The Iditarod and Mrs. J's neighbor, Marvin

In Room 8, we've been studying the Iditarod. Just this morning, at 04:06, the last musher came into Nome to win the Red Lantern Award. Lance Mackey won it last week.

Mrs. J's neighbor, Marvin, which Room 8 often hears about, ran in a dog sled race in Alaska back in 1939. Now this was before the Iditarod, as we know it today, was being run. Marvin is 95 years old and he has had many awesome adventures. Tonight, his daughter in law brought out these pictures of Marvin in 1939 in Nome... running in his dog sled race!
Here is Marvin in his dogsledding gear... keeping warm while standing on the Bering Sea ice outside of Nome, Alaska... in February, 1939.

Here's Marvin with his 6 - dog team. He won first place... and look what he received!

Fast forward... here's Lance Mackey coming in to win first place last week in Nome, Alaska.Lance kept 15 of his 16 dogs all the way to the finish line!

Learning about the world of logging

Friday was a fun day for Room 8 and the other fourth graders.
We spent the day looking at old & new logging equipment, some
of the animals that live in the forests, and some competition among
colleges. I think Room 8 most enjoyed climbing on all the large,
new equipment. Because I took 80 photos, I decided to put
them into a slide show so we could see all of them. Enjoy! BubbleShare: Share photos - Easy Photo Sharing

Moms are usually stronger

Brandi, Kacey's mom, joined Room 8 on a recent field trip to look at logging equipment, practices, and other topics related to the industry. While Room 8ers were climbing around on the tractors and other equipment, I thought it would be a great time to take a photo of Kacey and his sweet mom.

"Hey Kacey, stand there next to your mom," I said.

As is common to Kacey when he sees anything called Canon, Nikon, Olympus, etc., he took off running.Hey, not so fast there, Kacey. I think that's what Brandi thought. She was pretty quick. I guess she's had to learn to be that quick to catch up with her boy.

A struggle began...

She caught him...

and this was about as good as we got!According to Kacey, Brandi was only tickling him.

Yeah, right, Kacey... I think she was just a bit stronger.

"Hurry, Mrs. J. Bring your camera!"

They sounded frantic... I had no idea if I needed my camera for something good... or bad.

This is what I saw when I walked out the door... a group of boys staring at the outside wall.

"Mrs. J! LOOK! The spider is sucking the blood out of the fly!"
I will tell you that I took about 15 pictures of the spider and the fly... but for the sake of your time, I'm only posting one. They didn't change positions in those 14 other shots.Room 8, or some of Room 8, was totally impressed.
Kobe was concerned I hadn't gotten Orion in the picture and, according to Kobe, "Orion's the one that found the spider and the fly!" So Kobe positioned Orion, and then joined the photo.

Pretty cool, guys!

Finally!!!

In Room 8, we're studying all about the Iditarod, a dog sled race in Alaska. One thing we saw yesterday on a video, were mushers wearing their headlamps as they were mushing during the night.

Today, Kacey brought in a headlamp to show us. I LOVE it when Room 8ers bring in things related to what we're studying...I think I've said that before on this blog. So Kacey was telling us about it and I asked him to put it on.

NO WAY...

Well, I'm a bit bigger than Kacey...

and older...

and maybe a bit forceful...

I tried to talk him into putting it on... NO WAY...

so Vanessa put it on...

and then, well, I just put it on Kacey myself... there was a bit of a struggle, all in fun, of course.I even got his incredible smile on camera too!

Whew! Now I'm exhausted!

Playing on the primary side

Friday was a big day with our recorder concert. After the performance, we took our music stands back to the music room and turned in our recorders and the books.

On the way back to Room 8, we passed the primary playground...and the primary students had just left for the day.

"Hey, Room 8? Do you want to play awhile on the primary playground?"

Oh geez...you would have thought I had told them it was Christmas. They hooped and hollered...Ashley even hugged me screaming, "I love you Mrs. J!!!" I almost titled this post, 'Cheap Thrills'... but I didn't.

The bars were the first big hit...
"Mrs. J.... take a picture of me!' I must have heard this 200 times! I told this group I couldn't see their faces..so they switched positions. Jacob, Ashley, Kaia, and VanessaAshley is hanging on...but it looks like Kobe bit the dust - literally!Oops! Looks like I spoke too soon. Ashley also bit the dust...on top of a couple of guys, Austin being one of them.Spegi tried out his swinging-on-the-bar talents!As did Wasey, Brittany, and Sarah.SarahRiley and Marseya tried a new piece of equipment.Austin and Kobe followed.Summer decided to climb up... as high as she could go.Brittany made the move to something different. There were different kinds of bars to hang from, to glide across...Ashley built up some momentum going across the rings...Kaia, well, I'm not sure what she was doing...except just hanging around!

It was time to take some group shots before heading back to Room 8. We took 2 serious ones...


and then 2 'funny' pictures...or 'crazy' pictures...
It was a great fun Friday in Room 8.

Recorder Concert

Friday was our recorder concert. It was exciting to perform for some of our parents and the 3rd- 5th grade classes.
Summer
Wesley and Max on the end...

We had an afternoon assembly...
Wesley and Max

We played quite a few songs...
Kacey, Sam, Riley

Orion
Mr. R has been teaching us how to read music and play the recorder for the second trimester.
Riley
Austin, Kobe, Marseya

Jacob, Vanessa, Ashley, and Kaia. I wonder what in the world Ashley is saying???

Marseya, Jacob, Vanessa

Sam and Riley

Jacob and Vanessa

The group...or part of them!

Kacey and Spegi

Abby and Jacob

Parker

Brittany

Orion

Abby

Wasey

I love this photo of Summer!

Mr. R with Sam and Riley

Austin and Kobe

Kacey

Mr. R telling the group what they're playing next.

Parker, Brittany, and Wasey

Sarah and Summer

The first trimester, we had music classes where we sang and learned to read music. This second trimester, we continued to learn to read music and play the recorder. Unfortunately, for the third trimester, we don't have any music. This is the first year music has been this way. It's all about budget cuts.... budget cuts... and more budget cuts!

It was fun while it lasted!