All I Want for Christmas is My Two Front Teeth

I couldn't resist. It is so funny how many of our classmates are missing their two front teeth :)

Nikolaustag!

In our travels around the globe learning about different cultural traditions, we learned about the German tradition of Nikolaustag.  On December 6th, children put out their empty shoes to be filled with goodies by St. Nikolas. We thought we would give it a try since it was December 6th and were surprised and excited that St. Nikolas found us at WMAES!

 

 

 

 Here's our empty shoes waiting to be filled with goodies.

 We all wore one shoe during math as we waited to see if St. Nikolas would make the trip

to Grand Rapids to leave us a surprise!

 The magic of the season! What excited and happy faces!

Field Trip to Blandford

We had a great time expanding our knowledge of winter ecology at Blandford Nature Center. Thank you to our parent chaperones!

Hands-on Fun!

Friday was full of hands-on fun! All week we have been learning about "how-to" books.  We have talked about how to follow directions from books and also how to write a how-to piece to teach an audience. We followed the directions and planted bulbs to grow Paperwhites in our classroom. They are pretty little white flowers that bloom in the wintertime.  At the end of the day we opened up our craft book, mixed ingredients to make salt dough, and rolled out some salt dough tree ornaments. A little messy, but a lot of fun!

Family Night!

This year we welcomed the winter season with a fun-filled family night complete with games, a bonfire, hayrides, hot cocoa, and live reindeer. I was so happy that many of our classmates came out to enjoy this fun evening! Next family night is in February!

Gratitude Tree

Last month the students filled out special leaves to share what they were thankful for. It was a great lesson in gratitude. The kids didn't want to get rid of the tree after Thanksgiving and a couple of them had the idea to decorate it with snowflakes. After folding and cutting our own snowflakes, the kids wrote one of their favorite things. Each day, one student will share theirs and add it to our "Favorite Things Tree".

Service Learning Buddies

For the last few weeks we've been lucky enough to have three service learning students volunteer during our after school program to help out with reading. They teach the kids a lot and have become wonderful role models. Couldn't pass up the chance to take a picture of these two!

Morning journal entries are getting better and better! I love the innocence in this one- I'd vote for her any day!

Graphing with M&Ms

We had a lot of fun on Friday learning to sort, tally, and make bar graphs using M&Ms! Thanks to Mr. Algra and Ms. Paula for helping!

Character Ed/ Pumpkin Writing Assembly

What a great assembly to celebrate our wonderful kids! Today we awarded a student of the month, author of the month, and TWO of our classmates tied for FIRST place in the pumpkin writing contest. Way to go, first graders!

 Ms. Baxter and Mrs. Willinger getting the kids pumped up for the writing contest!

The adorable "trophies" awarded to the contest winners

WMAES Art Prize

Here we are putting all those cereal boxes to good use! The kids have been working hard on our WMAES Art Prize entry- a mosaic made from cut-up boxes. Our poster will be on display in the hallway next week. Check it out during conferences!

Hay Ride!

One of my favorite days at WMAES is always Hay Ride Day with Mr. Dunkerton. The kids had a great time. Thanks, Mr. D!

Learning About Maps

Today Miss Holly planned such a fun lesson to teach the kids to read maps. By following a map of our campus, we found all of the puzzle pieces that led us to a treasure at the chicken coop!

Field Trip to Robinette's

Thankfully the sun came out Thursday afternoon for our field trip to Robinette's. The first graders took a tractor ride through the orchard and had fun in the corn maze. We learned about the behaviors of honey bees and the cider-making process and then got to enjoy a cup of cider and a very tasty donut!

Creating Addition Artwork

What a smart group of kids. This week we worked on making addition sentences. After creating a design with different shapes, they added each type of shape to find how many total had been used in their designs.

Butterfly Release!

What an exciting morning! Our first butterfly emerged from her chrysalis. When we thought she was done drying her wings and getting them ready for flight, we took her out to the meadow. She stayed on a flower for a while and then flew off to join the other monarchs in their migration to Mexico! We are proud butterfly parents!

Any day now...

Here's a picture of some of the chrysalises. If you look closely you may be able to make out the pattern of the monarchs' wings inside.  We are anxiously awaiting their arrival!

Garden Salsa

This week we are learning about the plant life cycle. Miss Holly showed the kids how to make fresh, organic salsa using plants from our garden. We used almost all of the different plant parts: seeds (garlic and onions), leaves and stems (cilantro), and fruit (peppers and tomatoes). The kids gobbled it up- I even saw a few drinking it when they ran out of chips!

Our New Pets: Caterpillars!

Our little caterpillar friends are doing great thanks to their very caring first grade "parents". We have about 15 little guys that are growing bigger every day. A few have already attached themselves to the top of the cage with a "silk button"(ask your child what that is!). I think by Monday we will have at least one chrysalis if not more!

More Pattern Hunt Photos!

Here's some more photos from our pattern hunt. Didn't get a chance to upload them till today!

Pumpkin Patch!

Today we headed to our pumpkin patch to choose a very special pumpkin for our classroom. It was a big decision! After much thought and a mini "election" we ended up with a pretty nice one! We were also out and about with Ms. Holly and Mr. Shawn today making observations and learning about life cycles.