Local Landform Models

Now that I finally got my camera and laptop together in one place and WORKING I can finally post some of what we have worked on in the last week. First and foremost I want to post my newest student blogger, J.Z. She has been my biggest support of the classroom blog and I was excited she decided to write about the Local Landform homework I assigned. Students were to make a 3D model of any landform in Oregon or Washington State (since we live on the border). With the model students needed to write an index card with the name of the landform, where it was located, what type of landform, and two facts about it. When the landforms finally came in I was BLOWN away! It was my proud teacher moment of the year!!! Let's see what J.Z. has to say about the assignment:

We've been learning about forces of nature and our homework was to make a model of a landform. Our teacher had told us the legend of Crater lake and I really enjoyed this study!!! I love doing projects like this. I think it helps me understand more not by being told but actually making me write something to explain what I've learned.

J.Z.'s Crater Lake model

Multnomah Falls in Oregon

Mt. Hood

The Sea Lion Caves in Oregon

Mt. Hood

Columbia River Gorge

The Mima Mounds in Washington

Mt. St. Helens

Crater Lake

The Ape Caves in Washington

I so with I could include every students pictures. They were all so truly amazing and they put so much time and effort in to it! I hope the families had fun doing this activity together and learning about their local landforms!

Kid-Directed Art & Free Time

We had science homework due last week. I would love to say that all our kiddos complete and turn in their homework. Unfortunately, that is far from true. For daily work that is unfinished we keep our students in during recess to complete it. This is true for weekly homework too. However, for our monthly calender and monthly science/math project the students miss out on some wonderful free time. Our science experiment write-up last week fell into the free time category.

During free time students had the choice to make foam snowmen, draw winter scenes on black paper with chalk, or play board games. Some free times we allow students to play computer games, board games, or draw on whiteboards. We try to limit the choices just for crowd control.

Normally for art projects I try to control the outcome by doing a focus and art lesson. Allowing kid-directed art goes against my natural inclination and it is something I am working on (especially with little ones at home). When the host teacher wanted to hand out black paper and chalk I was a little nervous. How would it turn out? Would they just write messages or letters to their friends? Would they think it is boring? I felt beyond foolish when I saw the art work they produced. It is simply beautiful. It was a shame some friends had to miss out and write about science instead.