JK has been very busy getting ready to celebrate Tu Bi’shevat on Monday! We talked about the importance of trees to people, animals, and the environment, and created some beautiful handprint tree art. We also started to germinate some beans and lentils, and learned about the life cycle of a seed: seed – sprout – root – plant. On Monday, we will join our grade 4 reading buddies and have a Tu Bi’shevat seder and a little surprise project!
Stay tuned!
This week in JK we finished our ‘animals in the winter’ unit. We learned about hibernation, migration, and adaptation. Please check your child’s backpack for artwork, a game, and a song! To wrap up our unit, we had Let’s Talk Science from Ottawa U visit us for a fun workshop where we compared how well fur, feathers, and fat kept our hands warm in the snow compared to an empty bag. JK decided that the best one to keep their hands warm was the fur (also because that’s the coziest!)
This morning we got to hatch a fossilized dinosaur egg. It was made out of baking soda, water, and food colouring. We helped the egg dissolve by pipettes and vinegar, and found a T-rex fossil inside! Then, we got to make our own dinosaur eggs and hatch them! We used our 5 senses to check out all of the ingredients – except taste because that would be yucky – and throughout the reaction.
(Listen with the sound on.)
We had so much fun! If you’d like to repeat the experience at home, here is the link to the experiment.
Comment below when you try it at home!
Today we listened to the story “Dinofours It’s Snowing!” by Steve Metzger. The dinofours are dinosaurs that are four years old, just like us! We were inspired by the footprints that they made in the freshly fallen snow in the story and we created our own dinosaur footprints using our classroom toys and some paint. Check out our awesome work!
If you’d like to listen to the story again at home, here it is! Enjoy!
Today I learned (TIL) about dinosaurs:
Netasaurus: Dinosaurs were HUGE!
Reuvisaurus: Kentrosauruses lived millions of years ago.
Joshuasaurus: I forget what the name is but I liked looking for dinosaur bones (paleontoligist).
Livasaurus: One of them (herbivore) cannot bite people because their teeth are not sharp they are flat.
Joeysaurus: Bones are the only part left of them. (Fossils)
Moishesaurus: Finding the bones was the best!
Ivrisaurus: You can’t touch them because they’re not alive anymore.
We had a visit from Isabelle and Ahmad from Ottawa U’s ‘Let’s Talk Science’ program. We talked about fossils and became paleontologists. Then we went hunting and found a dinosaur skeleton in our class. We collaborated to put it back together and named it “Rex”. We then made two dinosaur puppets (check your child’s backpack!): one herbivore and one carnivore, and we talked about the different shapes of their teeth. Then, we used toothpicks to dig fossils (chocolate chips) out of rocks (cookies). It was so much fun! We can’t wait for their next visit in the winter!
Shalom JK Families,
We are having a visit from Ottawa U’s ‘Let’s Talk Science’ program on Monday. Our scientific exploration will be about dinosaurs so I’ve given JK some homework for Monday morning: they need to bring in a dinosaur stuffy, figurine, or book. If you don’t have one at home, don’t worry, we have plenty in the class! There is no need to buy anything.
Thank you for your support!
Shabbat Shalom
Here is what we observed and what we now know about what happens to snow when we bring it indoors:
We are now headed out to repeat the experiment! Enjoy your day!
JK has been working hard on English letter recognition.
We have been learning a different way of singing the ABC’s.
Follow along with Morah Susan in the video below to practice at home!
Today we conducted the walking rainbow experiment. JK was so excited to watch the coloured water “walk” over the paper towel bridges and fill up the empty cups with new colours!
If you’d like to re-create it at home, here is the link. Comment below and send pics!
The beginning:
The middle:
The end:
JK has been busy learning about colours. We read “White Rabbit’s Color Book” by Alan Baker, and have become deeply interested in mixing colours to create new ones! We’ve so far tried watercolour paints, and have been using old markers dipped in water to see what colours are hidden inside the ink. We discovered that black markers can have some green pigment, and purple markers have some blue!
Stay tuned for our walking rainbow experiment…