We Touched Poop!!!

Big day! We touched poop!

But let's rewind a little! Yes, today was poop-filled, but more importantly, we were able to meet an amazing animal ... Lucy the Asian Elephant!

This morning Teacher Courtney shared something serious. Elephants are endangered. Some people choose to kill elephants for their tusks. Each day 96 elephants are killed in Africa for their ivory. 

An ivory decoration and a tusk

We learned that, rather than buy ivory, people could make better and more caring choices. Elephant fans could instead buy a painting done by an elephant, write notes on "poo poo" paper made from elephant dung, or even buy carvings made from the taiga nut, which looks similar to ivory and also provides meaningful work to individuals in South America. 

We journaled ways we can make choices to help animals, every single day!

(1) No Litter / Pick up garbage
(2) Throwing paper in the recycling
(3) Do not chop down trees
(4) Don't buy ivory

Then we explored the similarities and differences between an African and an Asian elephant. 

Then we HELD ELEPHANT POOP! We held it!! Big day!!!!

Then it happened. We finally met Lucy!!!! We asked questions, danced the Macarena for her, and gave her a maple-extract popsicle! Ask your child what she did with it!

Can you see the caramel-coloured popsicle chunks
in the two right pics?

We welcomed in Dean, aka. "Zoo Royalty", who has been working with the Edmonton Valley Zoo for over 30 years and has tremendous knowledge and infinite experience!

Dean taught us how the zoo safely captures animals for their medical checkups and treatments! We saw Dean demo hoop nets, control poles, and even some blow dart pipes (which aren't typically used but are oh, so super cool!). 

Dean, you are so passionate about animal care! Thank you for your visit!

We had a quick lunch, and then headed out to observe our chosen animals! We were even able to write stories about them today!

After lunch we saw the zoo's compost area, where animal bedding, waste and much more go! Bacteria helps the waste beak down into dirt. Can you believe it? Lucy was down there exploring! What a gal!

Today was a blast! How it is Thursday already?!?

Our Week is Zoo-Riffic!!!

Today was short, but oh, so sweet!

The second we arrived at the zoo, we headed to the commissary! This kitchen feeds over 400 animals! 

We learned about herbivores and carnivores, and also about piscivores (primarily eat fish), insectavores (primarily eat insects), and frugivores (primarily eat fruit)! So many neat animals to feed at the zoo!

Teacher Courtney showed us the meat cart for the carnivores. Theses animals get whole food which is already dead.

We entered the fridge, and peeked inside the freezer, too!

Courtney tiptoed us into the nocturnal area, which is currently closed to the public due to construction. We were super surprised to see the lights on! The enclosure was being cleaned and we were able to see the sloths, bats, porcupine, and kinkajou, in a rare moment of light!

Today, rather than sketch the animals we had chosen for the week, students had to decide fairly as a group which new animal they would observe today! This opportunity allowed us to compare and contrast the new animal with our previous one!

Observing the red fox 

Observing the seals

Observing the reindeer

Teacher Courtney noticed how curious we were and gave us a chance to meet one of our classroom bunnies up close! This is Summer, a Flemish Giant. Can you believe he is only 10 months old!?!

After a speedy lunch, we had a chance to meet Frodo, the Central Asian Tortoise. We compared and contrasted tortoises and turtles, observing a turtle artifact alongside little bossy Frodo!

Sadly we had to hop on the bus an hour early, but we certainly made the most of our shorter day! 

Guess who we meet tomorrow!?! Eeeeeek! This sweetie!

What a wonderful week of learning!!!

What a Zoo!

Today rocked! It was day 2 of our Zoo School week, and we were challenged, surprised, and excited so many times today!

We knew the rules and routines, so the second we arrived we headed out to observe our animal!

We were tasked with observing three things about our animal, drawing a few specific body parts, and then drawing a full labelled diagram. Off the groups went to observe the lemurs, meerkats, and snowy owls!

Observing the meerkats

Sketching the lemurs

Spending time with the snowy owls

We spent time thinking about a nice gift to bring Lucy the elephant. What kind of popsicle would she like? We smelled three extracts, and through a vote decided on maple! The popsicle will freeze over two days and be ready near the end of the week!

Then we discovered how the zoo trains animals! We learned about target training, how to reward an animal for a desired behaviour, and how to select an appropriate reward for a given animal! We had a hoot using pom poms on sticks and clickers to "train" one another!

After lunch, we headed to the Arctic Shores area to learn about life in the arctic!

Then, a training session with Hula the harbor seal! 

We tackled a rousing game of Mystery Artifact, working together to use our senses to identify several unknown animal items. We were presented with a tortoise shoe, a wallaby fur, a rhino skin, and a tiger fur! Great job, kids! 

We ended with a few quiet minutes journaling about our top 4 moments of the day! So, so hard to choose!

Seals, owl sketching, clicker (training),
& Arctic Shores slides

We loved every second, and several friends even had to take a power nap on the way home ...

Tomorrow is going to ROCK!!!

Zoo-TASTIC!

Today was ZOO-TASTIC! It was our first day attending the Edmonton Valley Zoo's week long Zoo School adventure, and it was an absolute blast!

We arrived and got busy right away. Our teacher, Courtney, sent us out in our small groups to tackle some animal observations. Each group will observe their chosen animal for a few minutes each day throughout the week! Today we were challenged to write 3 "ing" words, describing what our animal was doing. We also drew and labelled their enclosures. 

Observing the lemurs

Observing the snowy owl

The meerkats decided to observe us too!

Back in our classroom, we met a non-venomous children's python! Many opportunities to think, wonder, and learn! 

Some cute little rats live in an enclosure in our classroom, and Teacher Courtney gave us an opportunity to meet one cutie close up!

Bursting with energy, we were let loose to do an animal fact scavenger hunt! 

Then it happened. We came face to face with the most dangerous animal at the zoo. We went "backstage" to meet all 300 pounds of Taiga, a majestic Amur Tiger!

"We're going WHERE?"

The day finished off with some quiet journaling time, choosing our "top 4" moments of the day. 

Back we go tomorrow for more learning, more challenges, and more adventures! 

SO THANKFUL for today!

  

The Important Lessons

Today we welcomed 24 fresh baby chicks into the world!

The kids were absolutely in awe. We had waited and waited for 21 days, carefully monitoring the temperature and humidity in our incubator. Our eggs had actually become new life!

As Mrs. Beliveau looked at the math assessment and writing tasks she had prepared for the day, one thing became clear. The most important lesson we needed to learn today was not going to be how to skip count, nor was it going to be how to write a strong sentence. It was going to be about respect for new life. Isn't God amazing?

Lessons saved for another day!

We took many moments today to cuddle chicks, holding them gently and speaking to them softly. The boys and girls marveled at how God created such an amazing miracle, right under our noses! Check out some memories!

What was extra special to see were the differences between the chicks! Some were yellow, others black, others brown with beautiful blond stripes. God made them all special and unique, just like He made us!

It was a wonderful, memorable day and the students were so welcoming of all of the curious company who made their way into our classroom. They were very protective of the fragile new life, and were so keen to share their knowledge and answer questions. We definitely learned the meaning of "good news travels fast"!

This has been an AMAZING journey filled with loads of valuable lessons. Today's math and writing lessons, however, have been saved for another day. More importantly are the lessons we have learned about new life, respect, patience, and compassion. God's work is truly amazing!

2, 4, 6, 8, Our Counting Skills are Really Great!

We are crazy for skip counting!

Over the last few weeks, as we have explored numbers to 100, we have practiced skip counting:

• by 2's to 20
• by 5's to 100
• by 10's to 100

Learning to skip count helps us count large groups of items accurately and efficiently.

The skip counting chains we made on our 100th day have been very helpful!

Today students were given bags of manipulatives and were asked to count the items. Part of the challenge of using skip counting is figuring out how to count leftover items. 

We tried the challenge as a class with this pile of items:

We collaborated to group the items into 10's:

10, 20, 30 ... 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39!

Then we tried counting the same pile of items using skip counting by 5's:

5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, 35 ..., 36, 37, 38, 39!

Students got into pairs to count their own pile of manipulatives! Here are some groups hard at work:

5, 10, 15, 20, 25, 30, 35, 40 ...41!

10, 20, 30, ... 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36!

We are getting so good at counting large sets, that we can even do it with our eyes closed!

10, 20, 30, 40 ..., 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46!

The students are on their way to becoming skip counting experts, but please continue practice at home. These skills need to be automatic before being successfully applied in counting situations such as these. Why not practice in the car or in line at the grocery store? 

Happy counting! 

Fantastic Gymnastics!

We've been so blessed to have an incredibly talented, experienced, and caring Holy Redeemer parent volunteer to teach our energetic kids gymnastics! It is a class the students absolutely look forward to! The lessons are focused on the 3 F's; building our fundamental movement patterns, developing our fitness, and having fun! We had a blast and learned so much!

Here is a sneak peek into our last Teddy Bear-themed gymnastics class! Please enjoy the pictures and videos of our students tackling various balances, rolls, locomotor movements, jumps, and landings! Be sure to make it full screen!

Thank you for sharing your gifts with us, Mrs. Gazso!