Mrs. Raper

We had so much fun at the Millis Health Center yesterday! During the presentation, we learned about the purposes of bones and muscles and played a trivia game based on what we learned! Several students got to go up and volunteer for demonstrations.

After the presentation, we got to explore the a different room with lots of hands-on activities surrounded around the themes of health and wellness.

We bounced on trampolines:

We played Dance, Dance Revolution:

We also challenged each other at cup stacking!

We had lunch together while watching Bill Nye, the Science Guy. It was a great day! Ben wrote a review of our trip:

The Millis Health Center was really amazing! I loved the room where you could play lots of fun games. I would recommend that room for younger kids. I bet all of the other kids there liked the Body Wheel of Fortune just as much as I did. That room is better for older kids. The short movie that we watched was hilarious. I think any kid would love it! It was all about bones and muscles. The scientist who is in it is the funny part. He was such a scaredy cat! He ran away screaming when he saw a skeleton!

Annika had fun too:

I think kids should go to the Millis Regional Health Center. My class went yesterday and learned about bones. We played Wheel of Fortune and the Muscles team won! During lunch we watched Bill Nye, the Science Guy. I thought it was a funny show.

We have started our plants unit in science. This unit will last 6 weeks and take us through the life cycle of the plant. We started by observing seeds and then soaking them overnight to observe them again. We removed the seed coat (which many students are referring to as a "seed jacket" :)

After that, we split the seed in half to observe the embryo and cotyledon. Ask your child to define those terms for you.

Today we planted our brassica seeds. We got our planters ready with a wick for watering, potting soil, fertilizer and seeds. After that we were ready to water and place them under grow lights.

Of course, we're still plugging along with multiplication! Here are some students drawing pictures at the board to represent some of the facts:

Around this time I should be posting pictures of our seedlings being thinned and transplanted. Mrs. Sink's plants grew. Ms. Deal's plants grew. Not ours. Our class had the opportunity to discuss the fact that science experiments don't always work the way you think they will! We isolated variables and realized that we all have the same watering system, lighting set up and fertilizer. The only thing different between all three classes was the seed packs. We have replanted using different seeds and have our fingers crossed that these will grow.

In the meantime, enjoy some pictures from arts integration which is a music class this term. Ms. David had us sing "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot" to identify the "mi, re, do" notes at the end.

After we heard the notes, we practiced identifying the notes on the staff and then finding them on the piano.

I put a link on the sidebar (under the Word Wall words) to our DonorsChoose grant for two iPod Touches. We have two donors so far. Feel free to send the link to anyone who might be interested in knowing what we'd like to have for our classroom!

Our Brassica plants are growing! We replanted and seem to be in good shape. We have thinned and transplanted and everyone in the class has true leaves on their plants. We have started measuring our plants and sketching observations.

We are in the middle of another drumming session with Mr. Bill. Since music is our arts integration class this term, Mrs. Raper gets to drum as well. We're learning rhythms on the djembe and having lots of fun!

The whole class would like to thank everyone who has left comments. We meet around the computer and read them together. Reading these comments has started discussions on sturgeon, avocados, signs of spring, and geography. We have visited new websites shared by commenters and students have shared stories about extended family all over the country!