IPS/Butler University Laboratory School

We have been introducing new materials to help us tell our stories every few days.  So far we have natural materials, story stones, story people, water colors, blocks, and clay.  Check out our authors exploring story telling with their materials!

Paiton uses blocks to tell a story.

David explores natural materials.

Martavious uses natural materials and blocks to tell a story about losing a tooth.

Friends tell stories using watercolors.

Clay creation to help organize thoughts before telling a story.

Wyatt, Ruth, Oliver, and Townes are playing rhyming bingo.

This week we started our word study after Reader’s Workshop.  Our word study this year will be focusing on patterns and what we notice in words.  These conversations, books, and games will help the children progress in reading and writing.   Over the next week we will be focusing on rhyming.  Rhyming is the beginning of playing with words.  Hearing sound similarities and differences can help make the connection between the letters and how they make up a word.  Today, in class, we played rhyming bingo.  The kids were so excited about it!  They were not only rhyming words on the board, but shouting out others word in addition to the ones they saw!

Friends wave to the “girls”!

This week, we have been in charge of taking care of the chickens- we’re the chicken stewards! Today, we were able to collect 3 eggs from the “girls”. When we came inside for math workshop, we began an impromptu conversation about what to do with the eggs we collected. Messi suggested baking a cake. Regan suggested giving them to Miss Judy, our cafeteria lady. Some friends liked the idea of giving them to Miss Judy but weren’t sure if they wanted to give them all away. We talked about how it might feel good to give to someone else. Regan mentioned that Miss Judy may need all of the eggs to make pancakes for breakfast. Another friend, J’Den, suggested something else.

How about we give her half? J’Den

What is half? Mrs. Argus

Like not all of them, but some. Half! J’Den

If you go, one for me, one for you, one for me, one for you, its half! Messi

But how do we know what half is? We only have three right now. We may get 10 by the end of the week, what would half be? Mrs. Argus

I have an idea, we should do this as like a math workshop problem. J’Den

Going off of J’Den’s suggestion, we grabbed a manipulative (the bears) and closed our eyes and pretended they were eggs. I laid out 6 bears in two rows, 3 and 3. We talked about how half would be one of the rows. We then laid out 8 bears and talked about how one row of 4 would be half. We practiced spotting half in 10 bears. The kids were then challenged with another question…

But what if we only get 9 eggs this week? Mrs. Argus

You give Miss Judy half! See, these for us, these for her… uh oh… J’Den

Its not fair! Beatrice

It doesn’t work. We should probably give Miss Judy more then us.  J’Den

When you can’t divide it fairly, its an odd. Fairly is an even. Mrs. Argus

Odds and evens! Odds and evens! Lucas

We then practiced noticing when numbers could be divided fairly, and when they couldn’t, and described them as either odds or evens.

J’Den talks about odds and evens with the egg problem.

Mr. Henderson and I also noticed a new interest in our classroom- dinosaurs! Throughout last week, friends were making dinosaur puppets and using a few small plastic dinosaurs to tell stories during story workshop. We noticed a lot of conversation circulating around this idea too. Today, we put out pictures of dinosaur bones with some clay and asked the kids to explore the clay. Many friends were inspired to create parts of dinosaurs and even eggs! Addie shared a really neat connection during the day as well- both chickens and dinosaurs lay eggs! I wonder if we will find any other connections…

Addie points out her noticing in a dinosaur book. Great observation!

Tags: arithmetic, capable, chickens, collaboration, curious, problem solving

Today during math, our class explored the ten frame!  This is a rectangle divided into ten squares that can be used as a counting tool or as as an alternative to express numbers one through ten.  We started our lesson using a guided exploration of the ten frame by creating a giant one on the floor!  I asked students to get into the ten frame a few at a time and we talked about what number was represented.  Then, students were given a few frames to study and count individually.  Once they looked them over, they were asked to stand up at different times and do an action depending on the number their frame represented.  They enjoyed this movement break and grasped the ten frame concept quickly!

Tomorrow, we will use our new knowledge to learn a math game… ten frame war!

Ask your students about their first trip to the library today!  They will be allowed to bring their books home starting next week.  Some of your students have leveled readers in their folder to read for their log tonight and others will get their first book tomorrow!

Today was our first trip to the library! Mrs. Thomas was there with Mr. Wiggles to welcome the students. Then she read a book to the class by Mr. Wiggles all about how to take care of books. The children did such a nice job listening to the story. After the children listened to the story, Mrs. Thomas told the children that they would be able to check out a book each week. The children were so excited that they got to check out a book. This week they will stay at school, but after Mrs. Thomas talks about the procedures with taking books home, the children will be able to take them home each week. We are so excited about this new part of our schedule!

Last week we discussed characters and settings in a story. Today we began talking about how stories have a problem and a solution. Our story today was actually a letter from Miss Kelly, our custodian. It was a letter saying that she found Crystal Fluffy Speeder outside of our school and it had hurt its hoof so she put a bandaid on it. We discovered that Crystal got lonely over the weekend and tried to go visit the chickens, but when it went outside the door hurt its hoof and then it closed causing Crystal to get locked out of the building. Luckily, Miss Kelly came and took care of Crystal!

After telling our friends about what had happened, Shaniyia asked how did it get out there because it is just a puppet. They started suggesting that maybe Mr. Smith had something to do with it so a group of kiddos wrote a letter to Mr. Smith during Story Workshop asking how Crystal got out there. We slid it under the door to his office and are awaiting a response…It is such a great thing when I am thinking that the problems are how Crystal got stuck outside and got hurt, but the children found a new problem-how did it get out there in the first place! I love these minds!