Jammie Jam

On Friday we counted all the PJ's that vista 1st - 4th graders have donated throughout the month for the Jammie Jam. Our grand total was 51 cozy and comfy pairs of PJ's!! Mr. Terko spoke with all the children in the kiva and expressed how proud he was of their efforts not only with the Jammie Jam but the food donations for the Williston Food Shelf and the money for Pennies for Peace. Awesome work Vistonians!! The spirit of giving abounds in Vista!!

Creativity

Many hands make light work! We certainly were busy the day we created our new December calendar. The children learned the "trick" to creating fabulous paper snowflakes and within 15 minutes our room looked as if a storm had passed by. Many of the children continue to create these wonderful works of art every morning. The look on their faces as they open each snowflake to see the pattern they have made is priceless.
Our trip to the Flynn Theatre to see the Vermont Symphony Orchestra was a huge success. Many thanks to the parents who helped shepard the children from the bus to their seats in the 1st row of the balcony, yikes! Not quite sure which they enjoyed more, their seats or the show. Here are the pictures that Tammy Jadus shared.

Create a Country - part 2

Thank you to everyone for coming in and celebrating the work of our children. They were all so excited to share their completed maps. After the dust settled and we were sharing our thoughts about the open house many of the students commented that their favorite part was visiting the other classrooms and seeing their projects! Two months ago they were afraid to venture across the kiva into the "big kids" classrooms. Time to open up the doors and begin mixing and mingling a bit more. Hope the maps that went home via school bus made it in one piece.

Create a Country

I learned so many things today . . . how to successfully have 19 children mixing flour, salt, and water all at the same time and then use the mixture to have their 3-D thinking brought to life as well as how to enlist the help of 19 little people to clean up said mess! What a day. The children were incredibly cooperative and helped each other out happily and in ways that I wouldn't have thought possible. I was able to grab the Flip camera about 1/2 way through the morning and capture a few moments. Tomorrow we move on to part 2 of the project . . . paint! Wish us luck.

Evening Star Quilt Block Patterns

The children did an amazing job creating Evening Star Quilt Block patterns for our November calendar. After a lesson in rotating and flipping shapes they set out with squares, triangles, and very specific directions pertaining to color patterns. We were all amazed at how well everyone did and how fantastic our calendar looks as each day passes.

It's alive!!

We made our bread today for the annual ABS harvest celebration tomorrow. It was so much fun measuring ingredients and watching the bread machine mix them all together. At one point Isaac checked to see how everything was progressing and came back to exclaim that it looked like a brain! From that point on we called our bread "brain bread". We sure hope that more of our friends are back in school tomorrow to share our "brain bread" with us.

8 + 2 = 10 children in the class today!

We were happy to have Annabel and Maggie back in action today. After our Tuesday temperature, tally & time we created number sentences this morning for the number 8 using our odd and even pieces. We were quite surprised by all the various ways we could show 8. Here are some of our favorite number sentences:
5 + 3 = 8
4 + 4 = 8
8 + 0 = 8
3 + 2 + 3 = 8
2 + 2 + 2 + 2 = 8
3 + 2 + 1 + 1 + 1 = 8

Where is everyone?

Well we know where you are not . . . at school! We have a whopping 8 students in our classroom today. At first we were all very excited because everyone got on a computer without having to wait. But then we all sat down for morning meeting and what a tiny circle we had! We miss you all very much and look forward to your return to the classroom. Get better soon:)

Andy Newell visits ABS

Andy Newell, the top ranked U.S. Olympic Nordic skier came and spoke to the Allen Brook students on Monday afternoon in celebration of our P.E. departments year long study of the 2010 Olympics. He has been cross-country skiing since he was five years old, and went to the Winter Olympics four years ago in Italy. He is training to go the the next Olympics, which will be in Vancouver, British Columbia. Andy grew up in southern Vermont!

Here is a link to Andy's official website:

http://www.andrewnewell.com/

Mt. Philo

Possibly one of the best field trips that I have ever taken a class on in 20 years! Everyone pushed their limits in one way or another and we all had a fabulous time together. Many thanks to the parents who joined us and helped to make the day a memorable one for the entire house.

Kiva Share

Every Friday the entire Vista House meets in the Kiva to share completed work and sing a few songs. The children always enjoy this time together and find the nicest things to say to one another about the projects, stories, experiments, and art that are shared. The 1st graders are in awe of the older children's work and have bravely descended into the Kiva to share their own humble beginnings. I feel like a mother bird with fledglings!

Likes and Dislikes

We sure do live in a World of Difference. Friday we discovered that while some of us like snakes others dislike snakes. Here are some other things we discovered with this activity;
Aidan - I learned that it's okay to like things that other people don't like.
Alexander - Other people can like things you like and they can not like things that you like.
Sunthoshini - Some people like the same likes and some people like the same dislikes.

3 is the magic number!

Everything in first grade works better with a little magic thrown in! This week we have been learning about the 3 parts of a story (beginning, middle, and end) as well as the 3 parts of a sentence (capital letter, spaces between words, and end punctuation). When conferring in Writers Workshop the children are questioned as to whether or not they have all of these elements. During writers share the listeners can comment or question a piece of writing that has outstanding elements or perhaps has something missing. They are really beginning to listen to their own words as well as others with a critical ear.
Yesterday we managed to stay clean for our pictures as well as learned how best to wash our hands from a visit to Germ City.

Daily Jobs

Everyone loves to do the special jobs of the day, especially answering the telephone. Being the morning director has many responsibilities throughout the day: line leader, special helper, calendar, as well as running morning meeting and using the Smartboard to lead everyone in the morning message and daily question results.

Matthew - Sharpening pencils is fun.

Cole - I can't wait to be morning director again because you get to run the Smartboard and be line leader.

Charlotte - I like to be the telephone person because we didn't have that job last year.

Maggie - I like doing the pencils because we got to be in charge of where the pencils went.

Guntaas - I'm excited to answer the phone.

Cyrus - I would like to be the pencil person because you get to sharpen a lot of pencils and you can make them really sharp.

Sunthoshini - I can't wait to be the telephone person and I hope we get lots of calls.

Working Together

Our class is coming together quite nicely. The children have stopped asking when they are going to have "choice time" which I imagine was free play time in kindergarten. We have set up a behavior system that encourages good listening skills (I know many adults that could benefit from this), taking turns speaking, and following directions. Each time the class works together to achieve one of these skills a balloon is popped on a page on the Smartboard. Under each balloon is a letter which is part of a hidden message (their reward). When all the balloons are popped the surprise is revealed and we are able to celebrate. They also worked feverishly trying to decode the hidden message each time a clue was revealed and were quite successful. Last weeks hidden message was "video party" which turned out to be a youtube video of Really Rosie singing Chicken Soup With Rice (we've been singing the September song from the book by Maurice Sendak each morning) and lollipops for everyone! We'll have a new hidden message this week! I'm going to have to up the anti with a more difficult message.
The children also very much enjoy our weekly Kiva meetings with the other 3 classrooms in Vista. We have done a mixture of singing and sharing quality work. We are looking forward to sharing our own work next week.
I hope to see everyone this Thursday evening at our Vista Parent Information Night.

5th Day of School

Here we are on the 5th day of school and already we have many routines in place. Everyone is excited about their daily jobs and are waiting patiently for their turn to be in charge of the telephone! We are all enjoying exploring the math tools and are beginning to use them much more constructively. Without a doubt the favorite times during our day are the social events! Here is what several of the children had to say about today:
Charlotte - We went to the technology lab and we made our dots bigger.
Guntaas - I liked playing soccer outside for recess.
Jessica - I liked doing the monkey bars at recess.
Cole - I liked sitting with my friends at lunch.
Isaac - I liked lunch, it was very yummy.
Hailey - I am having a drawing contest with my friends.
Colby - I liked drawing with circles.
Michael - I like to color and make dots.
Matthew - I liked it when Pumsy came out with Ms. Sumner.
Sunthoshini - I like doing Writers Workshop because I like writing stories.
Maggie - I like writing during Writers Workshop.
Cyrus - I like to do Readers Workshop and I read Fly Guy, it was really funny.
Aidan - I like Writers Workshop because I wrote a story about my cats and I like them very much.

Our Smartboard is here . . . sort of!

I have spent the entire summer wondering about my new flock, gathering materials, and creating activities for us to do together. Finally meeting most of you today and feeling your creative spirits has made the wait all worth while. I have a really good feeling about this school year and all the possibilities that lie in store for us. The work crew showed up shortly after everyone left to install our new Smartboard. Within minutes our beautiful room was filled with large boxes, bubble wrap, wads of tape, power tools, hand tools, carts, ladders, screws, wires, and piles of dust. Not to mention furniture moved everywhere around the room. It looks like a very messy construction site and they won't be finished until tomorrow! As I always say, "Things get worse before they get better." Expect to see some changes when you arrive on the first day of school! Click HERE if you would like to see a demonstration of our new Smartboard.
Thanks again for coming in and sharing a story and snack with me. I can hardly wait for next Wednesday. Oh yeah, your dots look amazing on the computer.

Pets

Do you have pets at home? We have 3 cats who are more like family than they are pets. Our oldest cat is Eleanor Roosevelt. She loves to be with her people and is the "lap cat" of the bunch. Stella Luna is our mighty hunter who presents us with "gifts" almost every day; voles, moles, mice, rats, frogs, and snakes. Ginger Rogers was a rescued kitten who is afraid of her own shadow. She eats every meal as if it were going to be her last which is why she is as wide as she is long. They provide me with great stories which I then turn into books. Can you guess which cat is which?

Keepin' Cool

The summer heat is on and it sure feels good. That is if you can find a way to stay cool! Here's a Flip video movie of how we stay cool on a hot summer day. The Flip movie making software has a couple of "cool" effects. Enjoy :)

Happy Birthday

August 1st was my birthday and I had a fabulous day. The sun was shining bright all day long. I played with my new camera and learned a few tricks from my son who knows a lot about photography. My favorite picture is this one of me creating a heart out of light. I just love playing with technology and learning new things!!

Blueberries for Ms. Rogers

The sun was shining and Alita and I were craving blueberries. Only one place would satisfy our blueberry appetites . . . Owl's Head Blueberry Farm in Richmond. The bushes were loaded with gigantic blueberries just waiting for us to pick, and eat, them. Blueberry pancakes for breakfast tomorrow followed by blueberry muffins, baked blueberry sandwiches for lunch, and perhaps we'll end the day with blueberry tarts. Good thing I love blueberries!
Make sure to have someone read Blueberries For Sal to you. It's one of my personal favorites by Robert McCloskey. Click on the book for more on Robert McCloskey.

Summer Fun Ideas

Go to the public library.

Go to the beach.
Start a collection.
Take photographs.
Start a scrapbook.
Write a postcard to a friend.
Read!
Explore nature.
Make a comic book.
Play at a park.
Play a board game.
Make a board game.
Visit a science center.
Go camping.
Write me a letter!
Julie Rogers
2180 Main Road
Huntington, VT 05462

Welcome

Welcome everyone to the 1st year of our 1st and 2nd grade looping class. I am so excited to begin the new school year that I've already been collecting and gathering new books and internet tools as well as putting together loads of fun activities. We are very lucky this year to be receiving an interactive Smartboard in our classroom that is sure to enhance our learning. I am having a grand time learning about all the possible ways to incorporate this very cool tool into our day in every way possible.
For the remainder of the summer I will be updating this blog with tidbits about my summer. I have 2 teenage children named Sam and Alita who keep me on my toes. My husband Bill is at work most days so he misses out on a lot of our fun. Our 3 cats are always underfoot so you'll be hearing about them too!
Make sure to check out everything on the sidebar. I'll be adding to it and making changes as time goes by. Oh yeah, and remember to make sure and have someone read aloud to you everyday. It helps them relax and is the best way to prepare for 1st grade!

Here I am water skiing this summer on Woodbury Lake where we have a summer camp. I love to ski on water and snow!