Monroe County Downtown Recycling Center!

Celebrating Earth Week!

“The earth does not belong to us. We belong to the earth.” 

-Chief Seattle 

Planting Sunflower and Daisy Flowers!

Making Compost!

Using Recycling to make Tracks! 

Superheroes Saving the Earth!

All About Spiders!

Spiders crawling... EVERYWHERE!

Today we used our prior knowledge of  spiders and built upon that using books to complete the activity! To begin, we shared facts with each other. Then we pondered on some questions we had about spiders. After we made a list of questions, I grouped the children up in small groups and gave them books and a note card. We rotated the books around so each person had an opportunity to look at all books. They were expected to write down two facts on their note cards. 

Once the books were rotated completely around, we grouped back together and shared what we had learned. Each child shared- I strongly encourage participation! (Research has shown that the more a child participates, the more successful they are in school- academically and socially.) We then filled out our bubble map on the board. 

Afterwards, students were given a bubble map worksheet to complete. They had a choice to fill in the bubbles using what we wrote on the board, what they wrote on their note cards or choosing descriptive words from a pile. 

Our exit activity for this project was creating a spiders web. They had to glue on "silk" to make the web and use a stamp ink pad/finger to create the spider. The spider was expected to have eight legs and fangs- yikes!! ;)

Monroe County History Museum and Play-Doh Fun!

Oh Indiana! 

On Friday we visited the Monroe County History Center. I highly recommend checking it out if you haven't been- very neat!! To "kick" off our tour, we watched a short film of how men, women and children lived in Indiana during the late 1700's/early 1800's. Afterwards we discussed the film and passed around artifacts. Below you will find a rolling pin, butter churner, coffee grinder, yoke and books. The children had a blast playing with all the items! 

Later, we took a tour through the museum. They loved sitting in the old schoolroom and being in the cabin! We learned a ton of facts about Monroe County- did you know Monroe County used to have a circus?! There is a fish on top of our courthouse... but no one really knows why? We all had a fabulous time learning about the history, cultural and natural environment of our GREAT city. Such an authentic learning experience! :)

We love Play-Doh!

Stylish as always! ;)