“This leaf looks like a beetle’s wing-shields!”
This week in Our Big Backyard…
Alphas learned that Austin is in a very special place in Texas. We knew that Hyde Park was built on Blackland Prairie, but we learned that when we go west of here, once we get to Shoal Creek, we hit rocky hills that are the edge of the Edwards Plateau. This is an important land feature that helps explain how we have so much water here—water drains downhill, and we live downhill!
Water attracts all kinds of living things and Austin used to have all kinds of creatures that no longer live here. We are beginning to learn that plants and animals attract each other because they depend on each other for food. Animals need plants for food and plants need animals to spread seeds. Larger animals need smaller animals for food – which means smaller animals need good places to hide! Out on the prairie might be hard, but near the Edwards Plateau the landscape changes and we find a wider variety of plants, including SHRUBS! We learned that shrubs come in all shapes and sizes: bigger than forbs, but smaller than trees; they tend to be woody, thorny, and often produce fruit.
We created foldouts that illustrate how plants in our environment are structured
By height and species to create the environment around us….
We studied another beautiful pollinator…hummingbirds who often build nests and rest in the shelter of shrubs. There are 9 native species around Austin among them the Black-chinned, Broad-tailed, Lucifer, Ruby-throated & Rufous. We learned that hummingbirds have excellent memories. They can remember every flower and feeder they’ve been to! We watched how hummingbirds build their nests and made our own flock of hummingbirds.
We explored how important Shrubs, the unsung heroes of our landscape are!
These producers provide shelter, shade, food, and protection for smaller creatures. Look at the flowers and berries our Alpha Shrub has produced!
It’s so inspiring when classmates learn more or create
reflections on our discussions and explorations…
Showing an illustration of hummingbird life.
We created art paper to finish making our wildflowers
by adding stems and leaves.
And we added more color & texture to our Q2 Self Portraits!
This week in Language Arts…
Ms. Eliza’s group…
Our letters of the week were 2 consonants…Hh & Dd. Our sight words: can, the & we. We’ve begun putting our phonics knowledge to practice making simple VCV (consonant-vowel- consonant) words with the same initial sound. Once a week we combine constructing new words and handwriting practice on white boards.
Our Reading focused on nonfiction stories ~ The Little Duck by Judy Dunn, and stories about creatures who live in the understory, one of them The Chipmunk Song a beautifully illustrated story about what it would be like to live the life of a chipmunk.
On Poetry Thursday we read from The Dirt Book – poems about creatures who build their homes underground like chipmunks, moles, and toads.
We read the fable of The Tortoise and The Jackrabbit by Susan Lowell and wrote about it in our journals.
Ms. Kim’s Group…
This week we practiced handwriting with Ms. Kim’s “crazy paper!” We talked about “personal goals” and we will talk about how nonfiction writing can support us in achieving them – but it was interesting to see how some of us are good at things that others find difficult!
We talked about the difference between “observing” and “inferring.” Sometimes an inference is just an educated opinion and it might not be completely true. We made observations and then we made inferences about what we saw.
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LOTS of great potions and charms in this class!
This week in Math…
Ms. Kim’s Group…
We want our Alphas to think about subtraction in 3 ways – starting with its definition: “to pull under” or take away. We think about comparing differences between quantities and we also want to think about “what’s missing.”
We are getting to know our “teen numbers,” and we are practicing how to write them too!
Making sets of ten and counting very large numbers is always fun when it’s candy!
New month, new calendar!
Ms. Eliza’s group…
This week we focused our practice on solving word problems. As we pose a problem, we’re looking for relationships, patterns, and regularities. We’re learning to be flexible, creative thinkers engaging in mathematical processes. So we ask…What is this problem asking of us? Is it a problem in which we’re joining numbers or taking them apart? How do we retell the problem in our own words? How can we model the problem using objects or drawings? How can we then translate it into a Part/part whole organizer or an equation?
For all of the problems we worked through as a large group and then in partnerships, there was only one answer, but many different ways to model it.
We learned to play a couple of new games, and added our understaiding of place value in the 70’s to our journals.
Partnerships are a powerful way to engage in math because it helps us to talk through problems, explain our thinking and make decisions together.
Learning to play Pyramid
Sometimes the game we choose is solitaire to practice math facts.
Another seek and color mystery on the 100 chart.
& In Other News…
discussing cool rocks…
duck..duck…goose
& new EYE-POPPING neon pink sneakers!
