Still playing with the camera...so now, GUESS WHO these smiles belong to?

Mrs. J had fun playing with her camera today!

I've only had my camera for nearly 2 years. I have taken photos in sepia and black/white before, but had forgotten how to set the camera for this. As you can tell, I just figured it out last night...thus many sepia toned pictures.

A de Colores practice session

As part of our unit on California missions, each group learns the song 'de Colores' and sings it for the class. Today, two groups performed...here's part of a practice session.

Visiting a Yurok Village

Our field trip to the Yurok Village was awesome. We were divided into 3 groups - basically the 3 classes - and each group did 3 activities: touring the village, hiking in the forest, and making necklaces.

On the tour of the village, we also saw one of their canoes. They're made out of a HUGE redwood log. You can see how long they are...and ONE person can easily steer! The canoe has a heart, lungs, nose, and kidneys.

Touring the village, we went into a traditional home. These are not like the homes we are use to. The door is round - do you remember why? Inside, there is a pit - type area, with a narrow ledge around the pit that is at the level with the door. Do you remember what the ledge area is used for? What about the pit?

In keeping with tradition, the women enter feet first and the men enter head first. We certainly wanted to keep with their customs.


After visiting a typical home, we went to the sweatlodge. Traditionally, this was only used by the men. Since this is for education, women can tour.


One of the activites was making necklaces. We used beads, dentilium shells and abolone. These always turn out beautiful!






















Once they were made, we loved wearing them and showing them to the camera!

A very unique mission...an edible one!

If you look at the campanario, you can see that this is Mission San Diego de Alcala. What you may not realize, is it is EDIBLE! Yep, we ate it all.

This piece of art was done by our very own Ashley L. and her mom. It was a cake and ice cream cake. Ashley said they baked the cake, cut the design, scooped out a lot of the middle, filled it with ice cream, replaced the cut-away cake, then frosted the whole thing. Wow!

Room 8 enjoyed our visit to Mission San Diego!

We've also had 5 other missions come in. I will be taking photos of them and posting them on here for all to enjoy.

For parents...building a mission is OPTIONAL....so don't worry if your Room 8'er hasn't built one. They don't have to.

Skippy John Jones, one of our 3rd grade teachers favorite books

One of my buddies who teaches 3rd grade decided she wanted to read the book, Skippy John Jones, to my 4th graders. It's a cute book...she reads it with a MOUNTAIN of ENTHUSIASM...and my class enjoyed it!

Apparently there are several Skippy John Jones books..and I think she must have every one of them.

I have NO idea why all this is underlined. It just happened!

Joshua should win the creativity award in reading!

I felt I needed to post both photos so you could see the extent of Joshua's creativity. He's not doing anything with his hands, but he could if he wanted. This is what you could call HANDS-FREE READING!

Mrs. Johnston's granddaughter does NOT want to be a dentist

Thalia has no dreams to become a dentist - I don't think.

You might think she's checking out SpongeBob's teeth...and maybe she was, but she actually got her head STUCK.

She told me by the time they got her head out, her face and her ears were all red.

OK Room 8 - don't put your head in SpongeBob's mouth if you run into him!

We're Going on a Mission!

It's MISSION time in Room 8!

The class is divided into Mission groups. Each group competes along the game board by doing various activities. The members of a group may work together and help each other, but each student is responsible for their own work. I believe Room 8 would agree that this is a fun way to learn!

Some of the activites have been finding the answers to basic questions such as Who started the first missions? When and where were the first two missions founded? Putting all 21 missions in order on a map...finding out what a neophyte, companario, litter, etc., is. Learning spanish words such as a map is a diseno...a fort is a presidio...etc.

Mission reports are also being worked on. Right now, Room 8 is taking notes on their missions. We're doing it all in class. Once their rough draft is written, they're welcome to take it home to be typed...but parents: Please don't change it at all! I prefer to read Mission reports written by 9 and 10 year olds...not 30 & 40 year olds!