the top off and then the spoon and scoop the seeds and pulp. Then put it on the tray then wait for the other people. Then read and write until the other people are done.
by Catherine

The pumpkin is on the table. Now the top is off. Now my pumpkin is done. My pumpkin seeds are in a bag.
by Kyree

First it was a regular pumpkin. Then I took off the top of the pumpkin. Then I put dirt in it. Then I took the seeds out to put them into a bag.
by Bella

Step 1-This is a baby pumpkin on a plate. It is all by itself. Step 2-Then we took the lid off. Step 3-Then we scooped the seeds out of the pumpkin. Step 4-Then we put the dirt in the pumpkin and the we have a pumpkin in a pumpkin.
by Alexa

Cut the top of the pumpkin. Take out all of the pulp, the stuff inside and the seeds. Put 1 or 2 or 3 seeds back in and put some soil in. Then water it and give it a lot of sunshine.
by Mikey

We were planting in a pumpkin. Here it is. We cut the top off the pumpkin. We collected the pumpkin seeds with a spoon. We got all the seeds out and the top off. It was fun! We put 1 or 2 or 3 seeds back in. We put the pumpkins by the sun so they will grow. And we watered it once in a while. We put dirt in it too! We brought the seeds home
by Talia

This is my baby pumpkin. A grown up cut my pumpkin top. I scooped the pumpkin seeds out. Micah's mom scooped some soil in my pumpkin.
by Coryana

Whole pumpkin. Cut open pumpkin. Get the seeds out. Put dirt in the pumpkin. Put the seeds in. Wash my hands. I'm done.
by Erin

A pumpkin regular. The pumpkin cut. I scooped out the pumpkin pulp and put the seeds in the bag. I put in soil. It was fun.
by Reilly

Pumpkin. We took the top off. We planted soil in our pumpkins. We planted seeds in soil.
by Kyle

Pumpkin Planting?!

Parents came in and helped us carve the tops off of 21 little pumpkins. Kids scooped out pulp and seeds, then put a few seeds back into their pumpkins with a little soil. Thanks to Micah's mom, Liam's mom and Mikey's mom for their help!

Listening Center

First grade teachers wrote a grant to get I-Pods for our listening centers. We shared our books and cassette tapes with each other and now all classrooms have over 75 stories for kids to listen to and enjoy!

Compliments Are Gifts of Words

We all passed around a beautifully decorated little box in open circle and as we handed it to someone we gave them a compliment. Everyone felt so good afterwards!

How Much Does It Weigh?

Kids were making estimates about the weight of our class pumpkin. They weighed themselves so they could compare their weight to our pumpkin and then got to hold the pumpkin. It was heavy! When we weighed it it was 19 pounds!

Crabs Have 10 Legs!

In math we are practicing counting by 10's using crabs! We learned about crabs-how many legs they have and what their legs are called, what they eat and how they move. We're making our own crabs too!

What is Circumference?

Kids had to estimate what length of yarn would fit around the circumference of our big class pumpkin. Kids were pretty close! We found other objects in our room and used our yarn to measure them and then compare that to the size of our pumpkin.

Number Line Fun!

In math we were practicing a strategy for adding and subtracting-using a number line. Kids were walking on the number line to solve an equation. It was lots of fun!

Parts of a Tree

We've been studying leaves and today talked about the parts of a tree, how a tree gets its food and the tree's life cycle. We read a great story called The Apple Pie Tree and labeled our own trees.

Homework

Kids are excited to finally have homework! Each week they will get a reading log to keep track of what they read and how much they read. Also they will have an easy, fun math game or activity.
Having just a bit of homework helps kids and families establish a routine that is fun and low pressure. This will help later when the homework load increases.

Work on Writing

Every day one of the literacy choices kids make is to do something we call "Work on Writing." Kids do all kinds of writing-cards to someone, a letter, a recipe, a list, a story-any kind of writing they can think of. This gives kids real practice writing.