Happy Holidays

It's here! It's here! Christmas break! Half of our 4th grade year is over. We had a very busy day today during our last day before break. We started off our day with a morning sing along in the gym. When we got into the gym, we saw that it was decorated with lights strung across the ceiling and the stage was decorated and lit up. I was invited up to the stage to participate and lead the school along with Mrs. Ogborn, Mr. Michel, and Mrs. Grabner in a schoolwide Christmas macarena. I've got some great moves. I'm not very good at stage diving as we would all find out.
We then went to Mrs. Robben's room and read some Christmas stories with a first grade classroom. During that time, we practiced our technical reading and writing by creating a life saver train because they had just read The Polar Express. After we were finished with that, we read Christmas stories to each other and made hot chocolate. It was fun to share the spirit of the holidays with a younger group.
For lunch, we all (yes, even me) ate in the gym. I sat with all the girls for a little while, and can those girls talk. Whoa! I then moved over to sit with the boys.
In the afternoon, we were treated to a puppet show put on by our specials teachers from the building. I then participated in the Heusner staff adaption of the Twelve Days of Christmas. I had the honor of being the partridge in the pear tree. It was fun. But the narrator read so fast it was hard to keep up. I think she did that on purpose. I worked up a sweat.
Finally, came our Christmas party. Now, our parties aren't anything special. They are actually quite relaxing and enjoyable. I made a classroom CD for each student which included their favorite songs and some music we listen to often in class. We played the class CD, unwrapped gifts and goodie bags and talked with our friends. Now that the day is over, we are all ready for our long awaited winter break. I wish all of you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year and hope you are refreshed when we return after the break!

Happy Holidays!

Substitutes and Incredible Reindeer

This week was very busy. Our classroom had a substitute two days this week. On Wednesday, I was fortunate enough to go to a workshop on using blogs in the classroom, which I think we do rather well. I got a lot of great ideas and helpful hints to make blogging more effective in class. It was equally enjoyable knowing that our class was being respectful and working hard for the sub. I just love getting rave reviews from substitutes, it makes me so proud. *Tear* The next day, we had Miss Donahey, a student teacher in our building, as a "sub". I say "sub" because although I was still in and out of class, Miss Donahey wanted to see what it would be like to sub in a classroom, since she will have to start doing it in January.

Last month we performed our Integrated program in front of the whole school, this month it was the second graders turn to perform. Their program had a Christmas theme in which a special group of reindeer superheroes save the day. It was quite comical and it always amazes me how some of those younger kids get in to it. I enjoy watching them perform. My favorite part was the scientist and the newscaster with him. "

"I think that the deadly meteor is going to fall to Earth...TONIGHT!"

Good job second grade, we enjoyed the program.

BRRRRRRRRR!!

Man, was this week of school a weird one as far as our weather was concerned. At the first of the week, it was nice and warm with temperatures around 70 degress. We enjoyed those beautiful days outside at recess. Thank goodness we did though because two days later, the temperature dropped to about 30 degrees. Cold, cold, cold. So cold in fact, that we decided to stay inside for recess. It was alright though, staying inside is fun, at least for a slight change. We got to get out some of the games in the cabinet and play. I, Mr. Boyer, cleaned house in a nice game of WAR with Pedro and Chase. I think they let me win. They didn't want to hurt my feelings. How nice of them. There was a competitive and VERY LOUD game of Twister, which I eventually had to put a stop to because of the noisiness. Harry Potter UNO was also a hot game to play. Our classroom LEGO set also got a lot of use during our recesses. I think I could possibly play with LEGOs all day long. They are so much fun.
Well, I have a feeling our nice days are gone for a while. We'll just have to get ready to bundle ourselves up in coats and deal with the chill, while out at recess. I don't think we could take having a recess indoors every day. We'd all go crazy.

Aliens Invade the U.S.

This year our 4th grade program was a little different from years past. The program covered our Social Studies curriculum as we journey through the 50 U.S. states. This year, our program was invaded by aliens who have come to earth looking for a place to inhabit. It was the job of our tour guides from each region to host the aliens and with the help of others, give some facts about each region of the United States.
The aliens came to earth in their "high tech" spaceship complete with lights, sounds, and smoke.
The whole 4th grade worked really hard to make this program a success. After practicing for weeks during Music, P.E., and Integrated times, their hard work paid off the night of the performance. Everyone postively contributed to our show, including we 4th grade teachers who performed a "song and dance" routine. It seemed to be more scary than the aliens.
The aliens were treated to many things throughout the U.S. They were shown the Turkey Buzzard Line Dance and also the Hawaiian puili stick routine, complete with rump shaking hula dancers.

Overall, the program was a great success and we received many rave reviews about the production. My hat goes off to all the hard work our 4th grade students demonstrated to bring the audience a wonderful performance.

Thanks to Jordan C. for the pictures.

Splish Splash

Wow! What a busy, busy week. We concluded our action packed week with our trip to the YMCA to swim. The class earned the priviledge to go swimming by reading 7 books during the first nine weeks. All three 4th grade classes, over 70 kids, took a dip in the YMCA swimming pool. The Y was having some issues with the family pool, so they let us swim in the lap pool instead, which was twice as big. We were still able to use the water slide though, so it all worked out fine in the end.
Mrs Kinion and myself got in to swim with the kids, while Mrs. Hendrix (who wasn't feeling well at all) corraled the kids back to the pool area.
When Mrs. Kinion and I jumped into the pool, you would have thought that two pieces of playground equipment had got in. We were climbed upon, rode, swung on, splashed, chased, dunked, kicked, and cannonballed. And yes, we loved it. We all swam for almost two whole hours. Before getting out, we posed ourselves for a class picture. See there's the proof, we swam on a school day! Our classes were great. They were polite, respectful, and responsible students, and they were complimented by the lifeguards. It was a great way to reward the kids for doing such a great job and all their hard work when it comes to reading.
I don't know about the kids, but I am absolutely exhausted.
Our next goal, will be 14 books and we'll have our reward when we come back from Christmas break.

A Visit from an Author

Today we were visited by author Lisa Campbell Ernst. She has written or illustrated over 25 books for children. She talked to us about what it takes to be an author and all the things that she does to create one of her books. Ms. Ernst showed all uf some slides that showed the process she goes through to complete a book. She even drew us a picture of one of her favorite characters, Baby Bear from the book Goldilocks Returns. Goldilocks Returns was the book that we saw being made from start to published product. Heusner students asked Ms. Ernst some great questions.
"What's your favorite book?" (All of them, they're like her kids.)
"Do you have any kids?" (2 girls, age 8 and 14)
"How do you get ideas for your books?" (Always asks "What would happen if..." and usually a good story could come out of it.) This is when she told us a story about her trip to the store to get toothpaste. She misread the box that said ANTI-CAVITY but she thought it said ANTI-GRAVITY, what if that were actually true?

Lisa Campbell Ernst concluded her visit by signing autographs sor students who wanted some of her books signed. Heusner students really enjoyed the author visit as it was very interesting and exciting. I'd really like to write a book myself someday, so I was interested in the steps to publish a book. Never give up or get discouraged and don't be afraid to make many, many, many corrections and revisions.

Ballet Gran Folklorico de Mexico

On Tuesday, our class had the opportunity to see a unique dance troupe at the Steifel Theater in our hometown. There were several other fourth grade classes throughout the school district also invited to go see the dancers. Since Mexico is part of our 4th grade curriculum, the experience was great for us to get a sense of the Mexican culture. The group told a story through dance and performances which included the Mexican can can and a Mariachi band.
We really enjoyed seeing the dancers, some of the dances they performed were funny. We all especially liked the dance in which the group was hunting a deer. The dancer had the head of a deer with antlers attached to his head and made many motions and movements that made him look just like the animal. Then there were other guys with bows and arrows who chased him around the stage as if hunting him. Quite interesting to say the least.
We would like to thank the Salina Arts Center for sponsoring us and allowing us to go. And a big thanks also go out to Mrs. Vidricksen and Mrs. Hofmeier for recommending this wonderful opprotunity for us.