Monthly Archives: September 2009

Dragons at Morning Meeting?

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A bearded dragon on our carpet!

A bearded dragon on our carpet!

Today’s morning message had a little riddle in it.  It said that we would be having three visitors to Morning Meeting, but only one of them was human!  The kids were a little puzzled at first.  After they realized that aliens were probably not going to be visiting us (that disappointed them terribly), they remembered that Brooke wanted to bring in her pets to our sharing time.  They knew that Brooke had bearded dragons, so they couldn’t wait for Morning Meeting to start!

The dragons did not disappoint!  Mrs. M, Brooke’s mom, was kind enough to bring in the dragons to share with the class.  Their names are Bob and Bernie.  She was very knowledgeable about how to care for the dragons, what they look like when they’re happy and mad, and what those little holes on the side of their face were for (those are their ears, by the way).  The kids had lots of questions! In case you were wondering, they do not breathe fire.

Most of the kids were not afraid of the dragons, and the ones who were a little creeped-out soon got comfortable with our new friends.  The dragons were not very active since it was rather chilly for them (it was a balmy 49 degrees Fahrenheit this morning!) but they were still amusing.  One of them seemed to nod his head to answer “yes” to one of Mrs. M’s questions!  A few brave souls got to pet the dragons.  Their teacher was not one of them.

We are considering the purchase of a class pet, and Mrs. M was very honest about how difficult it is to care for bearded dragons.  They need a terrarium that is three times the length of their bodies, a heat lamp that keeps a precise temperature, and they eat live food.  Even though the bearded dragons were quite awesome, we all agreed that they might not make a great class pet.

Oh well, at least we have this claim to fame: we were visited by real dragons at school!  Who else can say that? 🙂

Analyzing Peeler Staff

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stemleaf

Ages of Peeler Teachers and Staff

In math class, we are learning how to create and analyze stem-and-leaf plots.  Stem-and-leaf plots are just one way to organize data. 

We thought it would be fun to analyze the ages of the teachers and staff at our school.  We sent out a survey on a wiki asking for staff members to add their ages.  We had eighteen responses.  We made the stem-and-leaf plot that you see here.  The students found out the following fun facts:

  1. The median age of Peeler staff members is 43 years old.
  2. Most staff members are in their 50’s.
  3. There are 7 staff members under the age of 40, but 11 are 40 or above.
  4. The difference in ages between the youngest and oldest staff member is 35 years.  This number is called the range. 

We had a great time playing with these numbers!  Thanks to all who participated!

Silly animation might turn into a cool project…

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I, Mrs. Buckmaster, am very nerdy, even on the weekends!  But that usually works out great for the students since my nerdy-ness sometimes leads me to some pretty cool online stuff.  I found an online animation studio called Domo Animate and made this crazy creation:

DomoNation.com: Silly and creepy by mrs buckmaster

Like it? Create your own at DomoNation.com. It’s free and fun!

What do you think? I know my 20-second cartoon is a little cheezy, but this would be kinda cool to use for projects at school, don’t you think? It was so easy to make, and there are lots of different themes and characters you can choose from. What ideas do you have after watching it?

Breaking News!

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Sierra, our contest winner!

After school today, I got a message from a representative of the American Heart Association.  She was glad to tell us that our very own Sierra is one of the local winners of the Healthy Living Essay Contest!  Students from schools all over Greensboro were given the chance to enter!  I am so proud of Sierra; great work!

You can read Sierra’s blog, The BIG Voice of a Little Girl, here.  Hopefully she will post her winning essay on her blog sometime next week.

Congratulations!

Student Blogs

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Our student blogs are up!

I’m very excited about our student blogs this year. Last year, only a few students were given a blog, but this year everyone has their own webspace!

I see the blogs serving more than one function. For starters, it makes a great digital portfolio. Students and parents will be able to see how writing improves over time by reading through old posts. The blog is more convenient than having a portfolio on a disk because it can be accessed anywhere there is an internet connection…and you don’t have to keep up with a disk that can be easily lost or damaged. I also hope that the blogs will create a platform for discussion that reaches far beyond our classroom, school, or even our country. By inviting people from all over the world to read our blogs, we can gain new perspectives and make real global connections.

So if you have time, stop by and read some of the blogs of our fifth graders. They can be found on the right hand sidebar under “blogroll”. Comments are very much appreciated!

Game Review Activity

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Hey friends!

Since I’m at home sick today, I thought you might enjoy doing a little “research” for me! I have always been curious about Cool Math.com.  It claims to be a site that’s about math, but there are many games on it that have nothing to do with math at all!  I would like to use the site at school, but I think we need to make sure that there are some legitimate math games that reinforce skills.
Here’s where you come in!  Follow this link to the Cool Math games section. This is where they supposedly have all the games that have to do with math.  Please play one or more of these games and write a review of the game in the comment section below.  Here’s how I’d like your review to look (feel free to copy and paste this part and fill it in with your thoughts):

Name of game:
Math skill practiced:
Difficulty (1-easy/5-very hard):
Description on how to play:
Comments (what you thought of the game):
Math Rating (1-terrible math practice/5-excellent math practice):
Fun Rating (1-boring/5-super fun):

Everyone must post at least one review to receive credit for working today.  Please make sure you get your review written and posted.  If there is extra time, you may explore other games (and write other reviews too if you want!).
Happy Gaming!
Smiles,
Mrs. B 🙂