8:15- Brain Turns On

My kids have a lot to do this week before Friday. One of my early-arrival kids was wandering around the classroom at about 8:05am when one of his classmates asked, "Why don't you work on your math?" 

His reply, "My brain doesn't turn on until 8:15. I gotta let it wake up first; then I can work on my math." This morning he waited until 8:17, then got started.

My brain was a little sluggish when I woke up too. I was super productive after I got home yesterday and cleaned/sorted/recycled most of my apartment. Except, I kept getting distracted with more cleaning things to do and went to bed much later than I should have. Oops. My goal is to go to bed on time tonight. We'll see what happens. 

Even with a slightly sluggish teacher, we still accomplished a lot today. We finished our latest read-aloud book, did a science lab (testing how much work fruit can do via slinky), and began a new social studies project. The project was my students' idea; they wanted to make another social studies related powerpoint. 

The next big topic coming up is WWII, which they already know some things about from a few of our read-aloud books. So, yesterday I came up with guidelines for them to learn about other countries' involvement in WWII. Our focus in class will be on the US and Great Britain (and just a sprinkling of other countries). Things they need to find out: how the country got involved in the fight, when, why, who major players are, what life was like on the homefront (that one might be tricky...), did fighting take place in their country or did they go somewhere else to fight?

I had just wanted them to look over the plan I had come up with to see if they wanted to add anything to the project, but they were excited about it and wanted to start right away. Might as well capitalize on the enthusiasm! We drew sticks for partners and they chose their countries: Germany, Soviet Union, and the Pacific Islands. Should be interesting projects!

Class with the 7-8th graders was interesting too. One of the 7th graders had eye surgery today, so she was not in class. The 8th graders all had to quarantine starting Tuesday afternoon (and confirmation is postponed) due to exposure to covid during questioning. That left four 7th graders to teach in person (the 8th graders tuned in via Teams). One positive thing is that we only have two days of school next week, so the 8th graders won't miss much. They are cleared to come back after Easter vacation.