Holland and Germany

We finished the hard page in our math workbook and learned how to make a use a table. (Jane and Izzy)
We had to do our math work book page together! (Genesis)
There are only 9 more days until Christmas! (Daniel)

We finished our trip "around the world",

In Holland we learned:

about Poinsettias (Caroline)
They wear wooden shoes. (Anne)
Santa Claus is called Sinterklaas. (Paisley)
They don't believe in Santa Claus and some guy from Spain brings them presents. (Julia)
Their gifts are left in their shoes. (class)
We got candy canes in our shoes. (Jordan)


In Germany we learned:
the Christmas tree is called O'Tannenbaum (Paisley)
We learned the word for Christmas and it was Weihnacheten. (Anne)
The first country to put up a Christmas Tree. (Paisely)
We got to color a tree. (Kearia)
We got stamps for each country we visited. (Wodajo)
We got to put glitter on top of our trees. (Kearia)

Our special today was computer and we decorated a gingerbread house with colors. (Caroline)
My mom was the mystery guest this time and I'm so glad. (George)
We got our final compliment for the jar and decided we want a toy day on January 6th!(Caroline)
We worked in our W.W.W. books. (Jordan)
We learned that the word "would" is odd because the "l" is silent and "ou" does not say ow! (Anne and Jane)
We got a gift from our book buddies. (Jamey)
Would is spelled two different ways. (Daniel)
We got a compliment from each "country" we visited. (Zach)

Question for Parents:
Julia wants to know; If you could go anywhere in the world where would it be?

*giggle moment*

When we were learning about tables in math Xander thought we were talking about tables we eat on!

England, Sweden and Israel

Today was a special day because we "went around the world"! We imagined that we were on the polar express as we traveled from one first grade classroom to the next learning about different countries and their special winter celebrations.

The first country we went to was England and we learned the following things:

Santa Claus' real name is Father Christmas. (Murphy)
One of their traditions is to send Christmas cards to each other. (Caroline)
They decorate like we do with Christmas trees and ornaments. (Jane)
They wear masks for Christmas plays. (Xander)
They celebrate Christmas kind of like us. (Anne)
We went to Mrs. Boozer's class to learn about England. (Caroline)


When we traveled to Israel we learned about Hanukkah:

We played dreidel. (Daniel)
They had to worship all Gods. (Paisley)
When we played the game you had to spin the dreidel and if you got shin that meant to share. (Wodajo)
We played the game with real pennies and we got to keep a penny. (Adam and Genesis)
We learned what all the symbols meant when you spin the dreidel. (Anne)
Hey means half of the pot. (Zach)
Gimmel means you get the whole pot. (Jordan)
If you get nun that means you don't get any. (Paisley)

When we traveled to Sweden we learned:

The people who went to church had to hide in church because all the people who didn't go to church did not like them. (George)
The oldest girl in the family has to wear all white and a red sash. (Caroline and Adam)
The girl also had to wear a wreath on her head with seven candles. (Izzy)
The girl serves food to everyone in the house. (Zach)
The sweeden people did not like Christians. (David)
She had to wear candles so she could see where she was going at night when she was going to the tunnels. (Kearia)
We went to Mrs. Raye's room to learn about Sweden. (Anne)
They have a special celebration that many people in America celebrate. (Xander)
We made hats with seven candles. (Zach)

Other highlights from the day:
George gave Izzy two more quarters for her collection and now she only needs Nevada!
Today we had book buddies.
Our special today was library.
At library we watched a little movie about being honest.
For book buddies the entire class went to Mrs. Hester's room.
We reviewed how to write a friendly letter.
When we did our morning work we talked about "to", "two", and "too".

Question for parents:

Zach wants to know; If you had a million dollars how would you spend it?

Hanukkah and Fact Families

During Math we played around the world with addition facts and Mattie beat Zach. (Daniel)
Zach still won the game. (Zach)
Our special was art and we also got to have Spanish. (Caroline)
We had a two hour delay because it was so foggy outside and there was ice on the road. (Anne and Jordan)
For shared reading we "traveled" to Israel and watched a video clip to learn about Hanukkah. (Adam)
Mrs. Ziegler kept saying she can't believe there are only 11 more days until Christmas! (Jane)
Caroline got to share her tooth story this morning. (Caroline)
We did better at taking notes on the video than Mrs. Ziegler thought we would. (David)
We used subtraction and addition with numbers. (Genesis)
We worked on Fact Families again. (Anne)
Julia shared what she got from the tooth fairy this morning; she got a Christmas mouse. (Izzy)

Some of the things we learned about Hanukkah:
They play a game called Dreidel. (Izzy)
The Jewish people won the war! (Daniel)
They make cookies shaped like the star of David and the dreidel. (Paisley)
They have lots of food and eat it for eight days. (Caroline)
They open presents after dinner. (Jane)

Question for parents: (please respond with a comment)

Caroline wants you to guess what you think Julia's mouse is named...

Xander wants to know; what do you think are some of the foods eaten for Hanukkah?

Izzy wants to know; How much ground could a ground hog hog if a ground hog could hog ground?

Jane wants to know; How many candles are on the menorah? Eight or Nine?

*Giggle moment*

Zach kept saying the number twelve with a very southern accent!

It was very funny when Mattie beat Zach during around the world!

Pajama Day!

We thoroughly enjoyed our morning as we joined Mrs. Bryant's class for a viewing of the Polar Express. While enjoying the show the students were served hot chocolate, popcorn, donuts, and candy canes...yum, yum!

We went to Mrs. Bryant's class to watch the Polar Express and ate some snacks. (Paisley and Zach)

We got to wear our pajamas to school. (Anne)

We learned two Mexican songs in music like Felis Navidad. (Izzy and Daniel)

We sang the Whitaker song in music. (Genesis)

We learned more about pennies, nickels and quarters. (Wodajo)

We barely got our math checked before lunch. (Caroline)

We finished our "have to" work in guided reading. (Adam)

We had new learning stations. (Jordan)

Dr. Seats came into our room. (Jane)

Question for Parents:

Jane wants to know "Where do you think the Polar Express went?"

*Giggle Moment*

Funny moments in the Polar Express

Quarters and Wood Chucks

Mrs. Ziegler showed us the new books she got for the listening station. (Genesis)
Izzy shared her quarter collection with the class. (Paisley)
David got to share his tooth story. (Murphy)
Today at our morning meeting we talked about our schedule. (Zachary)
David finally brought the tooth journal back to school. (Caroline)
Izzy is missing Nevada, Oklahoma, and New Mexico in her quarter collection. (Adam)
Mrs. Ziegler found Alaska and West Virginia for Izzy's collection! (David)
We learned about fact families in math like 7,3, and 10. (Zach and Daniel)
We saw a play called The Legend of Polar Mountain. (Anne and Izzy)
The play changed our plans for P.E. (Caroline)
There was an abominable snowman and two little kids. (Jamey)
The abominable snowman was funny. (Jane)
Zach was in the newspaper for kids who have no food at the YWCA. (Daniel and Zach)
At phonics and word block Murphy said are instead of our. (Caroline)
I did not get to go to a learning station today because I had too much "have to" work. (Xander)

Question to Parents (please respond with a comment):

Xander wants to know; How do you like our blog?

Paisley wants to know; How much wood would a wood chuck chuck if a wood chuck could chuck wood?

GIGGLE MOMENT

Paisley's question!

Another busy day...

Caroline lost her tooth last night so she put her tooth sticker on our tooth chart. (Caroline)
We realized that got our 9th compliment on the 9th day of December! (Wodajo)
We learned how to use our tens frame with our morning work today. (Adam)
Mattie showed a picture of her elf named "elfis". (Anne)
We learned that on a calendar you can go up one space to find out what it was one week ago. (Jordan and Izzy)
We did not get to have our book buddies on Monday so we did it today. (Paisley)
Some of our book buddies were late. (Mattie)
In the computer lab we put a lot of toys and other stuff on a piece of paper like stamps and stickers and printed it out and got to draw it. (David)
We wrote about who we wish we could give something to for Christmas. (Jane)
We wrote down lots of teachers name and we got to choose which teacher we would write to. (Daniel)
Me and David made a plane and Santa's sleigh in the math station with our pattern blocks. (Rosalie and David)
We had new stations. (Caroline)
In Mrs. Ziegler's group we learned two new sounds. (Jamey)
We learned all the words we were stuck on. (Genesis)
Mrs. Ziegler wrote down the words we needed to practice. (Wodajo)
Mrs. Ziegler taught us the sounds that are made by /ck/, and "ke". (Jordan)
We did choral reading in our guided reading group. (Daniel)

We couldn't think of giggle moment today!:)

Vietnam

Just as we were about to work on our blog yesterday, Mrs. Ziegler got a call from Mr. Ziegler and had to run home quick enough to let him in the house since he had locked his keys inside. So, today we will try to update you on what has been happening in our classroom the past TWO days:

We learned about a country called Vietnam. (Anne)
We went to Mrs. Bryant's class to learn about the children of Vietnam. (Paisley)
I got to share my doll. (Rosalie)
Our special today was library and we had a substitute because Mrs. Wilcox was in a meeting. (Caroline)
Rosalie was wearing a dress because she was trying to dress up like a girl in Vietnam. (Wodajo and Murphy)
We had new stations during guided reading. (Daniel)
We got to see Rosalie's grandfather. (Jordan)
We learned that people in Vietnam speak another language. (Genesis)
The children were poor but they are happy. (Anne)
They don't have the same kind of money.(Julia)
We got to learn a new word in Vietnam and that is "sin-chow" and that mean "hello". (Paisley)
We learned that things were not as expensive in Vietnam. (Caroline)
If you flew to Vietnam it would take you 22 hours on a plane. (Jamey)
To ride a bike to school in Vietnam cost $70.00. (Xander)
We learned that three tigers have 12 legs. (Wodajo)
We used white boards to do mental math. (Mattie)
We learned that if it's on the first day of January and you go down one space it would be one week from that date. (Jane)

*Giggle Moment*

When we had to push our chairs to Mrs. Bryants Jordan sat down on his and Jamey tried to push him but had a really hard time.

When we were logging on for our blog today, George wanted to know if we were on Ebay.

Yesterday, we were talking about our needs and wants and Zachary raised his hand to say we need "elecation" (he meant to say education)!

Los Posadas and Gingerbread Men

Wow! What a busy day! While learning about Los Posadas this week we discovered that before each party the people of the neighborhood or family all get together and walk from house to house looking for shelter, they are denied at each house until they come to the last at which point they are invited in and the celebration begins. I wanted the students to experience what it would be like to live in Mexico and celebrate Los Posadas so we reenacted a procession of our own. The last door we knocked on was our own and after being invited in the students "celebrated" by drawing their own pinata, filling it with things of their choice and then writing and later sharing what their pinata was and what it was filled with. As a culmunation to our week of Gingerbread Men activities we decorated or own gingerbread men with a large assortment of candies. At the very end of the day we spent some time recognizing and counting coins. Below is what the students want to remember about the day:

We learned how to use a butter knife when decorating our gingerbread men. (Wodajo)
We learned a song about Hannukah in music. (Murphy)
We learned what it was like to be Mary and Joseph when we went on a procession looking for shelter. (Jane)
David lost his tooth in the middle of our morning meeting!(Paisley)
Mattie finally returned the tooth journal and shared her story about her lost tooth. (Caroline)
We brainstormed our spelling words for next week. (Adam)
We learned that if we put our gingerbread men in our bookbag it will break. (George)
We designed our own pinatas and wrote about them. (Xander)

*giggle moment*

Zach put so many red hot candies on his gingerbread man that the kids started calling him "Red Hot" man.

When David used his arm to wipe his mouth he accidently wiped out his tooth and found it resting on his arm.

Our Second Blog Together...

We finished our story about Christmas in Mexico. (Julia)
We wrote about our Gingerbread men. (Wodajo)
I got to use the computer to write my gingerbread man story. (George)
On the playground Jane got a cut on her hand. (Murphy)
We wrote about the interview we had with Mrs. Foster yesterday. (Paisley)
We finally got to go outside for recess. (Zach)
We learned about Nickels. (Izzy)
We had P.E. (Adam)
We had new learning station partners. (Mattie)
I finished all my work at the phonics station. (David)
I had to go to the office with Caroline to clean my hand because our room was locked. (Jane)
In speech we practiced "S" and "R". (Xander)
We played Uno in speech. (Jordan)
We had a new activity at the overhead station. (Rosalie)
In P.E. we got partners for stations. (Caroline)
We learned that if you wanted to know what the date would be one week from today all you have to do is move down one space on the calendar. (Paisley)
We got new colored pencils to help us check our work in the morning. (George)
We did not get to read a book when we met with Mrs. Ziegler for guided reading. (Anne)

*giggle moment*

When the class left for P.E. they took a right out of our classroom door but Jamey forgot where we were going and he took a left to go to the bathroom. (Jamey)

Our first blog together...

Today we named Thursday's table the "Pokemon" table. (Zach)
We had our third Mystery guest and it was Anne's mom. (Adam)
We explored a different world than last time and it was Mexico. (Wodajo)
We read the Gingerbread Girl.(Jordan)
We read Nine Days to Christmas, A story of Mexico. (Mattie)
We learned new words like Pinata, posadas, servant, tortillas, market, automobiles, village, and mass. (Paisley)
Today for lunch we donuts because it was Anne's birthday. (Genesis)
We studied pennies and learned that it says "one cent". (Rosalie)
We learned about the coins so that we would know them when we saw them on white paper. (Caroline)
Today our special was computer lab and we did math on the computers. (Murphy)
We chose our take-home readers. (Xander)
We interviewed Anne's mom. (Daniel)
We did not get to write about our gingerbread celebrities today. (David)
At recess I built a marble tower as big as me. (Jamey)
I figured out that Abraham Lincoln is facing to the right on a penny. (Jane)
We went on our blog today. (Julia)

*giggle moment*
In our story today the little girl got in the bathtub to act like a duck but it was too cold because her mother didn't lit a light. (Jane and Zachary)

When trying to figure out if a story was fiction or non-fiction Keaira said that she thought it was a "Yes Fiction!"

Welcome to Gingerbread Town!

We began the day by having our vision checked and then finally having a new "number of the day" for our math journals. Today's number was ten and each student had to represent the number ten in as many ways as they could think of such as ten tally marks, ten on a number line, ten pennies, 2 nickles, ten on a clock, etc. We were pleased with the number of representations we were able to come up with. We did leg crunches and bicep curls while chanting our two newest word wall words; then and or. We listened to the magical story of the Polar Express and then took our own imaginary trip to Gingerbread Town. While there, we were introduced to all the gingerbread celebrities that were created at home. Among those present were Hannah Montana, Indiana Jones, Abraham Lincoln, Santa Claus, Mickey Mouse, Batman, Jane Goodall, Michael Jackson, Dale Earnhart Jr., Taylor Swift, Queen Anne, Daphne from Scobby Doo, and Tony Romo! We began planning a story we will write tomorrow about each of our celebrities. After guided reading and learning stations Mrs. Ziegler introduced our new class blog to the students and we are all very anxious to become more involved!