October Events

Wednesday, October 1
Nature Walk in County Farm Park

We will look for signs of Fall during an hour-long walk with Faye Stoner, a naturalist and good friend. There is no cost for this program. Closed-toed shoes and weather-appropriate attire are suggested.

Thursday, October 2
James Mark visits
Amelia's father is coming to tell us about his career

Thursday, October 9
Material Recovery Facility (MRF) for Recycling Field Trip

During the tour of the City of Ann Arbor’s Materials Recovery Facility (MRF) students will learn first-hand what happens to materials that are separated at home and school for recycling, composting and trash. Tours are partially outside and weather-appropriate attire is suggested. Closed-toed shoes are required to be worn.


Friday, October 10
School Closed for Staff Development

Wednesday, October 15
Leslie Science Center for all-school trip to explore the Black Pond

We will investigate the habitats of native plants and animals on a hike through the woods at the Leslie Science Center. While walking on the floating boardwalk, we will discover who is living in the pond with nets and containers. We may see many pond animals from salamanders to fairy shrimp, viewing the smallest on a video microscope. Activities may include identifying habitat components, simulating food chains, and playing an animal classification game. We will need parent volunteers to drive. Please let your child’s teacher know if you can drive several children (we will have room for 27 kids, so we need space for about 6 others).

Thursday, October 16 – Friday, October 17
Howell Nature Center
Over night Field Trip


Friday, October 31
Eco-Fair
In lieu of the typical Halloween celebration, we have an Eco-fair. Children (and staff) are asked to make a costume out of recycled materials. The costumes do not have to be elaborate or time consuming to make. The point is to have fun. In the next few weeks, look around your house and/or at places like the Scrap Box, in Ann Arbor, with your child to formulate and idea. Then enjoy designing and making a “recycled costume” to wear at the fair.

Thank you Marco

On our field trip to DTE, Marco Bruzzano, Nicholas's dad, showed us a very age-appropriate power point presentation about energy and energy companies. He gave us a brief explaination about how electricity works and talked about the wide variety of jobs people can have when they work for an energy company. In the discussion he included how DTE is working on alternative ways to make energy such as windmills and we saw the solor energy cell on the DTE building across the street from his office. He also talked about ways we can help use less electricity, for example turning off lights when we leave a room. Thank you to Marco and Felicia, Marco's co-worker, for taking time out of their day to give us a tour.

Mouse Maze

The children in Will's class designed mouse behavior experiments.  Each student formed a hypothesis and created an experimental 'chamber' to test their theory. On Friday,our class was invited to come and obsever the experiements in action.

KeeKee, a chimpanzee puppet, will visit your home soon. KeeKee is bringing with her a backpack with a journal in it. Please write in the journal about what KeeKee does during her stay. Then upon KeeKee’s return, your child will have an opportunity to share with the class the adventures they shared.
KeeKee's visit is just one way to help the children make a connection between school and home. During the year, there will be other activities to help reinforce a strong link between these worlds.

Yoga

Children rarely have problems gearing up or getting excited. Learning how to wind down and relax is often harder for them to accomplish. To help the children obtain some calming skills, we are doing yoga a few afternoons a week. The session begins with everyone sitting with legs crossed and hands on knees, with palms up. Then we take deep breaths, air in the nose and breath out the mouth. This is the first step to unwinding. Then we start with the yoga positions. While in each position we take cleansing breaths. As of today, we have learned 6 yoga positions. Tranquility slowly infuses (most of) the group. After yoga, the children listen to a chapter book. Then everyone is energized for the next afternoon activity.

The chaper book I am currently reading in class.

Umbrella Walks

I try to provide many and varied opportunities for the children to go on walks. Sometimes it is to get to a destination and other times it is merely to experience and observe the world. Since most transportation these days is done in cars, many children get few opportunities to experience walking in the elements. Therefore years ago, I started taking children on “umbrella walks”. Friday, after our field trip, we went on our first “umbrella walk” through the neighborhood.

Trader Joes Field trip

Thank you to Doug and Trader Joes for a great tour. It was interesting to learn about the “behind the scenes” life of a grocery store. Doug took us into the “employee only” section of the store. We saw that everyone who works in the store has a locker to keep their things, much like our cubbies at school. In the back of the store, we met people who keep track of all the food that gets put out for costumers to buy. There was a table with art supplies where the artists create the signs and trees for the store. In the back, there was also a huge freezer and refrigerator that we had the opportunity to walk into.

Like SK, Trader Joes recycles. They have a big machine that crushes the boxes before they go to the recycling station. The store also encourages customers to use reusable bags. They gave each child a Trader Joes bag for use when they shop. Most of the children agreed that “Miss Elaine” held the most desirable job at the store. She is the person who fixes sample for customers to try. She let us try apples, plums, and lemonade.

Field trip

Friday, September 12, we will be taking a field trip to Trader Joe’s. We will leave school around 9:15 and walk to the store. (If there is a thunder/lightening storm, we will take the bus).

This trip is part of our month theme to explore jobs/careers. A person at the store will take us on a tour of the stores and explain all the jobs people have to do to keep the store running.

During a school wide trip to County Farm Park, all the children at school had the opportunity to become better acquainted. Children from 4 years old to 11 years old worked cooperatively making a series of rivers and canals in the sand. The collaboration and negotiation that went on during the construction were phenomenal to watch.

Getting to know you

On the first day of school we made this circle together. Each child received an oddly shaped piece of paper to draw a picture on. Then we worked together to fit each piece into a circle. We discussed how we are each unique just like our pictures, but together we are now part of the circle, part of a new group. This is just one way of getting to know each other and start forming our classroom community.