Week of February 14 - 22

NATURAL SCIENCE

This week in first grade we were still learning about plants and started on The Stages of Life. They were specifically focusing on BORN, GROW and REPRODUCE.

For our plants, all of our dreams came true and out of about 50 students only two beans did not sprout. We allowed those two students, and those that were absent last week, to try growing their beans in a cup again. The rest of the class was given soil in their cup and they planted the sprouted beans and placed them outside. Now we will cross our fingers again that they grow and the birds don't eat them before we get to see the results.

The students are having a wonderful time with the plants and they are showing that they understand what should and shouldn't be happening.

For the stages of life we created a foldable with four flaps. Each flap was labeled with a stage of life and I included "EGGS" as one stage because we used the chicken as our example. They folded, cut, drew and colored everything themselves and we talked about how the chicken goes through each stage.

They were very interactive in this activity and some even hopped out of their seats to show me a chicken "growing" or "laying eggs". They flipped through each stage of their completed foldable and spoke about it amongst themselves. The students enjoyed this activity but were far more interested in the plants, understandably so.

ART

This week in art we were reinforcing the students knowledge of animals. They are making a yogurt duck so this week they colored and cut out their ducks. They will bring an empty yogurt cup next week which will go inside the duck to create the body and Teacher Carmen has a surprise for them after that! While they colored their ducks I read This Way, Ruby! A book about an observant duck who saves the day.

The students always enjoy coloring so of course they enjoyed coloring their ducks. They're also excited about the surprise. While I read the book they did not understand much but I only wanted them to hear some familiar words. Next week, I will read it again and help them to understand what happens during each stage of the book. My plan is for them to use their completed ducks to act out the stage of the book.