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September Research Project

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PBL   (PROJECT BASED LEARNING) The old-school model of learning facts and reciting them out of context is no longer helpful to prepare the kiddos to survive in today's world. Solving highly complex problems requires that they have both fundamental skills (reading, writing, and math) and 21st century skills (teamwork, problem solving, research gathering, time management, information synthesizing, utilizing high tech tools).  With this combination of skills, our kiddos have become directors and managers of their learning process, guided and mentored by us ( teachers and parents). This month the kiddos used their PBL techniques to research and favorite sport or extra curricular activity . We love doing this research project at the start of the school year to better understand our kiddos interests outside of school. We could not of asked for better presentations. They were amazing!!! We had some google slides presentations, cartoon shows, posters, trifold poster boards, and so man...
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I P.I.C.K. System

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We still continue to excel in our Daily 5 morning routine. We added a few new books this week. One being from the Harry Potter series. We were happy to see many excited kiddos who wanted to get their hands on it , but it did make us pause and review the Daily 5 " I PICK" system.  A few weeks back we introduced I PICK and it seemed to help a huge majority switch out their books in their book baskets with books that were more readable .  I showed the kiddos 3 sizes of shoes. I would put one on ( too big)and run unsuccessfully around the class. Then I put on another shoe ( too small) and tried to run around the classroom , unsuccessfully .  Finally the     " just right" shoe was put on me and I could easily sprint around the class. This demonstration not only gave me a good workout but more importantly taught the kiddos that they needed to find their own " just right" books to be successful with reading. We talked about I-PICK as well as the "Five Finger...
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Super Sneaky Silent E

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For our phonics lesson about the silent e, we became   " ninjas". We loved doing this lesson because we not only got to sing a Teenage Mutan Ninja Turtle's song ( go ninja, go ninja, go) but we got to learn how powerful that silent E can be at the end of a word . To demonstrate this we became ninjas and placed an E at the end of several short vowel words.  After the whole class lesson, the students then took their masks and went through their daily 5 books from their book baskets. In their own leveled books they could search for words that had the Super Sneaky Silent E. In our opinion , any lesson with " costumes" is a fun and productive one!!!!!
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