Animal Cells

After looking at parts of an animal cell, the students created the traditional jello cell and labeled the parts. I gave them materials and they were able to decide which material would be best to use for the cytoplasm, cell membrane, nucleus, and vacuoles. I think their favorite part of the project was eating it. Imagine that!

Meet Our New Pets

We finally received our tadpole and caterpillars so we can observe and discover their life cycles. The students have been so excited to watch the brine shrimp change and grow. They are eagerly awaiting the changes in the other two pets. The tadpole is beginning to show some of the legs and two of the caterpillars are getting into their "j". We will keep you informed of their progress.

Our Globes and Our Creatures

We are very busy in third grade. We have so many exciting things going on that we would love to share. We are working hard on our globes. The students have colored and labeled the continents and most of them have glued them on their world. They are looking more like Earth each day. Friday we hope to start putting the Equator, Prime Meridian and the North and South Pole in the correct locations.

Our brine shrimp have finally hatched. We have many tiny creatures in our habitat. The students have been making many observations about them. They are clear, white, tiny, move quickly, look like they have flippers, and like to eat algae. Tomorrow they will have another surprise... our tadpole has arrived.

Brine Shrimp Eggs (Sea Monkeys)

As part of our new science unit, living things, we have been doing Science Court. This computer program is a court case about characteristics of living things. The students are learning how to identify living things, dead things, and non-living things. Part of the court case is a test to see if eggs, specifically the brine shrimp, are alive, dead, or non-living. So we decided to check it out. We added the brine shrimp yesterday to our purified water. Now, we are making observations and inferences about our eggs. Most of the students voted that they have the potential for life. We will continue to observe and see if our inferences are correct.

We are also working hard on creating models of the Earth. We are using pumpkins as our beginning sphere. Today we made many observations about our pumpkins. We decided that the lines that run north and south on our pumpkins really do resemble lines of longitude. We began our project by painting our pumpkins blue. We will continue by coloring our continents and then marking our important lines and points next week. I will post pictures as we progress. We are very excited.

Nightly Reading

The students should be bringing home a book sack along with a reading log and several books of their choice. My expectation is that the children read each evening. I don't have a set time or even a particular book that they have to read but I want them to practice reading. We are working hard at choosing 'just right' books and also books from different genres. Please encourage your child to read each evening and record the books on their log. Reading takes you places.

First Day of School!

I am so excited that our first day went so well. I had to talk most of the morning about procedures, rules, and reminders. The class handled it well. We will review all of those things throughout the year.



I was able to share some information about me and I am anxious to learn more about my students. We started a class book today about their interests. I will post pictures as they finish.



We will be very busy learning and having fun this year. I hope you continue to visit our blog!

Last Day of School

I can't believe it's the last day of school. I have mixed emotions. I taught my last day as a fourth grade teacher- which was sad. After 10 years in the same room with fourth grade students, I'm bound to feel a bit sentimental. :)) However, I am excited to start the next part of my journey in a different classroom with different students and different curriculum. I didn't want to stray too far from my comfort zone so third grade seems like a natural change. I will try to post things during the summer, especially my trips and adventures so keep checking back. Thank you to all of my students and parents for making my year so enjoyable. I wish you the best!

It's a bird, it's a plane, it's Safe Suit man!

Kyle discovered a way to make all students safe in any type of situation. He invented the Safe Suit. His prototype was made of 50 pipe cleaners and 40 Styrofoam balls. It took him two hours to construct. He was inspired by the movie Iron Man. Kyle would love to be an inventor someday! I look forward to some great discoveries from him.

Fourth Grade Inventors

We have been busy with our inventions and also trying to learn about our state government. The end of the year is approaching and I am happy to see the progress the students have made. The government test will be on Wednesday so don't forget to review over the weekend.

The students did a tremendous job on the six-step process of design. They created some very creative inventions to solve a variety of problems. Emma Z. and Megan P. designed two inventions to help horses. Emma created rubber horseshoes to prevent ruts in the road. Megan decided to make a type of blanket to cool the horses down when it's warm. She used a science experiment and mixed baking powder, cream of tartar, and water to cause a chemical reaction. This made the temperature of the water drop and cooled the horses backs. Everyone did a great job!

Immigrant Projects and more

The students have finished and presented their immigrant projects. They did a nice job researching their topics and presenting their information.

We are working on famous Ohio inventors and creating inventions now. The students nominated one of five Ohio inventors for the Ohio Inventor Wall of Fame. I will post pictures of those after they present.

To go along with the inventor unit, we have learned a great deal about toys and their history. We learned about different Frisbee designs and tested some of those out. We looked at the history of jumping rope and watched a video of the King's Firecrackers in celebration. Today we tested several toys after reading Leo Cockroach, Toy Tester. The students graphed the results of a safety and fun rating after playing with the toys. We will now begin our own design process. The students will brainstorm several problems and try to develop solutions for these problems. We will become inventors!

Immigrant Projects

The students have been busy exploring specific immigrant groups that have settled in Ohio. We have researched why these groups left their homeland, why they came to Ohio, where they settled in Ohio, and the culture and customs they have contributed to our state. We are working in groups to create projects about these groups: Irish, Amish, Germans, Shakers, and African-Americans. The students have been working hard to create flip books, maps, posters, and plays about our diverse state. I will post pictures when we finish our projects and present them to the class.

Business Projects

The students have just completed an economics unit. We learned how businesses are created, how resources are used to create businesses, and how profits can be made. The students then created their own business plan and made advertisements for their business. It was a lot of fun and they proved to be quite creative.

In science, we just finished a unit on the changes that Earth's surface can undergo. We talked about slow changes and rapid changes. Of course, the students were very interested in the volcano, landslide, and earthquake information. We even watched a video clip of an actual landslide as it followed a young man down a street. Scary stuff!

The Battle of Fallen Timbers

Wow! It's been quite awhile since I've had the time to write. I have been very busy preparing for two major events coming up this month. The first is our District Family Science Day and the second is our Second Annual ACE Talent Show. I am very excited to be involved with both.

The fourth grade team has been busy preparing for the Ohio Achievement Assessments. Mr. Tausch came to speak with the students about putting forth their best effort on the assessments. He offered some very good incentives for next week. Hopefully I will be able to 'bust a move' with all of the fourth graders next Friday. Mrs. Troyer, our guidance counselor, has also been joining us on Thursdays to offer testing tips and strategies. The students have really enjoyed her skits and advice.

The last project the students completed was a sequencing activity to review the Battle of Fallen Timbers. The classes worked so hard to illustrate the causes and effects of the war. The were able to choose to make a book or a roll movie to show off their talent. The had to match the summary with each picture and then put the events in order. We are now working on productive resources and economics in social studies.

In science, we are working on the forces that change the landforms of the Earth. The students conducted a wind and water lab last week. Our focus was on erosion and weathering. The students also learned about deposition and the landforms created by that process. Some of the examples of those landforms are dunes, deltas, and moraines. They will have a quiz tomorrow.

Character Counts!

Wednesday was the last class in our Character Counts program. We were sad to see Mrs. Wiggam leave after our lesson. The students loved having her visit each month. She always motivates the students to do great things! She is an excellent teacher. We appreciate all of the volunteers and their commitment to the program. Our last pillars of character were caring and citizenship. We had a visit from Queen Alia. She was thrilled by the 'Haley' welcome we gave her. She was able to meet all of our caring citizens and was pleased by their behavior. We finished the surfer themed character books and Mrs. Wiggam presented each student with a certificate. Thank you, Mrs. Wiggam!

The science test over weather will be next Friday, March 26. The test will be multiple choice and will feature some review of past quizzes as well as analyzing and predicting weather maps. The students read all about weather systems today. The packet they received contains information we will use for the next week. The students will have to apply their weather skills for the assessment.

Famous Ohioans

We had the Ohio Wax Museum today and the students did an excellent job. I was so proud of them for their hard work. We positioned ourselves in the library and welcomed the second, third, and fifth graders, as well as our fourth grade parents, to learn about the famous people that hailed from the 'Buckeye State'. It was a great morning for all of us. We celebrated the accomplishments of the students with an easy afternoon. We started to create posters about ourselves and I learned a lot about the students including: favorite books, songs, and movies. They wrote about special events in their lives, their heroes, and designed cartoons about themselves. Maybe someday Mrs. Miglich will have her future students writing famous Ohioan reports about these students. I am going to try to post a slide show with pictures from today. Enjoy!

Quilts and the Water Cycle

Today we had a demonstration of the water cycle. Mrs. Shultzman used a model to show the students how the water cycle works. We got to see the whole cycle by the end of the day. Our concentration was on learning the three important processes of the cycle: evaporation, condensation, and precipitation. We reviewed how important the sun is to our weather. It provides the energy for the water cycle. We used a lamp to show how the sun heats up water and then condenses to make clouds. Eventually the clouds get so full of water they explode producing precipitation. The students were able to relate the water cycle to many real life examples including our own dew point experiment. We also read about the water cycle and reviewed the steps with a diagram.

We continued to work on our mini-quilts in social studies. Many students were able to complete the project and I got to display some of them. They have done a really nice job. I noticed it was very difficult for some students to put their ideas together to form a paragraph connecting the vocabulary words. We did a lot of brainstorming and sequencing to help organize the paragraphs. The students have worked very hard. I was able to really see how much they learned in this unit.

Clouds

Today we read, It Looked Like Spilt Milk as an introduction to our cloud study. We learned that people have been using clouds to make weather predictions for many years. The students focused on these four types of clouds: cumulus, stratus, cirrus, and cumulonimbus. They created collages based on the shape, location, and names of these clouds. They are displayed in the hall for the students to see. We also completed a study guide with the cloud and the weather it brings. This should be in the students' science binder.

In social studies we are working on a quilt project. The students are working in groups to make a mini-quilt with four key vocabulary words from Chapter 4. They are to create a quilt square for each term and then write a paragraph about how all of the terms are connected. They will share their projects with the class. We will post pictures of the finished quilts later.

What is the Dew Point?

Today the students became meteorologists. They created a class barometer to measure air pressure and reviewed the type of weather that is associated with high pressure and low pressure.

We also discovered the dew point for today by adding ice to water in a soup can. We recorded the temperature of the water before we added the ice. We added the ice and stirred the water until condensation formed on the outside of the can. We recorded the temperature when the drops formed and found out the dew point. We discovered that our temperature was very close to the dew point on the weather channel website.

We heard the story of Gnadenhutten and how the American Revolution affected the Christian Delaware Indians. It was a very sad story and one that we will remember for a long time.
We reviewed fact and opinion and completed a worksheet about facts and opinions from our Revolution reading. The students really remembered this skill and were very confident in their abilities.

Weather you like it or not!

Yes, weather is everywhere and the students are learning how meteorologists use weather instruments to make predictions. We have a weather center set up in our classroom and the students have been busy reading books about weather, testing weather instruments, investigating tornadoes and learning about weather safety. The students will be tested over weather instruments next Thursday, March 4.

In social studies, we have been learning about the French and Indian War. The students enjoyed Mrs. Haley, the storyteller, as our guest this week. We have expressed our concern about the treatment of the American Indians and how the Ohio Territory is divided. We will move into the American Revolution next week. Today we took all the dates and events of the past lesson and made a timeline.

Welcome back!! It's been a nice break but we are ready to get back into the swing of things. The students seemed eager to start working today. We finally got to go over the science and social studies tests. We took a pretest today to introduce the students to some of the concepts of weather and used the Smart Board to go over some questions. We went over the Can you? statements for our Weather Unit. The students were to clean out their binders. At this time, there should be two papers for science and two papers for social studies. Tomorrow we will go over the Can you? statements for the next social studies unit and discuss European Explorers. The students will also have the Valentine's party and I'm sure they will have a great time. I will have to post pictures. Enjoy your evening.

Science Test

Today was another testing day. The science test over Matter is complete and I will grade them this weekend. I graded the social studies tests and they will be posted on progress book later. We will start new units in both subjects on Monday. We will be talking about the Europeans and Indians conflicts and wars in social studies and we will explore weather in science. Speaking of weather, have a happy, snowy, safe weekend!

Social Studies Test

Today was testing day in social studies so there isn't much to report. I have started grading some of the tests and I hope that the students continue to do well. Tests always give me a good idea about many aspects of the class. I get to see how much the students have learned, how I did at presenting the material, and occasionally I realize some students may not have prepared as well as they should have. The conversations I have with the students when questions are asked is always valuable too. I enjoy hearing their thought processes and reasoning behind answers. It makes me feel proud when I discover how much they have learned. It's a good reflection piece for us all.

Classifying and Sorting

Today we focused on science skills. We reviewed sorting and classifying items using properties of matter. We sorted shapes, science supplies, and finally candy. The students enjoyed using a variety of characteristics to classify my Fourth of July parade candy. We learned that properties of matter can be a useful way to sort many objects. Our real life sorting objective was to pick materials that we could use to build a house. We discovered that properties do make a difference when it comes to certain jobs.

Archaeology

Today we become archaeologists in Mrs. Haley's class. We used many resources to learn the job of an archaeologist including some websites that simulated a missions dig. We watched a Bill Nye video and read about the process of studying artifacts in our social studies book. After all of the great detective work and discussions, we received a letter from the Archaeologist Association of America. They needed our help to find out information about some ancient artifacts. The students worked hard to piece together the artifact, collect data about its characteristics, and finally make an inference about its origin.