iPads?

Well, most of us received our iPads today and got them set up. However, a few 4th graders did not as they had never been delivered to Tharp from their elementary and Mrs. Schultz hadn't realized it until we tried handing them out. She was going to contact all of the elementaries and get them to us ASAP! The students that didn't receive theirs were bummed but handled themselves very nicely. :)

While the opposite grade was setting up their iPads, the others took their first math unit pre-test. This is our first look into our students as mathematicians. The first units on whole numbers and operations will most likely take just a short amount of time to make sure they know the depth of the concepts, can think abstractly about the topics and can attend to precision when completing procedural computation (+, -, x, /). After we got all of the kiddos back together, we read a bit from Fish In a Tree. Ally has a new teacher and he seems to be set on personalizing their learning. I can't wait to see what he discovers and how Ally changes. Then, we discussed our "why." We can all do the what but the why is what makes it important and special. From our "why," we picked our one word. This one word is going to remind us each day of our why so that we stay focused on the importance of what we are doing. Some words were: success, focus, grow, challenge, fit... After lunch, recess and quiet time, we read one of my favorite books, Black Dog. It was about a black dog but it was really a symbol for something bigger. Next, we talked about why dogs bark and when and that some dogs bark more than others. Finally, we watched a video that compares our brains to a barking dog and how we need to calm and connect with our "barking dog" before we can solve the problems that set our barking dog off. Check out the video here: https://vimeo.com/109042767.