Tales Of A 4-5 Something

On October 16 we went to Zu bakery. We started by dividing into two groups and the first group was sent into the bakery. The first thing we learned about was called bread geography. Barak, the baker, said that his bread only had three ingredients. The water had traveled roughly five miles to his bakery. Next was the wheat which had traveled roughly 300 miles and was from Aroostook County and finally, the salt traveled from Ireland and France, a journey of roughly three thousand miles. Next we charted something called the wheat geography which was the parts of a wheat berry. He showed us a diagram of the parts of a wheat berry. In a wheat berry there are three parts: the endosperm, the bran, and the germ. Each of them do their own thing to help the berries grow and thrive. We saw his brick oven, talked about how he makes the bread, and even got to taste some! When we were getting on the bus he handed us each a stick of the chocolate that he uses to make chocolate croissants. It was so ...

We made arcade like games from scratch for Family Fun Day! Keane, JJ, and Tobey made a mini basketball game from cans and cardboard. Grace and Scarlett made a game where you fly your airplane into Jack-O-Lantern Airport. It is a game where you try to get a paper airplane into a box. It was fun to think about how to make games for other people and imagine what they would like. It was a fun day and we want to do it again.  Grace and Keane In the fall we had a fall party for Halloween. This year we made games. Some of the games were Cup Flip by Lucy-Ellen and Hailey. There was a game called the String Thing by Rafe, Asahel, and Dylan. There was a game called ring toss by Daphne, Ami and Paloma. There was even a face body board where you could put your face into a cutout and get your picture taken. It was pretty awesome. There was a cup toss by Emile, Tobey, and Keane where you throw the ball into a can and earn points. We thiught it was a lot of fun. Lucy Ellen and Asa...

Since we started school we have been learning about Local Foods. Today, we did a kahoot on local foods. Kahoot is a trivia game where the teachers make questions on a website and we use our iPads to answer. So it is basically a test but a lot more fun. We wanted to see what we remembered from our learning. We talked about the questions and remembered the fun we had in class. Each homestation in 4-5 goes to a class we call units. One of the units classes focused on history, the next focuses on food miles. Then, we went to a class that focused on soil and worms. And finally, we went to a class that focused on herbs and we made smelling jars! A lot of us liked making smelling jars even though it was so so so strong. Want to try? Here are two questions. An Atlatl is: an edible berry the dried skin of a deer a primitive weapon used for hunting the process of grinding food into flour How can you tell if an earthworm is an adult? it has a clitellum it has a full time job...

In 4-5 we get assigned buddies for the year who are in K-1 or EC. In Kai’s class we are partnered with Gretchen's k-1 class. For the first buddies we went to the Piney woods, played  and made alliterations for the first letter of our name. In our last buddies meet up we were working on making/tweaking inventions like a banana, a plane, random buttons, a TV, and a pencil. Some of the tweaks were scents, color, pools, making things appear, and emergency do NOT press buttons.   * challenge *   Can you make a four letter sentence that starts with the first letter of your name? * challenge * can you make a cooler version of a clothing piece? Thank you for reading!!!!!      Livy O.   Gloria F.

The whole Lower School and all of Waynflete is reading The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind by William Kamkwamba and Bryan Mealer. The teachers read it over the summer. It is about a boy who lives in Malawi in Africa. He grows Maize (which is corn) to feed his family. One year, when he was thirteen, there was a big flood. The fertilizer prices were higher and they couldn’t buy it. The flood washed away all the soil. The plants that survived did not survive for long and they had a drought. His family was starving and he had to drop out of school. William makes a windmill to bring electricity to his family and his neighborhood. We made windsocks at convocation connected to the book. It’s a really good story and it is non-fiction.                                  AK

                                                By Ethan In Electricity Club we have been using snap circuits. I bet most people have had experience with them. If you don’t know what they are, they are pretty much just metal wires and electrical boxes like a motor or a light.  We made the first five projects. I highly recommend the electricity club because it is very fun. I don’t know if you will like it, but I do! So why don’t you give it a try! This is Ethan reporting live from Kai’s homestation. Questions or Comments? Email kai at kbicknell@waynflete.org

Last Wednesday Josh, who owns Heritage Seaweed a seaweed shop in Portland, came in and talked about seaweed. We learned that there are many different types of seaweed and it has many different flavors. He told us how good seaweed is for our body and how growing it does not hurt the environment because it doesn't need fertilizer or freshwater to grow. He also makes many different types of snacks including bars and tea that we got to try. Fun fact, if you let seaweed rot it will release a gas that is bad for your lungs. Now we hope you will try seaweed and maybe like it. Rafe and JJ

We went to the Common Ground Country Fair. It was fantastically fun! :) We saw animals, played games and saw/ate good local food and vegetables. We also saw cool stuff like artwork and pet animals. There were a lot of other schools there and the place was busy. We hope to go back next year! Dylan and Tobey