Week of May 22-26

Our third graders explored self-image poetry this week. We started by analyzing George Ella Lyon's famous poem, "Where I'm From." Then, we brainstormed ideas about what makes us who we are. After this brainstorming session, we will write our own self-image poems, using the poetic techniques we have been learning about during this cycle.
Here is a poster showing some of the info we learned on our field trip to Ohmsett:

This week, the 4th graders took turns directing the first scene of "Macbeth." Watch how the decisions made by the directors affected how the scenes turned out!

In 5th grade, we began outlining the bodies of our TED Talks. I'm really excited about how they are taking shape! We are focusing on making sure to support our main points with research and that it all ties back to our thesis statements.

Week of May 15-19

This week, the 3rd graders went on an awesome field trip to Ohmsett, an oil spill response research and renewable energy test facility (http://ohmsett.com/). We got to see real oil spill equipment, like booms and skimmers, in action! We learned that people from all over the country come to Ohmsett to test their oil spill cleanup equipment and to be trained on how to respond to an oil spill.

In 4th grade, we shared the sonnets we worked on over the course of the week. You can see an example below. We also started to discuss the role of a director in plays and movies. The students will take turns directing their classmates in the first scene of Macbeth. It will be interesting to see how the same scene can turn out differently depending on decisions made by the director.

Sonnet by Angelina

The 5th graders delivered their intro to their TED Talks and received feeback from their classmates on how to make it the best it can be. Next, we are working on the body of our speech, using our research to teach our audience about our topics.

Week of May 1-5

This week, the 3rd grade poets continued to explore figurative language, and wrote poems using figurative language. I was thrilled with their willingness to try new things and their ability to create meaningful poems using figurative language!

In 4th grade, we learned about sonnets by looking at some Shakespearean sonnets and identifying attributes they all possessed (14 lines, iambic pentameter, specific rhyme scheme, etc.). Then we analyzed his famous Sonnet 18 and tried our hand at writing our own sonnets. I can't wait to see how they turn out!

Teach your parents what this sonnet means!

In 5th grade, we finalized our thesis statements and learned ways to open our talk to really hook our audience. Things like a jaw-dropping statistic, a personal anecdote, and audience engagement are all great ways to capture the listeners' attention right away!