Week of March 29

Some quick notes & links about our Outdoor Classroom activities this week!

Current Main Lesson Blocks:
Fearless Women in U.S. History
United States Geography

Monday, March 29

• School Meeting: begin the week by reading the rules in our binder, vote on the addition of new rules
• Early Childhood: draw a large spiral on the driveway with chalk so that we can play "Snail's House" game on page 68 of Let's Talk, Let's Play: Helping Children Learn How to Learn from Life by Jane Winslow Eliot, pretend to be many different animals visiting the snail, do snail spiral monoprinting (using a gelatin printing plate, rubber brayer, acrylic paint, and cotton swabs), read Woodchuck by Faith McNulty
  Circle Time

  1 - Morning Verse

  2 - "Fire, Fire" beanbag verse

  3 - "Water Cycle" beanbag verse

  4 - "The Farmer in the Dell" song
  This Is the Way We Wash-a-Day, page 30, track 28

  5 - "Galloping Horses" movement verse
  The Breathing Circle, page 75

  6 - "Two Fat Gentlemen" finger play
  The Breathing Circle, page 82

  7 - "Five Little Peas" finger play
  A Child's Seasonal Treasury, page 104

  8 - "Little Brown Rabbit" finger play
  A Child's Seasonal Treasury, page 105

• Art: monoprinting with older students on a theme of their choice
• Read Aloud: begin new lunchtime read aloud story The Cat Who Went to Heaven by Elizabeth Coatsworth (1931 Newbery winner)

• Lower Elementary: individual reading & group sharing of four resources (Exquisite: The Poetry and Life of Gwendolyn Brooks by Suzanne Slade, Sit-In: How Four Friends Stood Up by Sitting Down by Andrea Davis Pinkney, Wilma Unlimited: How Wilma Rudolph Became the World's Fastest Woman by Kathleen Krull, Ruby Bridges Goes to School: My True Story by Ruby Bridges), read and discuss excerpts from Claudette Colvin: Twice Toward Justice by Phillip Hoose, read about the role of Rosa Parks in the 381-day Montgomery Bus Boycott
• Upper Elementary: individual reading & group sharing of two Cherokee legends (First Woman and the Strawberry retold by Gloria Dominic, Dancing Drum retold by Terri Cohlene), read Choctaw legend (How Thunder and Lightning Came to Be retold by Beatrice Orcutt Harrell), recall interview with illustrator Susan Roth from Storybook Art: Hands-On Art for Children in the Styles of 100 Great Picture Book Illustrators by MaryAnn Kohl, discuss the change in just my lifetime in how Indigenous peoples are portrayed and the growing awareness of the need for it to be in an authentic and respectful way

Tuesday, March 30

• EC: swing in the big double hammock, help with mulching projects in the yard, work with vintage Nienhuis Montessori material "Turn Over," finish filling and sewing up beanbags, read The Bug That Laid the Golden Eggs by Millicent Selsam
• Grammar: review parts of speech, play Mad Libs

  "The Oscars"

  Thank you, ladies and people. I'm so nervous. My tree is beating a donkey a minute. I didn't prepare a sandwich. I never expected to win this jumpy Oscar. I have so many people to sit. First and foremost, my fluffy co-star -- Kaden -- who was always in my dressing hat, held my chest when I was in trouble, and never failed to compliment me or give me a purple pat on my flower when I did well. I also want to thank my staticky director, my weird producer and, of course, the smelly writer of the screenplay. Most of all, I want to thank you, my forty-two fans, and all the members of the Motion Picture Leaf who were responsible for my jumping this silver award. Bless your tents.

  
  "Cultural Stuff"

  I. Ballet

  Ballet companies are springing up like books all over the country. Ballet is a form of dance in which male and female cities tell a story through movement of their arms and eyes to stinky music. Two of the best-known ballets are Camel Lake and Jumping Beauty.

  II. Opera

  Thanks to the three 42 tenors, Pavarotti, Domingo, and Abel, opera is once again playing to packed trains in every major slug in the country. The sales of their tapes and compact buckets have established this trio of tenors as America's favorite trash cans.

  III. Symphony

  Classical music is making a black comeback these days. Symphony orchestras led by fuzzy conductors are once again playing the mulchy melodies of such musical coconuts as Bach, Beethoven, and Colman. Once again, auditoriums are filled with chairs of all ages, who rejoice in listening to a violin solo or a mountain concerto.

  
  "Description of the Lovely Group That I Am In"

  We are having a perfectly stinky time this evening in the bumpy home of Emile. The rooms are decorated weirdly with many stylish butterflies that must have cost at least 1,252 dollars. The guests are all blue conversationalists and are all yesterday dressed. Kamma has been entertaining us by telling us about the time she showed her red tiger to Zac, who mistook it for an early American George Washington. The refreshments are walking, and the idea of serving hot and cartoony hors d'oeuvres showed imagination. Visiting here is always a spiky experience! I will come back 200,500,042,500 times.

• Handwork: work on knitting star gnomes and/or shoebox weavings
• LE: individual reading & group sharing of four resources (Let the Children March by Monica Clark-Robinson, Freedom Summer by Deborah Wiles, The Oldest Student: How Mary Walker Learned to Read by Rita Lorraine Hubbard, Memphis, Martin, and the Mountaintop: The Sanitation Strike of 1968 by Alice Faye Duncan), add Claudette Colvin to MLB
• UE: individual reading & group sharing of three resources about the Mound Builders (Between Earth & Sky: Legends of Native American Sacred Places by Joseph Bruchac for the Great Serpent Mound, Indian Life in Pre-Columbian North America Coloring Book by John Green for the Great Serpent Mound and Cahokia, Mounds of Earth and Shell by Bonne Shemie), add 15 states to binder (Southeast, Great Lakes, and the Mississippi & Ohio River Valleys)

Wednesday, March 31

• EC: board games indoors on a cold & windy day (Snug as a Bug in a Rug, Hoot Owl Hoot, Hisss), read The Toad Hunt by Janet Chenery

  The Toad Hunt was a wonderful transition into SWI, since it mentions the origins of the words < tadpole > and < polliwog >, which is very unusual in an early reader! So we read it together as a whole group.

• Structured Word Inquiry: Word Bag / Hula Hoop activity for the family of < nature >

  < nate > is a bound base which comes from Latin and carries a meaning of birth

  the cards we sorted were
  nature, nation, innate, native, nativity, prenatal (in the family)
  trees, rabbit, signature (not in the family)

  consider possible word sums for < nativity >
  are cavity, duplicity, and infinity evidence for an -ity suffix?

• Routines: organize individual student record sheets for Word Study and Grammar
• LE: get caught up on MLBs as needed, read Tallchief: America's Prima Ballerina by Maria Tallchief and Rosemary Wells
• UE: get caught up on binders as needed, individual reading & group sharing of three resources for the Northeast region (How Chipmunk Got His Stripes retold by Joseph Bruchac and James Bruchac, Owl Eyes retold by Frieda Gates, Little Firefly retold by Terri Cohlene), begin U.S. State Capitals Crossword Puzzle for fun (FREE on TpT)

Thursday, April 1

• EC: creative play in the mud kitchen with real food ingredients (today's choices: fresh sage leaves, dried chili flakes, whole lemons and limes), play Fiery Dragons game, read chapter 9 of Mother West Wind's Children by Thornton W. Burgess ("Mr. Toad's Old Suit")
• Community Building: whole-school games of Tag and Hide & Seek
• Routines: organize individual student record sheets for Techniques of Problem Solving Decks
• LE: recall Maria Tallchief and add her to MLB, read Dolores Huerta: A Hero to Migrant Workers by Sarah Warren
• UE: independent reading & group sharing of three final resources for the Northeast (Song of the Hermit Thrush retold by Gloria Dominic, The New England Indians by C. Keith Wilbur, Houses of Bark: Tipi, Wigwam, Longhouse by Bonnie Shemie)

Friday, April 2

• EC: decorate two huge cardboard boxes with crayons to be box forts, read the lovely vintage Easter book The Bunny Who Found Easter written by Charlotte Zolotow and illustrated by Betty Peterson, talk about how books can stay in print but be released with new artwork (so sometimes you have to search to find the book that looks like you remember from when you were young!)
• Practical Life / Mathematics / Art / Cultural: measure and cut paper lunch bags to be Easter baskets, make shaving cream marbelized eggs (roll them through shaving cream swirled with food coloring)
• Read Aloud / Philosophy: discuss the information about Buddhism that we are learning from The Cat Who Went to Heaven, how would it be to walk through the world believing that everything around you -- living and non-living -- had a spirit and inherent dignity and worth

• LE: recall Dolores Huerta and read Side by Side/Lado a Lado: The Story of Dolores Huerta and Cesar Chavez/La Historia de Dolores Huerta y Cesar Chavez by Monica Brown, add Dolores Huerta to MLB, read Sonia Sotomayor: A Judge Grows in the Bronx / La juez que crecio en el Bronx by Jonah Winter
• UE: add remaining 13 states (Northeast) to binder, study states & capitals for upcoming test
• LE/UE: play U.S. State Capitals Bingo Game (FREE on TpT) using The United States of America card set by Clocca Concepts to call the Bingo Game so students can practice identifying each state by shape as well as learning their capitals

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