Trees and Leaves

The Whales have had a great start to their tree and leaf unit. The weather has been perfect for putting our scientist hats on and checking out the trees on our beautiful school campus. On Tuesday the Whales answered the question “do trees get thinner?” We learned that every year a tree will grow a new ring which makes their trunk thicker. We practiced counting rings on wood cookies to determine how old they are. The oldest one we had was 17 years old! We also learned that scientists can look at the rings of these wood cookies and can determine the environment that that tree had in each year. They can see whether it was a healthy growing environment or if is was really cold and dry that year. After looking at wood cookies in the classroom we took a tree walk around campus to look at the trees standing tall and strong. We know just by looking at a tree we can’t determine exactly how old a tree is, but we can look at the trunk and see how thick it is. We compared the wood cookies from class to the trees outside. We determined that many of the trees on campus are older than the wood cookies we have in our classroom. We also talked about the two different groups of trees; deciduous and conifer. Deciduous trees have leaves that fall once a year and conifer trees have needles that stay on their trees. Ask your Whale what some of the other differences are between deciduous and conifer trees are. Take a tree walk in your neighborhood and have your Whale think about if they are seeing a deciduous or conifer. We got to end our exploration by collecting leaves and throwing them up. Look below for some fun photos of the Whales throwing their leaves.

This week we had Felicity the Penmanship Fairy visit. We didn’t see her but she dropped off a basket full of gifts and a card for our Whales. Each of the Whales got a Felicity Penmanship book, along with colorful pencils, and smiley erasers. Felicity also gave the Whales magic writing dust that helps them write their letters. The Whales have been doing a FANTASTIC job focusing on their penmanship and taking their time becoming amazing writers. We are so proud of them!

In numeracy this week the Whales have been playing Speedy Bugs Love to Race to 30. They have been working on counting little ones and turning them into great big ten sticks. They have been adding on and counting by tens! What an amazing thing to see these Whales grow their mathematician brains! In Literacy, the Whales have been practicing reading and writing sentences and using a finger space in between each word. Next week we will be starting reading groups. The Whales will be getting reading bags with books that will change weekly. The Whales are readers!