Guess what I use as a bean bag chair? A raisin.

I have been adding books to my amazon wish list left and right these days.  (Anyone need a Christmas gift idea?)  Through all of the blogs and browsing, I have found a ton of books that I NEED to own.  (Yes mom, NEED). As a celebratory reward for finishing grades today, I let myself parooze at B&N.  Not only did I get my hands on some of the books I had been reading about, but also stumbled upon this gem:

Yes, a picture book about one of my favorite YouTube superstars: Marcel the Shell with Shoes on.  Please if you have not seen this, take the next three minutes of your life to do so:

 

Hilarious!  And of course, I had to purchase it.  This is just one of those books that makes me happy!  :) 

Happy Day!

Last week, I got wonderful news that I had recieved a grant I had written for books in the classroom.  Of course it was a big production with a lady coming in with a balloon and me turning bright red.  I think the ten year olds dreams were squashed when they realized the money was actually not going to be put towards a pizza party, but I think they will be excited with some of the books our classroom will be recieving in the upcoming weeks. 

Here are a few books that will be gracing the shelves soon:

Heart and Soul: The Story of America and African Americans

Christmas is coming early to Room 209!! 

Fatty!

So this week, we wrapped up our unit on nutrition!  As a way to wrap up/jet on to measurement... I decided to try the fat test with my kids.  This is a lesson I found somewhere out in blogland.  (If someone could tell me where that would be great!) 

Each child brings in a small sample of any kind of snack they want.  Which is basically like the best thing in the world for a ten year old.  And, to make that better, they had to bring it November 1st... the day after Halloween.  So you can imagine the kind of food that rolled in.  I asked the kids what would happen when we put the food on the bags and left it for 24 hours, and heard all sorts of responses:

"It will mold!"

"There will be cockroaches!"

"It will turn brown!"

"Ewwwwwwww"

"but... can we still eat it?!"

We also ranked the foods, whether they were healthy choices or not.  We set out all of our bags, and let the magic happen:

The next day, there was A LOT to look at! 

Yuck!  From here, we had to calculate the amount of grease that was left on the bag.  We had all sorts of measurements going.  Some were using transparencies to outline the stain and calculate the area, others were using a string to measure the perimeter of the stain... which led to great conversation about fat AND measurment.  Viola!

And I don't think I can ever eat a cheese puff again.  WOOF!



I’M THE SQUEAK UPON THE STAIR...

by

Greg Pincus

I’m the squeak upon the stair...
Yet when you look, there’s no one there.

I’m howling winds, groaning floors,

Extinguished lights, slamming doors.

I’m flitting shadows, darkening skies,

Piercing screams, distant cries.

I’m all your fears – heard, felt, or seen.

I’m in your head. I’m Halloween.

I love Halloween!  Now... on to the next holiday:

Totally making one of these bad boys.

The more you eat...

*Studying Nutrition*

Student:  "Miss K, I have a question."

Me:  "Yes, ma'am?"

Student:  "Well... I've been wondering..."

Long Pause

Student:  "What exactly is in beans that makes you fart?"  

Boo-humbug!

So I went to the store after a very busy day, to buy all the supplies needed to make these: 

All you need is chocolate, nutter butters and mini chocolate chips.  Melt the chocolate, dip the NB, add the chips and BAM, ghosts.  Seems easy enough huh?  Well, I just burned the chocolate (in the microwave) and now everything is ruined.  Whoops. 




....Maybe I'll shop for books instead. 

BUT WAIT!

We have been studying simple machines in science and how those machines make our lives and the work we do easier.  We have discovered simple and compound machines all around us and have done experiments that investigate the six simple machines.  As a wrap up to the unit, the fifth graders are creating their own infomercial posters that advertise a product that uses a simple machine to make the work we do easier.   Here is our inspiration:

The EZ cracker.  The lever that puts cracking an egg by slamming a fork into it in the past. A genius idea really.. who wants egg shells in their muffins anyways? 

We have all sorts of ideas flying around Room 210, such as: 

The catapult that launches you into a remote island for vacation

An automatic snow shovel for the winter

An escalator for your house (call now and get two for the price of one)

So, watch out world... these kids are planning to make your life even more easy!  Now, who wants to actually buy me the EZ cracker??