Goal Setting, X Practise, and Humpty Dumpty

Reading and discussing a poem

We started the morning with the 2nd half of our Goodybe Winter, Hello Spring assignment. Yesterday students wrote and drew about something they are proud of accomplishing so far this school year. Today they wrote and drew about a goal for the last school term. Some students wrote about being more organized in the morning to get to school on time, while others wrote about learning their times tables or getting better at reading. Hello spring and new beginnings!
In Math, we marked yesterday's multiplication practise and reviewed 2 digit x 1 digit multiplication.
At 9:50 we had a planned fire drill and our class lined up and walked outside quietly and respectfully. Mrs. Dagg and Ms. Burley commented on the model behaviour our class showed. Very well done everyone!

After recess we started a poetry unit by having small groups rotate through stations, or literature circles, for 45 minutes where students read, analyzed, and discussed nursery rhymes. A few students laughed at the topic but everyone quickly became interested when they learned that nursery rhymes are short poems from hundreds of years ago that made fun of or commented on the Kings and Queens of England, and things that happened in England. Many of the poems are like a secret code that passed on information without the enemy or the Kings and Queens from knowing the true meaning of the poem. They are short and have rhythm so that they were easy to remember and tell to other people because at that time most common people could not read or write.

For example: Humpty Dumpty was the code name for a cannon used in war from 1642-1649. The cannon sat on a wall. The wall was destroyed by the enemy during war and the cannon fell. The horses and King's men (in the army) could not lift the cannon back onto the wall again and the rhyme we know was used to pass on this message.

Now the students were really interested :-)

These were the stations:

1- read traditional nursery rhymes, and match verses with their titles and a picture about the poem

2- guess the origin/meaning behind the nursery rhymes (matching/reading activity)

3- read poetry books (Shel Silverstein, Jack Prelutsky, etc) with a partner

4- group collaborates to write a 2 speaker poem

5- group reads The Book that Jack Wrote and they identify the nursery rhymes refered to in it - make a list

6- read poetry books with a partner (picture book format)

By the time we regathered, went over answers, and discussed what they'd learned, there was 20 min left before lunch to finish work, then read or draw.
We had a fun morning! Mr. Wilson taught the class this afternoon.

Mrs. Schneider