Hot Topics in the Classroom - December

Interesting Investigations

A group of boys decided to chart the categories of numbers from millions to googles, and the number of zeros in each. (Last I checked, they had reached octillion which has twenty-seven zeros and had decided to take a break!) They recognized the similarity between the roots of the names of many of the categories and their work with geometric figures as well as their Italian language studies.

A number of children have been working on symbolizing the poem 'Twas the Night Before Christmas. To accomplish this task, they must be able to identify the parts of speech for the words in the poem. Younger children who want to tackle the same job usually start by hunting for articles and nouns, then moving on to verbs, while older students work word by word determining its use in the sentence. They are delighted when the entire poem is filled with colored symbols and often the poet's style of writing becomes obvious through the patterns that are formed with the symbols.

Some children have been testing their ability to read music by naming notes on a staff that are interspersed within short stories of famous composers (Bach, Handel, and Haydn). As they label the notes they decipher words in order to complete the sentences of the story. This has also prompted an interest in looking up full biographies of the composers and listening to excerpts of their music.

Our oldest students are beginning to correspond with eleven year old students in Italy. They have written introductory letters about themselves, describing what they look like and activities they enjoy. The letters will be mailed next week, and then they will anxiously await a response.

Daily Discoveries

• after talking about dodecahedrons a week or two ago, two children discovered that the ancient Chinese calendar wheel is in the shape of a dodecagon
• two other children discovered the method for converting mixed numerals to improper fractions and vice versa without using materials
• two children learned about the origin of the names the planets and their position as compared with the sun
• one boy discovered a link between Italian words and the Latin roots of English words, for ex.: Ital. cento/Lat. centum (hundred) as compared with Eng. century, cent
• two girls used the dictionary to identify synonyms and antonyms of long lists of words
• one of our youngest boys worked out the Roman Numerals 1 through twenty after revisiting the story of the ancient Romans who held up one finger to mean the number one -- indicated by a straight line on paper, five fingers to mean five -- folding down the middle three fingers to form a "V" for notation on paper, and two open hands for ten -- crossing the arms with open hands denotes an "X"
  

Words of the Week

gelatinous, mathematician, mesoamerica, dynasty, google

Exciting Events

Everyone enjoyed the Kennedy Center field trip. The consensus was that while they enjoyed the performance, they found the book to be far more riveting than the musical. We had full discussions about plot, setting, characterization, author's intent, and interpretation of the text when we returned to school that afternoon. Thank you to all of the volunteers who accompanied us. Having the opportunity to read two interesting novels this fall and see their stories performed on stage has been an invaluable experience for the children!

We will be drawing names for Secret Snowflakes Wednesday afternoon! New children will need help understanding how the process works and encouragement to keep their secret!

Home Happenings

Our class loves when it snows because we look forward to traditions of dressing in snow pants and frolicking in the white stuff! Please send snow pants or an extra change of clothes whenever snow is on the ground. The children in our class are permitted to bring sleds if the grass is covered completely. If they decide to bring a sled to school, they must be willing to share it with all classmates. We have also discussed that sometimes things break unexpectedly, so please keep this in mind when deciding whether to bring items from home to share.

Parent Particulars

Last week, two six year old boys in our class were fascinated with a golden bead lesson during which they were asked to lay out a quantity of beads ten times. We started with twelve times ten. They counted the unit beads one by one, exchanging them for ten bars as needed, and then counted the tens and exchanged for a one hundred square of beads. They arrived at the quantity one hundred twenty. When we wrote the problem down on paper, 12 x 10 = 120, we highlighted the zeros in red.

Next problem, 14 x 10 -- out came the beads on the work rug, and onward to the counting and exchanging process, and then, finally, writing the answer down with the zeros in red.

As they continued with problem after problem, excited to count and exchange the beads to find the answers, other children who were familiar with the lesson would pass by and smile, knowingly. Later, as the morning progressed, a couple of girls stopped along the way and whispered to me that they thought they knew the answer without counting the beads. Of course, I smiled and whispered back, "Let's try to keep that a secret!" The onlookers were bursting at the seams to relay that there is an easier way to multiply by ten than counting all of those beads. "Don't they know the secret?" they would ask. Eventually, they were sneaking off to check with older children in the class to confirm that their answers were correct.

For fear they might let the secret out, the girls decided to write down their predictions on a small piece of paper and tuck them into a pocket until the beads had been counted. After each problem, when the boys finished counting their beads and writing down their answers (25 x 10 = 250, 437 x 10 = 4,370, and so on), they would check with the girls who seemed to be able to predict the answers perfectly every time! Astonished at the correct answers coming out of one pocket and then another, the boys kept at it, even after lunch and recess, asking for more problems, counting and exchanging.

Finally, with only about ten minutes to spare until it would be time to go home, the boys ran over to me. "Look, Mrs. Hutchinson, we think we can do this without the beads!" They had just enough time to check their theory to see if they were right! Lo and behold, they had become members of the group who had discovered how to multiply by ten! (It just wouldn't have been as interesting if I had told them from the beginning that all they had to do was add a zero!)