Tales Of A 4-5 Something

In 4-5 we read My Side of the Mountain . It’s about a boy named Sam, and he ran away from home to go live in the wilderness. He made himself a home by hollowing out a tree. It was really cool ! After a couple weeks he got a little lonely all by himself! When the hunters shoot a deer, Sam takes it right away or hides it. Then he eats the deer meat  and makes clothes out of the skin. Reading this book was part of our Local Food Study because Sam had to either hunt or pick foods from the forest that were especially local. My Side of the Mountain is a very interesting and exciting book. I want to read it again. by Lucy

This year we read Seedfolks by Paul Fleischman. It was a book about a poorer neighborhood that didn't have lots of connections with each other in Cleveland, Ohio. A girl planted Lima bean seeds, then lots of people started planting vegetables and fruits and it turned into a big community garden. The book talked about each character and how they joined the garden in separate chapters. Some of our favorites were Royce who was a strong guy that was hired to protect the garden from people who might want to steal the fruits and vegetables. Another one was Curtis who was a big strong guy who planted tomatoes so his ex-girlfriend, Latisha, could see them and want to date him again. Part of the book we liked was that in every chapter there were new friends getting made and more neighbors joining the garden. By Connor F and Charles H

We had Open House on Thursday night. Our families came in and we showed them our work. We did our attribute trains and read our Lit book. We showed people our food memoirs and a lot of things from our unit class. Rikki, Chris, and Elicia were there too. Parents liked seeing the work and some wished they were in 4th or 5th grade. It was a fun night. Here are some 6 word memoirs: We Lo ve Beal's ice cream a lot.  I like riding horses out west.  Empanadas are fun to make together.  Mom made bad fish, oh yuck! Here are some links from Chris for music: Kusimama: http://www.jwpepper.com/ 10296741.item#.VemRBOkxEXU Winter Wonders: http://www.jwpepper.com/ Winter-Wonders/10028992.item#. VeiwlukxEXU El Condor: http://www.jwpepper.com/ 10204629.item#.Vei1u-kxEXU Like a Mighty Stream: http://www.jwpepper.com/Like- a-Mighty-Stream/3296955.item#. Vei1kekxEXU

WHAT WE DO AT RECESS   BY IAN CAMPBELL At recess, we love to play two-touch football. Sometimes, if there's a very small amount of people, we play with blockers and rushers. Not always do we get passed to, but it's still fun! We have just added a new play area. If you ever come in from the side gate, there is a large sandbox. That’s where we're now allowed to play! We like to play tag, “cook” in the upper sandbox kitchen, and more than half  of the people in 4-5 like to play football! "I like to play soccer and football at recess," says Basil DiBenedetto. "I like to play football at recess because I like sports," says Colin Smith-Hoops. "I like to play sports and hang out with my friends," says Yen Wilson. "I think the upper play space is cool,” says Liam Mahar. A Lot of people like to play tag, and watch football.

   http://www.sunflowerfarm.info/

On Thursday, October 8th 4-5 took a trip to Sunflower Farm. We saw awesome animals like goats, pigs, and dogs. They all were very nice and kind to each and every one of us! We liked to hang out with them and feed them grass and hay. It was cool seeing all of the goats, they said they had about 26 of them! We got to go into the pen and pet the goats and we got to choose one to examine and learn about. We then wrote a short note to a goat, aka  some info about the goat we learned about.  We also went into their kitchen and we watched Hope, the farmer, do the first step to make cheese. It was cool to watch and it smelled really bad but it was still fun! After that we went outside and got to taste some of their goat cheese with crackers. They were super yummy. We also got to try some caramel. It was super good, but instead of crackers we had vanilla cookies. It was amazing and we thought it was awesome that they could make all of that homemade and fresh. All in all it was a supe...

Two weeks ago we found out our K-1 buddies! We do a lot of stuff with our buddies. We go to Pachanga together, we read to our buddies, and maybe even go on a field trip with them. On the first day we played a game called Shoe Stew. It`s a game where everybody takes off one shoe and throws it into the middle and creates a “shoe stew.” Someone starts by going into the middle and picks a shoe and tries to find the owner of the shoe.  After that we read to our buddies for about a half an hour. On normal days we usually just read. That is what we do with our buddies and we think we will have lots of fun with out buddies for the rest of the year. Tobias and Seth 

On October 5, 2015 Lou came to 4-5 to explain about primitive skills in the wilderness. He also took us to the Fore River Campus to demonstrate fire making, atlatl, and useful plants! Before he showed us the demo fire we pulled the string fibers apart for him to demonstrate with..At the FRC we played quiet games and learned the fox walk. (It is where you feel the ground before putting your feet down.) One of the games was “Oh Deer.” Each person had a leaf and put it near the person in the pickle jar and got back to their spot in the circle. Charlie D. and Cole

Today on October 7, 2015 the 4-5 went to Tortilleria Pachanga on a field trip for our local food study. Nancy’s friend Lynne Rowe is the owner of the business. One of the things we did was wash the corn after it had soaked with limestone powder, to get the husk off. After the corn was washed we ground the wet soaked and cooked corn. We pressed the dough called masa into balls and pressed it with a tortilla press into tortilla shape. Then we cooked it on a griddle. We put salsa and cheese on it and ate it. We got to make and eat our own tortillas and they were soft and delicious. Lynne uses dried dent field corn for her tortillas. She only gets corn from Maine and Vermont and she is the only tortilla factory in Maine. She sells her tortillas to local stores and farmer’s markets like Rosemont. We learned that there are green, blue, yellow, white and red corn. Corn has been domesticated since 10,000 BC. It was a great trip! by Nancy’s homestation On October 7th, we traveled to the To...