Pleeaaasseeee!!!!!

We just finished working on opinion and persuasive writing. We learned that writers have an opening and closing sentence and give reasons to persuade someone to believe what they believe.

We started learning about persuasive writing by reading "I Wanna Iguana" by Karen Kaufman Orloff and illustrated by David Catrow.

Enjoy Karen Kaufman Orloff's website.

To practice our craft of writing, the children were asked to write their teachers a letter to persuade us   to get a class pet. As you can imagine, there was great sadness when they learned we weren't persuaded to get a class pet. To soften the blow, each child made and named their very own class pet.

Take a look at some of our writing and class pets.
          

Penguins

We learned lots about penguins this winter! To top off our learning we made penguins in an icy environment.
Besides reading, we learned a lot from Penguin videos.
Here are a few......Penguin Cam,  King Penguins,  Penguin Dance.

Mrs. Hoffman showing the penguin makers how to...

Take a look at a still shot of the Penguin Cam we checked out!
That's our Penguin Bulletin Board with writing and our icy penguin landscape!

Take a closer look at our list of penguin facts and reading area.
That is Jana and Taylor crafting their penguins.

More displayed penguin art and Mrs. Hoffman guiding the artists as they make the background,

A close up of Domenic and Mara painting while the others are listening to the directions.
You can also see one of our many penguin  reports!

Essential Question: What generalizations can be made about all penguins?

Going Places

Read Across America Day!

First thing in the morning we got online to  submit questions to the author and illustrator Peter H. Reynolds. At 1pm from Dedham, MA he read his newest book "Going Places".  From Dedham, we, and all of America got to listen to him tell us about himself, read Going Places, and answer questions. He didn't answer any of our questions but many children in our class asked the same ones we wanted answered. Ask your child what they remember about what he said.

"Make Your Mark"- Peter H. Reynolds website. Click here

Here we are watching and listening to the author!

We really enjoyed it! It was very exciting!

Common Core Standard: Comprehension and Collaboration
 Ask and answer questions about key details in a text read aloud or information presented orally or through other media.