Five for Friday! {March 27, 2015}

I'm happy to finally link up again with Doodle Bugs Teaching and Five for Friday! It has been a very busy week as we approach Spring Break, and we're all feeling the pressure to do as much as we can before the end of the year. Here is a peek at my week.

I really look forward to breakfasts like these overnight oats. They're such a treat in the morning! And the possibilities for flavors are practically endless... oats with fruit, brown sugar & cinnamon, coconut milk vs. regular milk, etc. What do you do for breakfast? Sometimes I feel like I'm the only person who HAS TO eat breakfast.

Since we're fully immersed in nonfiction reading and writing, I thought this great book of poetry would be a nice change of pace from the typical informational text. I absolutely love it. (And the kids love it too!) It has a winter theme, and although we haven't really experienced winter here in California this year, I thought my students could still get into the wintry mood with this book. It's a beautiful blend of science, vocabulary, and stunning illustrations.

 

Have you seen the Weird But True series from National Geographic Kids? These colorful books are packed with interesting tidbits that your students will be talking about for days. To be honest, I'm having a hard time maintaining our usual quiet reading time because all of the students want to read to friends and share EVERYthing they're learning. I admit, it's a good problem to have. :) The pic on the right is a selection of biographies that the school just ordered for us. There are some great ones about famous people (Gandhi, Noah Webster, Jacques Cousteau) in a very kid-friendly (and beautifully illustrated) format.

 

We've been spending a lot of time reading informational texts and discussing our thinking with partners. These pics show students looking for opinion words the author used. 

Our favorite part of the week was definitely the experiments. As part of our informational writing unit, we're learning how to write lab reports to demonstrate our thinking and learning through the scientific process. Our first few experiments have been related to force and motion, i.e., how different surfaces affect the speed of items rolling down ramps of varying heights and inclines. Every student was on task and recording their observations and results. It was amazing. 

Happy weekend!