Just a reminder about commenting...

I know Room 8'ers LOVE to read the comments. However, (don't you just hate it when someone says 'however...') I have had to delete some. If you remember, I ask that last names not be used or any telling information about where we are located -not the county, not the town, not the school. This is just for privacy. So if I notice a comment with a student's or their parent's last name, I'll quickly take it off. Please understand it's only for our privacy.

Keep the comments coming...it makes us smile!

Teachers come in all shapes, sizes, and ages

Look at one of the teachers in Room 8:
This is Devin...one of our teachers.

In math, we are working on rounding. Room 8 was ready for a challenge today. I THOUGHT I was giving them a challenge when I put up the number 184,999,993 and asked them to round it to the hundreds place. Now, it WAS a challenge for some, but Devin (and some others) knew exactly what to do.

I asked Devin to come up to the overhead and explain. In the first photo, he's explaining to Room 8 HOW to round a number like this, and in this photo below, he's writing the correct number.

The students in Room 8 are AMAZING!

Way to go, Devin!

We're writing about a friend

We're working on organizing our ideas to write a paragraph about a friend.

Miss C started us off by creating a graphic organizer about her friend, Alli. She told us how they had met in 7th grade...and a lot of other things about their friendship. Then we each decided on a friend and filled out our own graphic organizer.

Today, Mrs. J showed us how to use our facts to turn them into a paragraph. Before we wrote ours, we paired up with someone to TELL them our story. These photos are when we are buddied up sharing our ideas.
Madison and Emily
Mae and Macey
Danielle and Amber
Dillon and Trevor
Emma and Shawna
Jacob and Kyle W
Kyle A and Kamren
Branndon and Edin
This is Branndon's graphic organizer aboutEdin.
Carlo and Devin
a little bit closer look at Carlo and Devin...
Casey J and Austin

We finished our first paragraph today...and now we'll start on paragraph 2!

The Chicken Dance

No, that is NOT a chicken dancing on Ms R's head. It's actually her CHICKEN HAT that she likes to wear when she dances the CHICKEN DANCE.She's told us all that she's THE MOST BEAUTIFUL PRINCIPAL IN THE WORLD. Yep, and we knew it was true when she came in with this hat on.

She taught us the dance...and it is FUN.

Make photo slide shows at www.OneTrueMedia.com

We may come home whistling a new song on Wednesdays

Wednesday afternoons are our MUSIC AFTERNOON!

We've been going at 2:40 to Mr. R's music where we're learning to play the recorder. With him, we're learning how to read music and clap out notes.

Today, Mrs. D came into room 8 to sing with us. She played the guitar...and she has a beautiful singing voice. With Mrs. D, we'll just have the enjoyment of singing and learning some new songs.

So parents, if your child is taking an extra long shower on a Wednesday and you hear music coming from somewhere, remember it's our singing day...they're probably practicing a new song.

Another talented Room 8er - this time it's Mae!

Mae is a dancer. I think I wrote about that when she shared her bag.

Today she did a little demonstration of her favorite type of dance - tap. We moved some of the front desks back so she could have plenty of room and then we gathered around to watch. Mae did an awesome job of explaining it all to us. She showed us how the heal and the toe make different sounds. She also showed us some of the different steps...like the train...the 6...the 8, etc.



In these photos above, you can see her showing us how some of the steps go and how the plates are on the bottom of her shoes.
Once she was finished demonstrating, she answered a lot of questions for us. Mae told us she has been dancing - I think since she was 4 years old...or was it 6 years old? It's been a LONG time...and we could tell!

A Room 8 CELEBRITY

Our very own Kyle W is a celebrity. He thinks he might even turn PRO before he's 16 years old! LOOK at this trophy! It's HUGE...and it's Kyle's for winning FIRST PLACE in a BMX championship race this last weekend!
When Kyle shared, he told us all about the qualifying races. He also used some terms most of us didn't understand at first. But Kyle was great about explaining what it all meant. I can't imagine what it would have been like to be there. His dad told me he won by just a couple of inches. I bet that was exciting!

CONGRATULATIONS, KYLE W!!! We are proud of you!

Today we wrote spelling sentences

Wednesday's are USUALLY our day for spelling sentences - although some weeks we won't even do them.

As you can see in this picture of our hardworking Mae, she has the pink paper next to her. These are the rules for writing these. We've gone over them a couple of times now, but I still tell room 8 to take it out so they can check off to make sure they've followed the directions.


This next picture makes me happy. This is Emily checking her QuickWord to see how to spell a word. Anyone is welcome to ask me or Ms C how to spell a word - AFTER they've first looked it up in their Quick Word.
Here are some sentences written by Trevor. These weren't finished...but I love that he already had his name up in the corner of the paper. We do have a few Room 8ers who FORGET to put their name on papers.

It's not a happy scene when a paper finally gets ripped because no one claimed it!

Macey's new do...as in 'hair-do'

You should have seen some of the faces as Room 8ers walked in this morning and saw Macey's new 'do'!

I present to you the NEW MACEY...at least the NEW LOOK OF MACEY!Isn't she adorable?

Meet Branndon

You know the saying, "Last but not least"...well, that applied to Branndon today. He wasn't actually suppose to be last, but on his day to share, he forgot his bag. He kept forgetting. Tuesday I told him we were EXPECTING to see him share today - and he did!
Branndon loves basketball, so he brought this small one in to share. I can't remember where he actually got this small one.
This sort of looks like a cell phone in this photo, but it's not...it's a car. Branndon seems to be one of many room 8 guys who like the Hot Wheels.
Branndon is the first one to bring in a MODEL! I was excited to see this and to know he enjoys putting models together. My own boys use to do that. Room 8 had quite a few questions for Branndon about this.
Now how cute is this? This is definitely a stuffed dog, but Branndon told us he has a real one, too. I'm about in the market for a dog...and I think everyone in room 8 agreed that it was an absolutely adorable dog!

We enjoyed Branndon sharing his bag - actually we've enjoyed watching all of room 8 share. The only one we're missing on the blog is Ralphie! He and Qwinn shared their bags one day when I was out of town. Qwinn brought his bag back so we could 'stage his presentation' so I could take pictures for the blog...Ralphie hasn't brought his back. If you're reading this, Ralphie , please grab your bag!

Meet Tyler

Tyler...I've known who he was since he was a little ...real little guy! His UNCLE and his brother both lived in Room 8. I was excited to have another guy from this family!Tyler loves basketball and he brought this trophy in to illustrate. We definitely have a lot of Room 8ers who love sports!
We've seen a few of these cars...but Tyler's is unique in the name he gave it... THE CARROT! Someone in room 8 suggested putting a GREEN MUFFLER on it. Tyler said no - they don't have any green paint.
This was cool. Tyler made this money pouch. He had other small things inside of it to share with us. He made it in Boy Scouts. Room 8 was quite impressed!
I'm happy to report that Tyler is also a READER! He said he enjoys reading the Harry Potter books.
Tyler brought this turtle food because he likes turtles - and he has 2 of his own! I think he's the first one to tell us about having a turtle.

We learned a lot about Tyler today!

Meet Trevor

If there was a prize given for "How much can you fit in a lunch-size sack?", well, I do believe that Trevor would win that prize! How in the world he fit SO much in that sack, I'll never know.

I took so many pictures of him sharing, that I had a tough time narrowing it down to four. That's about the number I try to put for each student.

Trevor showed us a four-wheeler. He said he has one of his own - I assume he meant a REAL one - but because he enjoys them, he put this one in his bag. One of our Room 8er's thought it might be a trophy!
Trevor is one of my 'sports guys' and he DOES LOVE baseball. He brought a SF Giants baseball to show that...and guess what? It had Barry Bonds' picture on it. I do not think Trevor and I have a connection on that...He likes Barry Bonds...and I don't. I have to admit though, it was a cool baseball!
This was certainly impressive! It's an official coin used in a COIN TOSS at a Buffalo Bills football game! I didn't know they did this with those coins. I just assumed one of the referrees just pulled any old coin out of their pocket, threw it in the air while someone called heads or tails...and that was it. Wrong! I bet Trevor taught a lot of us something new today.
I started to open this post with this picture. Poor Trevor, his parents should really take him to the DENTIST! Not only does he have cavities...but the poor guy needs braces. Actually, he might do better with getting those awful things pulled out. (I'm only kidding, these teeth are FAKE! Could you tell?)
LIke I said, Trevor is a sports guy. He actually brought 2 different medals to share with us, but seeing as I'm trying to keep each post to about 4 photos, this blogging teacher chose this one. (Oops...I just went back to re-read this, and realized I had put 5 pictures on here!)

We enjoyed hearing all about Trevor AND having his parents come visit us while he shared.

Meet Tucker

Tucker had something in his bag that I thought was so cute. It was a picture of him when he was a baby. Now several Room 8ers have had photos from their younger days, but I loved the way Tucker held it up next to him so we could see how he looked now compared to a baby.Quite a few Room 8ers said they could see the resemblance!
Now this picture above surprised me. Tucker shared his cell phone. I had no idea 4th graders had cell phones...but when I asked for a show of hands for those students who had them, I bet 3/4 of the class raised their hands!
Tucker also shared this earring. He said it was his...and that it was pure gold. It has a $132 price tag on it. Plus, Tucker said it was a real diamond!
This last photo that Tucker shared is of his dad and 'Jim' (who he said is like a grandpa to him). They're in their shop. Tucker told us how they like to hang out and work on motorcycles...and this is like their 'hang out.'

It was so interesting listening to Tucker share his bag!

Meet Shawna

I hope Shawna is still awake. It's 8:53 p.m. as I'm writing this.

Shawna shared her bag today and wants to send the blog to her GRANDMA so she can see Shawna sharing. I was out at a dinner, so that's why this is so late.

Shawna started off by sharing her crystal. She told us this came from her grandma who paid about $100.00 for this! Wow! It was sure pretty, but I was sure hoping it didn't break!Shawna also had some postcards she bought on a recent trip. After Shawna showed us this one of a bear, she had another one of a SKUNK. Well, that sure started a lot of Room 8'ers having a 'connection' to share. We had to finally halt the 'skunk stories.' Shawna went to the State Fair and bought this button to ride the rides. She told us there were so many, you couldn't ride them all or see them all in one day...that's HUGE!
Shawna also loves to read. She brought this book to show that, plus the fact that she likes horses. It makes me happy to hear of so many Room 8ers who love to read...way to go, Shawna!

We enjoyed hearing all about Shawna.