Friday, May 30, 2008

This morning, performers from the Big Apple Circus came to our school. The performers were 8 and 16 year old brothers. Their parents were also circus performers. Their pet chihuahuas, Prince and Scooby, also performed with them. The older brother did tricks standing on his hands, which were on top of poles that were a few feet off of the ground. The younger brother juggled balls, bowling pins, and rings. The older boy did a trick where he was doing somersaults and Prince walked on his body. We thought it was neat how the dogs knew how to get in and out of their boxes. Joseph V. thought it was funny how the 16 year old had the dog on his feet in the air. Erin thought it was funny when the older brother told the dog to go in the box and the dog didn’t listen. We had a great time. Lots of us want to be circus performers, too!

During Reader’s Workshop we added another 2 minutes to our independent reading time. Now we’re up to 45 minutes!!!! In the beginning of the year, we started off with 10 minutes of reading time. Many children are reading more challenging “just right” books these days. The practice is paying off!

Today was our last time to practice Field Day races in P.E. Some people in our class got to explain the races to all of the children in Mrs. Yelin’s and our class. Coach Hudson said that if we dropped the Beanie Baby, we had to drop down and do 1 push up and say, “I love P.E.!” We did the Beanie Baby race two times. No one dropped it in either race!

This week we started reading The BFG, by Roald Dahl. BFG stands for Big Friendly Giant. Before we started reading, we tried to figure out what BFG stood for. No one guessed correctly. In the story, the BFG took a girl named Sophie from her bedroom to Giant Country. She was afraid he was going to eat her. Sophie lucked out because the BFG is the only giant who doesn’t eat “human beans” (he really means human beings). He taught her about Dream Country, the other giants, frobscottle, whizzpoppers, and snozzcumbers. Lily thinks the book is funny so far. Kelsey thinks it’s a really great book and would love to have it. Cassie has a copy of the book that she brought in from home. Nicole liked the chapter on frobscottle and whizzpoppers because it was really funny. Ms. Stern agrees!

Many people got the sentence correct during the spelling test today. Great job!

Today we found out about a trip that the first grade is taking on Monday. We are going to see the Hudson Vagabond Puppets perform Ferdinand the Bull. We need permission slips to be able to attend so we’re all going to make sure we bring it back on Monday morning!

Have a terrific weekend.