May 23, 2014

Aloha families and friends!

This week we started learning about our seventh and final continent: Antarctica!

 No one lives in Antarctica due to the extremely cold weather, so we focused our learning on the few species of animals that live around the coast of this frozen continent. We began with the cute and lovable penguins. On Monday we started by writing down what we already know about penguins. Here is what some of the kids said:

On Tuesday our class got to see a dress rehearsal of the school play production of "The Wizard of Oz". It was a great show and we even got to see one of our classmates perform! Colten did an excellent job as Red Bee - one of the narrators for the show.

After we returned to class from the show we all got to write about our favorite character from "The Wizard of Oz". Many of the kids chose Glenda the Good Witch as their favorite character.

"My favorite character from The Wizard of Oz is the Good Witch. The Good Witch is my favorite because she is pretty."

"My favorite character from The Wizard of Oz is Good Witch. It is my favorite because she is my brother's best friend."

"My favorite character from The Wizard of Oz is Glenda. She is my favorite because she is good."

We also continued our study of penguins on Tuesday, which included learning the different body parts of a penguin.

On Wednesday we moved from penguins to orcas, more commonly known as killer whales. Orcas live in arctic waters like those in the South Pole. Each student colored an orca and created their own puzzles. We love puzzles, so it was a lot of fun!

On Thursday we were introduced to the art style made famous by Piet Mondrian. We looked at some of his artwork and noticed that they all had similarities. They consist of squares and rectangles and he painted using the primary colors: red, yellow, and blue. It seemed simple enough so we all gave it a try! Here are some samples from our class artists:

We also finished our study of the orcas on Thursday with a fun craft! Here is how it turned out:

Finally, on Friday we had our perfect attendance assembly. Congratulations to Colten, Janet, and Doris for getting perfect attendance for 4th quarter, Jennifer for getting perfect attendance for the whole 2nd semester, and a super duper congratulations to Mahealani for getting perfect attendance for the entire year! She never was tardy or missed a day of school!

As a reminder, if your child has not brought in a white t-shirt for Songfest, please have them do so by Tuesday. 

Have a great three day weekend and Happy Memorial Day! See you all Tuesday!