IPS/Butler University Laboratory School

Mr. Harris talking about games.

We were lucky enough to have a guest speaker come into our classroom to talk about games this afternoon.  Mr. Harris, who is a lab school parent, but also works at Butler University in the ticket office, came in to talk to us about games.  He is around lots of games everyday.  Here are a few quotes from this afternoon’s chat.

Why do you like games? -Max

I like to play games because of the people.  i enjoy spending time with my family and friends. -Mr. Harris

How did you start playing games? -Kristien

When I was a kid we used to play games with my mom and dad.  We played games like memory and Candy-land.  Now that I’m a grown up I try to play those games with my kids too.

Mr. Harris also left us with a thought that attaches to what we have been talking about A LOT with our project.  “It’s not so important that you win or lose, it’s important that you have fun.  Even more than having fun, games and sports are a good opportunity to be an example.  No matter how small or how big you are it’s important to remember that.”

Today we began filming our puppet show movie! Before we even began filming the show, we sat in a circle, and we each took a turn filming the person next to us. The children were so excited to film each other and LOVED watching the whole slide show together.

I thought we would only get a 3 or so out of 14 scenes done today, but we did them all! The children LOVED filming, setting up props, speaking in puppet voices, being the director. They really did such a nice job taking turns, practicing, etc.

Tomorrow I will be editing the scenes with Jason because he is our editor and then Friday we will reshoot any scenes that we think need to be done again.

I cannot even tell you how fun this process was today. Seeing the children so excited about something that they thought of is such a thrill!

Today, Reid and William from Mrs. Clark’s class came down and shared with us that we will begin recycling again at our school. The children asked some great questions about what to recycle and were really respectful!

This week we started a new unit of study in Geometry.  On Monday, we gave the problem, “Mrs. Clark created a shape that had more than 4 sides.  What shape did she create?”  This lead to a lot of exploration about shapes.  We came up with hexagons, octagons, and even a few different 3D shapes.  The kids came up with a list and we started naming the shapes.  At the end of yesterday’s Math Workshop a few friends got into a discussion about octagons.  Ruth said all octagons look like stop signs & Aasha said they just had to have 8 sides.

Today we explored that question.  Could an octagon look like anything with 8 sides or was it a set shape?  We found out together that all octagons had to have 8, CONGRUENT sides.  I gave the kids the challenge today.  Could they figure it out; what is an octagon?

I have to say that the class was on a mission. (They were on a mission to prove the theory wrong :).  Selam and Ruth discovered that it might be possible.  Check out the picture below of one of their creations.

They shared it with the class and were challenged on the sides.  Were the sides really congruent?!  After more discussion we decided as a class that we STILL didn’t have the answer.  We will be working on this problem tomorrow as a class to try to see if we can find out what a true octagon looks like.   Even though we did not find an answer in one day I have to say that I am proud of the kid’s reasoning abilities and determination to figure it out.   Check back tomorrow for the update!

As I sit in the room watching Miss Jeffrey teach throughout the day, I am able to see things that I would not otherwise see. For example, during Free Choice I noticed after Makayla and Danielle worked with Miss Jeffrey on making puppets, they walked quietly over to their own space and started playing Build-A-Man (formally known as Hang Man). They were having the best time and were so present with each other. I loved seeing this friendship develop.

I also noticed that Isaac and Jett became very interested in helping create the set for the puppet show. They collaborated so much on making the cafeteria tables that were made stay up. They also were so engaged and having such a fun time working together on a common goal.

One last observation I wanted to talk about was a class collaboration that happened during morning meeting. Niall chose the greeting and game for the day because he was showing so much engagement during the previous day. He chose 20 Questions for the game. While he sat in the middle of the circle, friends raised their hands quietly and tried to guess what Niall was thinking. They worked together asking questions that narrowed down the subject until Ashu said “Is it a crocodile?” “Nope, but you are close,” Niall responded. Then, Malachi shot his hand up in the sky and asked, “Is it an alligator?” Niall smiled and returned to the circle. The way they collaborated was beautiful and fun!

Today we began a conversation about time in math workshop. It was a very engaging discussion because the children knew a lot about the concept of time (there are numbers 1-12 on the clock, there is PM and AM on the clock, there is a minute hand, etc.), and they also were very sure that the day starts at 1 o’clock, “when a little crack of light shows up.” I loved how enthusiastic they were and the discourse that was being displayed to tell their reasons why the day started at 1. The bulk of math workshop was discussion today, and I just loved hearing their knowledge about time and loved hearing their observations about clocks.

The whole week we are going to study time focusing on the hour hand and being able to tell the time by looking at the face of the clock. We are also going to focus on problems similar, “It is 2 P.M. three hours later it is what time. Show me on a clock what the time is three hours later.”