Pattern Portraits

This week, we blended math and art to create Pattern Portraits! In art, we’ve been practicing how to draw people using shapes and adding details that bring them to life. Putting those skills to work, each student drew a self-portrait. No stick people, here!

Next, we created colorful backgrounds by gluing strips of paper into repeating designs. A pattern means something happens again and again…and again! Students loved seeing how their choices of colors and arrangements made each piece unique.

The final posters turned out amazing! Like I told the kids, “I don’t just like them, I LOVE them!”

Take a look at our wonderful Pattern Portrait creations below!

Persistence, Perseverance & Patterns!

Our first Math unit focuses on patterning. We have worked hard to find a pattern, describe a pattern, continue a given pattern, and create our own pattern. Now the students are exploring how patterns can be related.

Ask your child to describe the patterns below.
How are they similar? Different?

As a class we examined the patterns below. We practiced describing these patterns using words (e.g. glue, glue, eraser), letters (e.g. A, A, B...), and numbers (e.g. 1, 1, 2...).

Then we challenged ourselves to make as many different AAB patterns from blocks as we could! We worked very hard ... this wasn't easy!

It is so important for the children to verbalize and justify their thinking. This helps deepen understanding not only in Math, but in any subject or situation. Don't be surprised if your child struggles with this skill at first. With daily practice together, we will only get better at explaining and justifying our thinking. 

The phrase we keep reminding ourselves of is "everything new is hard at first"!

Pattern Puzzlers

Our first Math unit focuses on patterning. We have worked hard to find a pattern, describe a pattern, continue a given pattern, and create our own pattern. Now the students are exploring how patterns can be related!

Ask your child to describe the patterns below.
How are they similar? Different?

As a class we examined the patterns below. We practiced describing these patterns using words (e.g. glue, glue, eraser), letters (e.g. A, A, B...), and numbers (e.g. 1, 1, 2...).

Then we challenged ourselves to make as many different AAB patterns from blocks as we could! We worked very hard ... this wasn't easy!

It is so important for the children to verbalize and justify their thinking. This helps deepen understanding not only in Math, but in any subject or situation. Don't be surprised if your child struggles with this skill at first. With daily practice together, we will only get better at explaining and justifying our thinking. 

The phrase we keep reminding ourselves of is "everything new is hard at first"!

Ball Python: Zoo Project Week 10

With all of our concert rehearsals this past week, we had to stretch our focus on the ball python over two weeks! But we sure learned a lot about this amazing reptile!

During our week at Zoo School, we will get to meet, and touch, Sid the ball python! We wondered what he might feel like. Bumpy? Smooth? Warm? Cool? Slippery?

Mrs. Beliveau met Sid last spring

We read The Greedy Python, a story about a snake who eats every animal he meets in the jungle. This python was so very greedy, that in the end he swallows his own tail! We worked hard sequencing the events using pictures. 

Snakes have such unique patterns, and we had a blast making our own patterned ball pythons with play dough and glitter! Then we described our patterns using letters or numbers (e.g. AAB or 1122) and compared the length of our snakes using words like longer and shorter. 

Our sketching continues to develop! We are adding more detail and are able to label the parts of our animals. 

Who is excited to meet Sid, the ball python? Can't wait!

What can you find in our classroom, down the halls, and even on our shirts?

PATTERNS!

The focus of our first math unit is on patterns. To kick off our unit, to get the students excited, and to show me what they already knew about patterns, we explored! Cameras in hand, we hunted high and low all over our school in search of patterns. Here are some patterns we identified:

This is just the beginning of our pattern investigation. Stay tuned as we work on (1) describing what comes next in a pattern and (2) showing the same pattern different ways.

Happy pattern hunting!