Last week in Science class, we churned butter. This integrated with a larger Social Studies unit based on Colonial life and Pioneers.

After writing all the materials and instructions for churning butter, along with predicting what would happen, how long it would take for their butter to churn and a few other things....

...students worked with a small group churning a small container of cream to turn it into butter. Students observed the results of their labor and tasted the buttermilk they helped create as well.
Everyone had fun churning the butter but I think everyone had MORE fun tasting the results of their hard work!

Crunch!

Yum!

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving! 

Noetic Math Champions!

National Champions! Both Earned a Perfect Score!

We have a class of outstanding math students this year! Grades 1, 2 and 3 in the self-contained program always compete in the bi-annual Noetic Math Contest. It's an advanced math competition, specifically designed for high achieving math students. The problems involve higher level thinking skills.

National Honor Roll Winners - Scored in the Top 10%

We did very well and had many students place in the top 10% of the country. In my class all of the students placed in the top 50%. Results can be viewed here.

Mrs. P's 'Be A Famous Writer' Contest

Nice Job! Three of The First Ten!
Earlier this year we discovered the website MrsP.com and during some of our dreaded "excessive heat days", we listened to Mrs. P read us a story from her magic library since we couldn't go outside to recess. We discovered she was hosting a writing contest and the students were eager to enter! The first ten students per age category to enter Mrs. P's 'Be-A-Famous-Writer' Contest won a prize! In our class we had four students that were within the first ten to enter nationally! They won an autographed book from Mrs. P! She also sent the rest of the class gold coins and bookmarks for their hard work. 

Our class was also the first to enter the contest as a whole class, so Mrs. P. sent us a big box of goodies including an autographed photo! Students wrote a short story as a class assignment as part of a writing unit and we entered them in the 'Be-A-Famous-Writer' Contest.

Thank you, Mrs. P! We had a great time writing the stories and the students are enjoying their awesome prizes!

Weekly Update - November 14

This week we will be wrapping up our Ramona Quimby Literature Study with a Beverly Cleary Webquest. 

In Math this week we will be using Khan Academy and also studying patterns. In Social Studies we will be learning about Colonial Times and tying into that, we will be churning butter in Science. 

Fresh & Easy Night

This Wednesday, Sonoran Sky will be at the Fresh & Easy store at Scottsdale and Shea between 4-8pm for a PTO fundraising event.

My class worked with Mrs. Baumkirchner's Kindergarten class to write some commercial scripts and create the videos. We really enjoyed being the older, wiser buddies in this project!

Speaking of the PTO, watch the video below to see just one of the many ways the PTO has supported the school.

Fun Is In Session!

Our Apple Store field trip was a huge success! Thanks so much to all the wonderful parent helpers who were part of this exciting experience. Students learned how to create a movie using iMovie '11.  At the end of the lesson the "genuises" helped each student burn his or her project(s) onto a DVD for them to keep.

Possibly the most exciting part of the trip was when we received lots of applause and loud cheering as we filed out of the store. (I don't think it because we were leaving.) 
Students kept mentioning their "standing ovation" for the rest of the day.

This is a compilation of most of the movies created during our field trip! Impressive work!

Click below to see some photos from this field trip: