Iditarod 36

Have you been hearing names like... Lance Mackey, Jeff King, Martin Buser, DeeDee Jonrowe ... and 92 others?

Maybe you've heard names like Kaltag, Shaktoolik, Unalakleet, White Mountain ... and of course, Nome.
We've been following what is known as The Last Great Race ... or The Iditarod!

In Room 8, each student drew the names of 3 different mushers. These were the ones they have tracked throughout the race. If one of their mushers 'scratched' (stopped the race for whatever reason), then they got to choose another musher. This year there were 96 mushers who started the race. We've learned to read and convert military time to our standard way of telling time and vice versa. We've been graphing the dogs of our mushers - watching as some of them 'dropped' dogs along the way. We've looked at strategies ... tried to figure out the why's of some of the data on the 'updates'.
When the mushers come down Front Street in Nome, someone comes out (the guy in the red jacket) to help guide the dogs and musher through the hundreds or thousands of people who are there to congratulate the mushers. ** Postscript...this is NOT Lance Mackey coming into Nome... it's Zack Steer and - can't remember who else. Here's Lance Mackey coming in:

Today, Lance Mackey (Kyle W's guy!) came in as the winner. Jeff King (Mae's guy) came in second. These two have been in a close race.
Every winner has their official photo taken with their lead dog. I'm not sure if this is Lance Mackey's official... because I thought he came in with 2 lead dogs. This is a 'bootie' worn by one of Robert Buntzen's dogs ... probably in 1996. A student I had that year went to Alaska after we had studied the Iditarod. He went to visit his aunt in Anchorage, who just happened to know Robert Buntzen. Michael, my student, met Robert, told him how we had studied the race, and a few weeks later, a package arrived filled with about 75 booties! You can see where his dog wore a hole in this one. While studying the Iditarod, we are also reading Woodsong, by Gary Paulsen. It is EXCELLENT...and sometimes I read little excerpts fromWinterdance. I call this book the 'adult version of Woodsong.' Gary Paulsen ran and finished the race - I think it was the 1995 Iditarod. Both of these books are of that race.

Ask your Room 8er about the race and their mushers, but you better be sitting down and be ready to listen. They will have a lot to tell you!

Room 8ers are happy to come "home"

"Home" in this title is Room 8.

Wednesdays are music day...or recorder days. As they were coming back from music on Wednesday, I just happened to have my camera out. Look at these little darlins... don't they look happy?Ahhh....room 8ers are the best!

Dr. Seuss day....or 'Read Across America'

Tuesday was a BIG day in Room 8.

We started the day with the STAR test. Fourth and seventh graders in the state of California have the honor of taking an extra part of the STAR test... a writing test.

It was also Dr. Seuss Day... and 'Read Across America.' In the afternoon, we had some high schoolers (and former Room 8ers!) come in and read some Dr. Seuss books. That was certainly fun!In these first two photos, Caryn and Michael read to us. Caryn will be part of Room 8 again next year when she takes "Elementary Aide" at the high school. She'll drive over and work in Room 8 for part of the day! HOORAY! Her sister, Chanel, worked in Room 8 a couple of years ago - and they both lived in Room 8 when they were in 4th grade!
In this photo above, I'm not sure the name of the girl in the green shirt - but on the right, is Erica! Erica looks JUST like she did when she lived in Room 8 as a 4th grader - only she does look a little older!It was also TWIN DAY at the high school. Amy and Kate (both former Room 8ers) didn't read to us, but they did drop in to say Hi!

We loved having the high schoolers come in and visit!

Some more Tribe Posters

To all the readers of Room 8 News... I have to apologize for the lack of posts. No excuse. I can say I've been so busy, which is true, but I'm always busy. I'll try to do better...no, I will do better. I love writing this blog and know you are enjoying it!

I wrote in an earlier posts about our studies of some of California's Native American tribes. I also told you how we were divided into groups, each group making a poster after doing research on a particular tribe. The Hoopa tribe has been published... but here are the Chumash and the Pomo. There are still 3 tribes not pictured...but they're coming! We've had a lot of absences in Room 8 with 'the crud' that's going around. It seems we're on the upswing now!

An Authentic Illustration

Meet Jacob.

Jacob does not normally look like this, but for the sake of his "tribe", he gave us an authentic illustration to go along with one of his topics, which, not surprisingly, is tattoos.

As readers of this blog know, we've been studying various California tribes. Room 8 has been divided into 'tribes' and each tribe has done research on various topics and created a poster. Each student had to write a paragraph and create an illustration for each of their topics. Friday, we began giving the presentations. Jacob asked me if he could do this, I said 'no' but he didn't hear me. Next thing I knew, in he came from the bathroom, black pen in hand. In my shock, I didn't check to see if this had been created with a permanent pen. Who knows, he may still be tattooed on Monday!

We had MANY students absent Friday, at least one from all but one tribe. So I only took one group photo. Branndon suggested we wait for photos until everyone was here. Excellent suggestion, Branndon!

Here's the Hoopa tribe:Emily, Mary, Macey, and Casey O.

Valentine's Day in Room 8

There was no shortage of sugar in room 8 this afternoon! One of our sayings, well, at least one of my sayings is, "We work hard and we like to party hard in Room 8."

If there's an occasion to celebrate, Room 8 rises to it! We had probably 6 different kinds of cookies, plus cupcakes, and juice. This doesn't take into consideration the overflowing Valentine bags that were hanging in the front of the room.

Take a look at some of the fun we had today:

Oops! Look at our new student!