The Northeast Region

Did you know that there are 11 states that make up the Northeast Region?  We took a train tour to 9 different locations throughout this region and learned about why it is called the "Birthplace of America."  Each day we listened to our tour guide tell us about a certain location while we followed along in our books.  We then completed our scrapbook page and put a symbol on our map.  Do you like our conductor hats?

Check out the lighthouses we made!  Ms. Fallon helped us draw lighthouses because West Quoddy Head lighthouse was our first stop in northern Maine.  We learned that the coast of Maine was formed by the glaciers during the Ice Age and lighthouses help guide the ships.

In Hershey, PA we learned what it would be like to mass produce candy by wrapping jelly beans in tinfoil.  Each student had one job to do, whether it was Wrapper Cutter, Candy Placer, or Candy Wrapper.  It was a challenge to communicate with one another to try to wrap as many jellybeans as possible in 3 minutes.  Most of us agreed that this would not be the type of job that we would want for 40 hours a week and now understand why many factories use machines.   

Tremont, the bunny, refused to participate!

  Today we checked out how many floors of the Empire State Building that we could climb in 5 minutes by ascending and descending the Pine Glen stairs.  The students might be a bit tired tonight!

To add to the fun of this week, our chicks hatched!  We got to watch one of them hatch in the incubator last week and the kids named her Eggsie.  The rest will be named on Monday, but overall we are enjoying the addition of our 5 fluffy and feathered friends to our class, while learning about the life cycle of chickens.

Buddy Reading

Prior to vacation we spent some time with Ms. Parnell's Kindergarten class reading holiday or winter-themed stories.  It has been a wonderful experience for the students to act as role models and to share what great readers do by reading with expression and practicing their read aloud skills.  Today we visited Ms. Varrell's second grade class to do the same.  Check out the photos of our phenomenal readers!