Tales Of A 4-5 Something

Since Thanksgiving we have been doing an Immigration and Industrial Revolution Unit. For writing we interviewed immigrants from our community and wrote nonfiction narratives. Some people were from Burundi, Iraq, Ireland, and Vietnam. It was a fun project because we worked with two to four other writers. We tried to tell the story of fact but with a storytelling feel. We tried to incorporate a 'golden thread' through the piece. How do you think we did? Jack

Our K-1 Buddies in Stacey's habitat are learning about trees. They made stories about make believe tree creatures and we wrote them down. Then we made Puppet Pal videos together. We like being with our buddies because it is fun to read with them and do fun projects. Later we will go to the Fore River Campus for a trip before we start vacation. Yasmeen

Our teachers told us to make believe we were craftspeople and that we made the best boots. We got templates to make a pair of boots. We got a half an hour to color them in and make them unique. We played music and got popcorn and apple cider. Everyone was having a good time and we were enjoying ourselves. The the next day our orders doubled but we had the same amount of time to make boots. We did not have popcorn, apple cider and there was no music. Everyone was rushed and felt that their boots were more sloppy. On the third day we still got a half an hour without snacks or music. We needed to make as many boots as we could. We started out working alone and then we realized that we would not make many boots by ourselves. We worked together and each table group became a station. One cut the boots out, one table colored the top of the boots, another colored the bottom and the last coloring in the straps. This way we got work done much faster. We all felt very rushed bu...

In 4-5 we are making mill cities in Minecraft since we're studying Indusrial Revolution and Immigration. Every home station has a city. Tim’s is called Hebdaville, Linda's is called Clements Ledge, Nancy's is called Mill River, and Kai's is called Watertown. Every city has to have a river, canals, 2 mills, roads, four boarding houses, a store, school, police station, a town square, one park, paths, a city seal, city name, and a mission. We all applied for jobs to build and make these things. We had to do a lot of talking and planning before we built. You can see videos about that here . When we were almost done building we made a screencast tour of our cities. I love being able to build in the same world with our friends and see how the things we learned in class can be made in Minecraft. It is like it is our city. By Abie Here are our tours. Hebdaville: Waterberg: Clement's Ledge: Mill River:  

On Wednesday, December 14 we got on a boat to America. We were headed for Ellis Island. We did this because we are studying Immigration and Industrial Revolution. We also studies our family trees. We put it all together and got to be immigrants. We had a lot of fun. We wrote reflections after the day was over. Here are some of them: "I really had a lot of fun. I got an 'L' chalk mark which meant lameness. I was nervous and I rubbed off my letter. One person took their jacket off and turned it inside out." "The lines were long but then I thought they must have been longer when there were two hundred or so people doing this for real." "When I got in line I felt very nervous. It was confusing at first. All I had to do was follow the flow of the crowd. I thought it was funny when Ben sat me down and wiped down my seat when I told him I had $500." "Everyone was excited when we boarded the ship. Talia had some bread and shared it with us. ...

We had some snow this week and it was fun. A little bit fell on Monday and we got really excited. There was not a lot of snow but we still played in it. The next day some melted but we still played in it. There wasn't enough to sled down the hill but we pulled people on the sled. Then the snow went all away and there was just mud. We think it will snow this weekend so we might get more. We like playing in the snow!  

In Writing Workshop we are interviewing people who have come to our country. It is for a nonficiton narrative about immigrants. We have talked to people from Burundi, Ireland, Sweden, Lybia, Kenya, and more places. Some of us have to wait for the interview so we get to do some free writing. Here are some poems we write today. I glide to the ground  Greeting my friends We cluster to keep cold Not wanting to melt I look up seeing The rest of my Family coming down  To join me Snow  by Rose B-T I sit still, still, still under the cold brown dirt. Until, one morning, I want to stretch slowly rise, rise, rise Til soon I start to sprout. For years I watch children pass. Bikes, animals, runners. My friends, the ones that sing, build their nest. My favorite friend being the girl who climbs me. She tries, tries, tries till her strength builds and she reaches the top. The seasons come  Some cold, some hot, some breezy. I am fond of all because I am ...

Since we are studying Immigration and Industrial Revolution we get to read books about the same thing in lit class. There are a lot of different books in the lit classes. It is fun because we get to talk about different characters and places but all the characters are moving to a new home. Some people are reading Esperanza Rising, Drita My Homegirl, Maggie's Door, Honeysuckle House, or Inside Out And Back Again. After we read out first assignment a few weeks ago we planned a newscast about what happened. It was like a update about the big things that we needed to remember. It was fun and we got to use the green screen to make the news report. We had to plan it first though. Some planning

Waynflete food drive is when all of Waynflete comes together. Kids from 3 to 18 years old and all the teachers came to our gym. We all brought food from our classrooms that we collected in bins over the past two weeks. Then we put all the food on 10 tables. We think we had about 2,500 pieces of food and we think it all weighed 2,000 pounds. All the food will go to Wayside and they will send it to families so they can have food. The man from Wayside said that his group would feed 1,600 kids this week. By Yacob and Kirby P.S. Divya told us the school collected 2,517 pounds of food!

We went to Lowell, MA to see the mills. The bus left 7:00 AM, so you had to be at school before seven. The drive was about a hour and a half, 8 people took the van a nd the rest took a Custom Coach bus. When we got there we split into different groups. Kai and Tim’s home station went to weave with the floor looms, we got really fast at it. Then we switched groups and Kai and Tim’s home station went to look at cotton bales and how the industrial revolution changed how many workers needed to be next to the machines. Then we went to the museum and walked past the weaving machines. They were really loud and there were only 4 weaving machines on! Lastly, we went to the boarding house. It seemed really cramped because if you lived there you would have to share a bed. We learned a lot about the industrial revolution and why people left the farms to come to Lowell. When we left we got stuck in a stand still. The Kennebunk rest stop was 9 miles away. The people in the van got out and w...

On Tuesday, November 8, all of 4-5 went to a show at Hannaford Hall at USM. The show connected to our immigrant study and the play was called The New American . The show was about a girl named Brigit who immigrated from Ireland. First the woman that was playing Brigit came out and started talking to us about the meaning of immigration. While she was talking she changed from her regular voice to an Irish one. Then she played a video that she talked over. It was very fun and we learned a lot.    Charlie and Abie

In fall, all of Waynflete collects non perishable foods and brings the food to their homestations. We put them into a big box for the Thanksgiving food drive. Next week, the boxes of food is brought to the gym and sorted out by Middle School Student Council. All of the food goes to the Wayside Food Pantry so they can share it with people so everyone can have a good and happy Thanksgiving. By Jane and Noa

In 4-5 we are studying immigration and the industrial revolution. In Tim's unit we are building a mill town in a Minecraft world. There are five jobs that we get to apply for. There are hydro engineers, city planners, park and rec directors, logo and mission creators, and the mill architects. We are In the process of building a mill town called Hebdaville Mills. There is a mill, boarding house, river/canals and a park. The other classes will all get to build one too. by Eliza and Yasmeen  

By Rosie and Hazel On Sunday, some of the 5th graders went on the tours with families visiting Waynflete. We all waited in the music room for tours. We had a piece of paper that told us where to go. Every tour started with visiting Franklin Theater  and we told them about the play that had just happened . We showed them through the whole school including the art gallery, in 2-3 , 4-5 ,K-1, and EC. There was one teacher in every room to tell the families more about the program. We always left them in the class they were looking at, and then they would talk to the teachers, and then they were invited to go to the art gallery to have refreshments.  

Just a while ago we did our literature presentations on the book that we had just read. The book was call The Wanderer. Each person got to choose a way to present how they understood the book. Some of the options were: Mystery drysack, write the next chapter, make a photo album, create character trading cards, or make a Wanderer picture book. The most common was the trading cards. We met in circles and listened to each other present. Our favorite presentations were photo albums and positive negative charts. The Wanderer was a great book. It was really fun watching our classmates present their pieces and to talk about the characters one last time. Sasha and Henry

Last Saturday Rikki, the Lower School art teacher left to move to Colorado because her husband, Bob got a job opportunity there. So we had a c.m. for her (community meeting). She talked about here years here and then we gave here a present and cards. The present was a canvas bag with a picture of our community art project that we did at the beginning of the year. Each homestation made little cards with drawings on them and when we gave it to her, she was so  happy to have something to remember us. But we have a new art teacher now named Chloe and we all can’t wait to see what she is like as an art teacher and start doing new things and techniques for different kinds of art.   By, Cece  

By Shane and Ian Today we brought our buddies to the piney woods and had a lot of fun playing in the leaves and playing

This year 4-5 is studying the salt marsh and all the 4-5ers chose a topic to study independently, for instance: Casey- Microscopic animals that live in the water Porter- Cordgrass, cattails, green crabs Becca- Tides We (the 4-5ers) get to choose how to make it, so we could make it in IMovie, Book Creator, Explain Everything or a Poster + more. After we had all our information we could set it up in one of the choices and present to our audience (which is our home station.) We have been gathering our information from Kids Rex, What Is A Salt Marsh? Videos like How Does A Salt Marsh Form? and Peat Society and a lot more. Plus we went to the Waynflete fields marsh to gather some information there too! And the best part is that we got to go into the tidal flats (the mud). Some interesting facts about the marsh/plants : •If you pinch the cordgrass and pull up your fingers you will get some really good, fresh sea salt on your fingers. •Some people/animals have died si...

by Porter and Luke Geneive or G.A. Morgan came to 4-5 to talk to us about her books. She made a series called the 5 Stones Trilogy. The series starts off with The Fog of Forgetting then   Chanterelle then Kinfolk, that just came out. It's about these 5 kids that go on a boat and get lost in fog. Then they find themselves in Ayda. Which is a mystical island which is made up of 4 realms Metria, Exor, Varuna, and Melor, that's all the realms. I'm still reading The Fog of Forgetting. One of the realms is ruled by a bad dude. I think the realm he rules is Exor. The 5 kids are named Chase, Knox, Teddy/Edward, Evelyn, and Frankie. They all get to Ayda by boat. I'm NOT going to spoil any more details. All I'm going to tell you is that Evelyn and Frankie are orphans. NO MORE SPOILER ALERTS!!!!! To all people that are reading this article make sure to read the 5 Stones Trilogy! If you go to GA Morgan’s website there’s a quiz about the 5 Stones Trilogy to test ...

On Thursday October 26 Nancy's homestation went to the art gallery to see an exhibit of the hundred dresses we saw a hole bunch of dresses that people made from the same templates. Some of the materials were cloth and buttons.We designed small dresses that we hung on a big dress that had 1,000 hooks .The Hundred Dresses is a book about a little girl that is different than some of the other girls and she says she has 100 dresses. By Cecily and Lola

On Wednesday we did leaf rubbings with our K-1 buddies. We collected leaves  and took some paper and crayons and put the leaf under the paper then rubbed it and it made a really cool print. We had a lot of fun leaf rubbing leaves with our buddies. -Rosie & Hazel

By Elliott Werner We went on a orienteering field trip to the Fore River Fields. Orienteering is when your go out in the forest and find different spots using a map and compass to add to your checklist. I was partners with Sam we had to find 12 of the 20 controls* and we punched them with a dibber*. It was really fun! After we all came back we had some time to have fun in the fields with a frisbee and a soccer ball. *A control is a white and orange 3D triangle that you need to find. *A dibber is a hole puncher to prove you were at the control.