We finished off our 3 Little Pigs study today with a glyph about all the stories we read. Amazingly enough we got this completed in 45 minutes. Last time we did a glyph it took almost an hour and a half!!!! It wouldn't take us 45 minutes either if the class would listen half as much as they talk!

Each part of the pig tells information about the creator. Eyes, type of ears, colour of pig, each thing means something. Didn't they turn out cute? One of my favourite things about directed activities like glyphs is that each student hears the same instructions and, yet, each creation turns out to be as unique as their creator.

Last week we did a character analysis of the wolf. We wrote down all of the character traits we could think of to describe the wolf as he is in the stories we have read. Then I read The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs to them and we wrote down all of the characteristics that described the wolf now that we had heard his side of the story. I found this activity at TeachersPayTeachers. Haven't heard of it? Well, click that there link and head on over. You will be amazed!

We are done with the in depth book studies. We did Cinderella, Goldilocks and The Three Bears and The Three Little Pigs. With only 3 main stories, we managed to read over 20 versions!  I plan to read a few other fairy tales like The Emperor's New Clothes, Rapunzel and The Princess and the Pea. I am toying with the idea of having the students write their own fairy tales but am not sure yet. Not all of the students could do it independently and I have to think about how to support those students who won't be able to write it on their own.

 In Science these days we are working on plants. We have started a lap book on plants. It looks like this.

Isn't this one great? The student turned all the letters into little people holding gardening tools. So creative! Inside we are putting all of our work. Like this,

So far we have done the parts of a bean and a few pages in the Lima Bean book. Last Thursday, we put lima beans into makeshift greenhouses using plastic bags and wet paper towels.

Then we did a scientific observation. We will do these every couple of days. Today was day 5 and not much has happened yet. A couple of the kids have beans beginning to sprout but the rest are taking it very slowly. Hopefully, everyone will have at least one bean sprout.
On Friday we planted grass seeds. Eventually we will have some very hairy grassy friends! We will be measuring the grass as it grows and using a graph in our Plant Study lapbook to record the data. Nothing had started to grow today. Check out the little grass guy on the left below. He is wearing a jet pack! And, yes, they do all have jingle bell noses. I am determined to use up as much of my stuff as possible before the end of June so that I don't have to pack it when we move into our new school in the fall. The noses are a little silly but the kids liked them. Hopefully, we will see some hair growing soon!

 Today we started the life cycle of a plant booklet. Tomorrow we will be cutting out the pages, sequencing them and then adding the book to our lapbooks.

It is starting to feel like there is not enough time in the day to get everything done that still needs doing. Yikes! Only 5 weeks left of school. I am starting to think about report cards and class placement for next year. June is such a crazy, busy month and I just want to slow down and savour these last few weeks with my class in this classroom, in my Turtlepond. I will get a few weeks in the classroom in the Fall before we move into the new building but this is the last June I will have there. And, the last year for Turtlepond. I won't be working in my own classroom the same way next year and can't expect my colleagues to like having a gazillion turtles around all of the time. Plus, I am ready to move on. The turtles have been with me for over 10 years and I am ready for a fresh start.

It is crazy to think that by this time next year, the building will be gone and a parking lot and playground area will have taken its place. Change is inevitable and I am super excited about the new building but, must admit, I will miss the brick facade of our current building. It represents a bygone era. But I think it is important to remember... 

and our new school will reflect this. We will no longer have to try to make a space work for how we teach. Instead, the space will have been built with how we teach in mind and we can put our creativity and energy into the teaching and not into trying to force a space to work in ways it was never intened to work. And the building will be earthquake safe. It is a win-win as far as I am concerned!