A Letter to Night of the Twisters

Last month my reading group read the book Night of the Twisters by Ivy Ruckman. The genre is realistic fiction and tells the story of the actual night of June 3, 1980 in Grand Island, Nebraska when seven tornadoes touched down. The story which takes place over a 24 hour period has [...]

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LogoPaths

Our new math unit, “Size, Shape, and Symmetry,” has an interesting software program called “LogoPaths.”  In LogoPaths, the user controls a turtle character through complex mazes by typing in commands such as “FD 50” (forward 50 grid spaces) or “RT 90” (Turn right 90 degrees).  This is a great opportunity for students to learn their [...]

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Chinese Scrolls

Following Steven Ratiner’s wonderful Chinese painting and poetry lesson, the children worked to revise their poems to capture the images imagined in their paintings. During the past two weeks, we have written the poems in ink on the painting, signed them in red Chinese ink with a handmade chop, and mounted them on beautiful [...]

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Weatherbug Achieve

As part of our extensive weather unit, this week the students have been working on an interesting website: Weatherbug Achieve.  This is a subscription based site, but one you can access at home.   On this website, you can see live webcams from areas all over the United States and read about their weather conditions.  There [...]

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