Water Cycle

Look right in front of you.  Do you see that?  Yes, right there all around you.  It's water vapor!  

Our water cycle board

1st graders have been hard at work learning about the water cycle.  We began by making our own water cycle board in our classroom. We made sure to label the important vocabulary: evaporation, precipitation, and condensation.  After we finished our introduction to the water cycle we transformed into scientists and began a water cycle experiment.  

 Students were paired up to construct their Mr. Potato head inspired water cup for our experiment.  Cups were filled with water and placed around the classroom.  Some experiment cups have nothing on top of them, other have napkins, tissue paper, duct tape and even plastic bags (some with holes).  We need lots of variables for a good scientific experiment.

Once experiment cups were filled with water, students worked as pairs to make a hypothesis about what they predict will happen to the water in their cup. 1st graders wrote their hypothesis in their water cycle journal.  

Now we wait and observe what happens...

100th Day...part 2

Welcome back to first grade after a hopefully nice relaxing vacation with your children.  I have heard many stories about your fun filled February vacations.  Here are a few more 100th day activities we completed, they were too cute not to share!

1st graders had so much fun dressed as 100 year old people that we took the opportunity to write about ourselves at 100 years old.  1st graders wrote about what they would do, wear and say.  We also used this activity to help practice our transition words (First, Then, Finally).  

Also on the 100th day, 1st graders used their imagination to turn the digits from 100 into a creative picture.  I love how different their pictures all came out.  Students made giraffes, smiles, flowers, scuba masks and even a deer hiding behind a bush.

100th Day

We finally celebrated the 100th day in 1st grade!  One day late but Valentine's Day was already jam packed with festive activities yesterday that we needed a whole day to really celebrate the 100th day.  1st graders are 100 days smarter and 100 days older...we sure did look a lot older today.

During math we headed over to the Fuller Meadow Senior Center for a few games of place value bingo.

I bet you didn't know your 100 year old Grandma knew how to skype.  Us old folks can definitely learn new things and today we skyped with a Kindergarten and 3rd class at Steward School in Topsfield.  Thanks Mrs. Klipfel for skyping with us.  We made sure our hearing aids were turned all the way up.

iPads are so easy to use that even when you're 100 years old you can still use them.  We met our 100 year old Kindergarten buddies in the amphitheater to explore the new apps on the iPads. 

Boy were we ready for the early bird special and a nice nap by the time our day was done (especially Granny Klipfel)! 

Valentine's Day

Roses are red, violets are blue.  Miss Klipfel's Class says, Happy Valentine's Day to you!  Enjoy our Valentine's Day poems by clicking the video below.  We hope your day is filled with chocolates, hearts and lots of love.  

XOXO Miss Klipfel's 1st Grade Class

Fancy Day

Fancy Friday which quickly turned into Fancy Tuesday due to our little snow day was one exquisite (that's a fancy word for great) day!  I was genuinely disappointed when we didn't have school last week and our Fancy Day was postponed.  We have all been very excited!  But no worries, it was well worth the wait today to see all the 1st graders dressed in their imaginative posh outfits!  Of course, I couldn't resist dressing in my most elegant clothes too.

Students were thrilled (that's even more excited then excited) to complete Fancy Nancy activities throughout the day.  1st graders read Fancy Nancy books, went on a fancy word hunt and used elegant vocabulary; looking exquisite while doing it all.  Some adorable darlings used fancy handwriting including hearts as periods.  Snack time was transformed (that's a fancy word for changed) into a Tea Party, using our imagination of course.  We also learned about Jane O'Connor and Robin Glasser the author and illustrator of the Fancy Nancy series.  They both gave us superb tips for writing and illustrating our pieces.

A large part of 1st graders Writer's Workshop from now until the end of the year will be using word choice in our writing.  Our Fancy Word Wall will help 1st grade writers' pieces sparkle and dazzle.  We have already added a huge amount of fancy words to our wall.  Keep your ears and eyes open for 1st graders using them while speaking and writing.

To end our fabulous Fancy Day we had a little soiree with Mrs. Higgins' class.  Our classes paired up to finish the day with some phenomenal reading.

1st graders (and their teacher) had a stupendous Fancy Day learning and working, with our pinkies up!

Knock Knock

Who's there? Justin.  Justin who?  Just-in time to be my Valentine!

If you don't know this already, I love cheesy jokes!  The cheesier the better.  Every morning in 1st grade we start our day with a joke so we always begin with a smile on our face.  We decided we would share our love of joke telling with our pen pals.

0 because they were all copycats!

This week, 1st graders have been making valentine's for their pen pals. Students looked up jokes in joke books (a great way to practice our reading) and picked the funniest one they could find. Some students came up with their own jokes and others picked one they remembered. 

After students found jokes, they wrote and illustrated them on their valentine hearts.  Their pictures were just as cute as the jokes! Students then wrote a little message to their pen pal on the other side.

Here are some jokes to put a smile on your face...

Groundhog Day

Happy Groundhog Day!  1st graders have been learning lots of fun facts about groundhogs.  Did you know groundhogs take a breath once every six minutes when they hibernate or that their teeth never stop growing? Or how about that they are the biggest member of the squirrel family?  We read non-fiction texts and used National Geographic for Kids to learn all about groundhogs.  Then 1st graders made predictions on whether Phil would or wouldn't see his shadow.

Looks like most of the class predicted correctly!

On Friday, we met up with our Kindergarten buddies in the amphitheater to do a little groundhog activity on the iPads.  As a group, we read Gretchen Groundhog, It's Your Day!  Then, 1st graders and their Kindergarten buddies worked together to illustrate the main idea from the story.

1st graders and their K buddy were able to choose which app they wanted to use.  Some used educreations, drawing box and others used drawing pad.  This gave their finished products some nice variety   Look at how adorable our groundhogs came out!