IPS/Butler University Laboratory School

Today, we learned a new math game called burglar! Students are put in partners and given number sets that have 10-20 numbers. They line their numbers up in a row, then take turns turning their back and taking one of their partners numbers. Once the number has been taken, students mix their partner’s numbers up and invite them to turn back around to see what number is missing! Students loved playing the game and the excitement of figuring out which of their numbers was gone. Not only is this helping us with number recognition, but also with ordering and naming numbers. This would be an easy game to recreate at home with handmade cards or playing cards!

This was the conversation we had at the end of the day today:

(After we saw pictures of Hurricane Sandy)

Mrs. Bucher-“My friends, what did you notice in the picture or what have you noticed or heard about what happened with Hurricane Sandy?”

Jamari-“The car was under the water.”

Israel-“They lost their house.”

Mrs. Bucher-“Oh my goodness. I am so sorry you saw that Israel. You are right, though, there are people that lost their houses.

Mrs. Bucher-“What I would like you to do is close your eyes and think about if you were there in New York or New Jersey and you lost your house or you lost your car. How would you feel?”

Maggie-“I would feel lonely.”

Mrs. Bucher-“Lonely? Why would you feel lonely?”

Maggie-“Because people died.”

Mrs. Bucher-“You are right. People did die. So, yes, I would feel lonely too if someone I knew or loved died. Anybody else?”

Selah-“I would feel poor.”

Mrs. Bucher-“Why would you feel poor?”

Selah-“Because I would not have anything anymore.”

Noah H.-“I would feel scared.”

Mrs. Bucher-“Why would you feel scared?”

Noah H.-“Because I would not have my house anymore which would make me scared.”

Mrs. Bucher-“So, I hear friends saying they would be lonely, scared, poor. Now, we are safe here in our school and we are not going to get any of this weather. What about the people that have been affected. What could we do to help those people?”

(Many hands raise)

Makayla-“We could fix their houses and cars!”

Mrs. Bucher-“Makayla, I love that you want to fix their cars and houses, but here is the problem: we are here (showed Indiana on the map) and the storm devastation is here (showed New York\New Jersey area). I do not think that we can go there to help fix them. That would be quite the field trip, but I love that you are thinking about helping them. Does anyone else have an idea about how we can help?”

Heaven-“We can give them money!”

Mrs. Bucher-“We could give them money, but I do not know about you, but I do not have a lot of money..”

Selah-“Neither do I….”

Mrs. Bucher-“…so how could we get money to send to them?”

Many friends: “We could ask our moms and dads!”

Ashu: “We could send them tools (to fix their houses and cars).”

Mrs. Bucher-“Wow, my friends you are have been so thoughtful! I just wanted to say how much I appreciate how kind you have been offering so many ideas. We have to get ready to go, but we are going to talk about it tomorrow again because there are so many ideas we have yet to talk about.”

**Ahhh…this is where our conversation ended because we had to get ready to go home, but I seriously could not believe how beautiful this moment was. Everyone was being so thoughtful, generous, and kind. Our weather project is definitely taking a bit of turn based on this conversation, and how natural it is that we are changing a bit because of weather! I wanted to share with you this conversation because it was a great moment that the children showed empathy towards others.

Last week in Story Workshop, we did an author’s study of Todd Parr.  The students loved reading his books and noticing what made his books unique.  Many of them have tried his style in their own stories.  Today Sydney shared the start of her book called “The Family Book.”  She was inspired by Todd Parr and that is evident through her illustrations and the start of her story.

This morning our science provocation included a new tool called a hydrometer.  The students explored the tool and made some predictions about what it is for.  Many of them thought it had to do with temperature.  Some students noticed that it had the words “instant ocean” on the side.  They were thinking that because ocean water is saltwater the tool may have something to do with salt.  We  made connections to the note we have from the museum because many students thought the liquid on the note may have salt in it as well. We also had our first science meeting this afternoon.  The scientists learned a new song all about the scientific method.  More to come about our science discoveries this week!

Today was such a busy day! During Math Workshop we introduced number lines to the class. We are working on counting on as a skill to help us solve problems. Instead of counting all of the numbers,start with the bigger number and count on. Some of the children were counting all of the numbers to solve the problems, but some started with the bigger problem, and then they just hopped however many more to get to the answer!

We are studying wind this week, and it comes at a very interesting time with Hurricane Sandy. I showed the children where the hurricane was today in relation to us and talked about if and what kind of weather we could see from the hurricane. We talked how we will probably feel a lot of wind and possibly rain from the storm. We decided that we needed to make a wind collage to be prepared for the windy day tomorrow. This week we will explore wind doing various activities including a balloon fly off, a car race, and an object tracks the speed of wind.

Today, we started using partner reading as an extension of our reader’s workshop time. This is an opportunity for students to read with peers who can challenge and support them during their reading growth. We created partner reading agreements last week, but hadn’t tried out the strategy until today. Students began by sitting back to back with their partner and reading independently. After this time was up, students were invited to sit elbow to elbow or knee to knee with their partner. Students take turns listening and reading to one another, asking questions and offering support when their friend needs it. They did a wonderful job reading to one another and were extremely supportive to their peer when they hit a trouble spot! I can’t wait to see how students grow and progress with their reading and with interacting with one another throughout the year. Here are a couple pictures from our experience today!