We have a very enthusiastic bunch of writers in our class.  During Writers Workshop the last couple of weeks children have been working on making books with a beginning, middle and end.  We started with planners to help us map out our stories and then we have used these to create the pages of our books.  Many children are starting to write some if not all of their own words as well.  When the books are finished we have been putting laminated covers on them and children have been using permanent markers to write titles. (This step is very motivating as I have almost every color marker!)  We have a basket in our room that holds a growing collection of kid written stories.  After we have had a couple of weeks to enjoy them here they will be sent home to make room for the next batch!

In science we have been documenting the rapid transformation of our corn seeds.  Children have been making scientific drawings in their science notebooks showing the change that has been taking place over time.  We are working hard to show the different colors we see and to label our drawings.  As our discussion of living things has shifted to plants we have also been checking out the different kinds of trees that we have growing around the school and collecting leaves from these to make leaf books.  We were slowed down just a bit by the damp weather this week, but hopefully our books will be completed by the end of next week.

During ECO on Wednesday we did a scavenger hunt looking for colors of the rainbow outside.  We are now representing all of those colors in a class weaving.  We have a stick loom hanging on our wall and are slowly weaving in the different colors.  I have loads of yarn for this, but if anyone has brightly colored ribbon they would like to donate we would love to have it.  In preparation for our walk back from the Wu Forest during our next ECO session today we took advantage of the fantastic weather and walked down the sidewalk about halfway to Bridge Street.  We will try to take at least one more practice walk next week.

Enjoy the three day weekend!