Ms. Hartshorn’s Classroom News
October 11, 2007
Dear Families,
This week has been full of new learning experiences that have given us reason to write, and write some more. We are learning about Report Writing and the parts of a report. Our Four Winds lesson a couple of weeks ago has given us practice writing a group report about insects. Our fabulous trip to the Shelburne Museum is giving us practice writing a partial report by writing a focus statement, and then drawing pictures or writing sentences about at least three details that support the focus. For example, a focus statement might be, "Long ago, people lives were very different." A supporting detail might be, "All of the cooking was done in a fireplace." Today we had members of the Moretown Fire Department visit our classroom for Fire Prevention and Safety Week. They shared many safety rules with us, explained a firefighter’s job and what they look like when fighting fire, and showed us many tools used in firefighting. Again, we were able to come up with focus statements, which we highlight with yellow crayon, and then provided supporting details using pictures and words. An example of this follows
There are many important fire safety rules. Children should never play with matches. If you have a fire or smoke in your house, get out right away. Call 911 if you need help in an emergency. Stop, drop and roll can safe your life. Firefighters might look scary in their uniforms, but they are there to help you. Make sure your family has a fire safety plan for exiting your house in case of an emergency. You should have a meeting place outside your house for your family to gather at if you have to leave your house during an emergency.
As you can see, we have built a paragraph with a focus statement or topic sentence, (which we also call the top bun of the "hamburger paragraph"), and several supporting details following. We’ll be working on finishing these paragraphs with comments or "bottom buns" of the paragraph. An example might be: "There are several things you can do in order to stay safe during a fire."
Our Class Insect Report
(The italics indicate the part of the report and the colors represent parts of a Painted Essay, which is a structure to help writers include all of the parts of a report or other expository writing piece).
Title Insects Can Protect Themselves
Hook-a startling fact (Red to get the reader’s attention)
There are more insects in the world than all other living creatures!
Background/Context (Red continued)
Insects have six legs and three body parts called a head, thorax, and abdomen. Some insects have wings. Some insects have wings, but lose them later when they don’t need them. Some insects don’t have wings at all.
Focus Statement (highlighted in Yellow)
Insects are unique creatures with amazing ways of protecting themselves from predators.
Details that Support the Focus (at least three)
Insects with wings are able to fly away quickly when a predator is chasing them. Some insects are able to blend in with their background, like matching the colors of a leaf to hide from predators. This is called camouflage. Insects have a hard shell on the outside of their bodies called an exoskeleton, which keeps other animals from hurting them.
Comment or Restate the Focus (Green)
There are many ways insects keep themselves safe from enemies.
We’re still looking for more apples to be donated to our class, so that we can make cider on Tuesday or Wednesday of next week. Please send any you may be able to donate tomorrow—Friday. THANKS!
Loree Silvis, a model teacher for mathematics, visited our classroom Wednesday morning. She did a lesson for first graders and a lesson for second graders. Loree focused on building a deep understanding of number. For example, the children made numbers different ways such as using their fingers, rekenreks, counting ropes and other math tools.
Loree Silvis with First Graders
Loree with Second Graders
Your children were fabulous investigators of the past at Shelburne Museum. Their questions were well-thought out, abundant, and demonstrated their curiosity about life long ago. The museum volunteers commented on how well behaved your children were, and even invited them back some time. I’m sure you heard all about the trip. Some of the comments I heard during lunch and on the way home were: Wow! They sure had to work hard just to eat dinner. They had to grow the food AND cook it! You could get anything you wanted at the General Store. Children didn’t have much time to play. And they didn’t have very many toys either. They didn’t have any t.v. or computers. The schoolhouse looked like fun. I want to be a blacksmith when I grow up. I didn’t know that the boys were the weavers. Who had to carry the water from the well? You mean the KIDS had to do it?
Photos of Shelburne Museum Trip
Moretown Fire Fighters and Us
DATES TO REMEMBER:
October 13th: Halloween Costume Swap, here at school, 8:00-11:00
October 18 & 19, School will be closed due to Teachers’ Convention
October 23rd: We will take our walking tour of Moretown Village. Ms. Hartshorn and I will point out where certain buildings used to be in town such as a blacksmith shop, doctor’s office, teahouse, hotel, and creamery. We’ll also tell them about the 1927 flood and show them the house where Mrs. Booth was rescued from the second floor. We plan to leave at 2:15. Please join us if you wish. If we don’t complete the tour on the 23rd, we’ll finish it on the 24th.
October 25th: Bus tour of old school house sites around Moretown. We will leave at 8:30 and return around 10:00.
October 26th Popcorn Sale 25 cents a bag at snack time
Wishing you a wonderful October weekend!
Brenda