We had such a full and exciting week! In our writer's workshop and as a part of our IB storytelling unit we had the chance to skype with Dr. Paul Pottinger who has climbed Mt. Everest and survived the earthquake there last year! As you can imagine, he had many stories to share and keeps his own blog to document his journeys as he climbs. It was very exciting to meet him!
In reader's workshop this week we continued reading folk tales, fairy tales and tall tales by choosing books that were just right for us. Students have been noticing similarities and differences between their own book choices and other similar stories they have heard or read in the past. We are so excited to see that kind of critical thinking going on in the classroom and have heard the students discussing story elements with classmates. This week we also had a very, very special guest come to school for a class read aloud! We really enjoyed listening to the founder of our school read us "Witches" by Roald Dahl.
In math workshop this week we explored the ideas behind multiplication and looked at those concepts from many angles. Students had the chance to interactively work with numbers to see how multiplication is simply repeated addition. The class worked and asked questions and showed each other the problems they had figured out. It was a great week in math workshop!
During our inquiry time this week we listened to an oral story that related back to the ideas of man's earliest forms of communication through cave paintings. Students were encouraged to think of their own stories where animal's interactions with humans may have been a theme. Those stories are being developed and will be moving forward into installations in the next week!