A Trebuchet Day!

What an amazing day this Monday was! We learned about one of the inventions that Leonardo Da Vinci modified- the trebuchet. Da Vinci, who was not actually a violent person at all,but was dedicated to protecting his country, Italy from it's enemies. He developed a trebuchet to attack and protect Italy from being invaded by neighboring countries. The trebuchet worked very much like a catapult, using counterweights to launch and sling objects from a basket. When the launcher was set loose,the counterweight would swing down and send the launching arm and whatever was in the basket flying through the air in an arc. Mr. Zawis built a model trebuchet for us to try out ourselves. We put our scientists hats on, and followed the steps of the scientific method as we launched various holiday objects to see how their weight would effect the distance that they flew. Not only did everyone do a fantastic job weighing, launching, and measuring, but also exemplified excellent teamwork throughout the process. I am so proud of each and every student involved!
Thank you all for your thoughtful gifts. I am so fortunate to work with these fantastic children and I am thrilled to see what 2008 brings for us. I wish you and your families a wonderful holiday.
Enjoy the slide show!

Da Vinci Trebuchet

Today in gifted,we did a really cool experiment called Da Vinci Trebuchet.
We got a marsh mellow, a choclate bell,a ordiment,and a pepper mint.
First, we would weight all of the objects.
Then, we would launch all the items in a Trebuchet and measure how far they flew. A Trebuchet is something that was used in the mid evil times.
Finally, we watched a video on two kids and what they did with a Trebuchet.
While Mrs.Phillips was there.
We all had alot of fun.

Written by, Abby and Alexis

Da Vinci

Today in gifted we learned about Da Vinci . We made our own version of the Mona Lisa which is Da Vinci's most famous painting . We gave our paintings a title written backwards . We drew the Mona Lisa step by step . One of the easiest ways to read backwards words is by holding it up to a mirror which we did to check our work . No one knows if the Mona Lisa is a male or Female . Another interesting thing is the Mona Lisa's mysterious smile . She blends in to the backround of the painting . And wherever you go she will be looking at you .

-Kyle and Jack

Hink Pinks

The most fun I had in GIFTED was hink pinks that is when we think of a riddle and it has a ryhming ending either in 1 syolable (hink pinks) 2 syolables (hinkey pinkeys) 0r 3 syolables (hinkety pinketys) my riddle was:



what is hinky pinky for a happy food found on bushes





A= A merry berry
from :Andy

Our field trip

Today we went on our field trip to St.Paul's Church to listen to the Trio Virtuosi's play classical music. There was,a violin, a flut,and a piano.2 of the songs they played together,and 3 other songs they played was alone. By,Paula

The Wonderful World of Gifted!

Thank you for coming to open house!

I am so fortunate to work with the very best children and therefore the very best parents in the world. I treasure the days that I spend with each and every student. Thank you to all who attended our open house. It was a pleasure to meet and talk with you. I look forward to getting to know you and your families even more as the year goes on. I am adding the voicethread presentation that we watched last night so that you are able to see it if you were not here. Enjoy!

Rock and Roll is here to stay!

Today in class we looked at some videos of the original singers singing the songs that we are practicing for the musical. It was a lot if fun to see the different singers' unique styles of performance and dress! Here is A clip of Mrs.Zawis' favorite band of all time!

Museum Fun

We had such a great time visiting the Cummer Museum. Our tour guide was wonderful, she really had a nice way of posing questions that made us think deeply about the art work that we saw as we toured the gallery. But I digress...when we arrived at the museum, we first had the opportunity to do some hand on art work ourselves. We made our very own cityscape collages. We learned about background, middle ground, and foreground and how those really change the way a painting of a cityscape comes together. We then explore the hands on part of the museum, where we were able to do just that-touch everything! You'll have to ask the students about some of the funny dancing that was going on in front of the big screen-literally!

Threading our voices

Today in Gifted class we did something called Voice Thread. Where Mrs.Zawis took a picture of us doing something in class and then we all got partners and got a sophiscated sentence and then put on special headphone and recorded us explaining what it means. And thats what we did in Gifted today!By Chris

Building Our Civilizations!

Exciting Field Trip!

We are thrilled to report that we were able to reserve seating for the ONLY matinee performance of Cirque de Soleil coming on January 17th. We even got orchestra seating...so we're all going, K-5. Mark your calendar, permission slips will be coming home soon and we'll need to get them back to pay our deposit. I can't wait. I have always wanted to go to one of their amazing productions. I hope you'll be excited too!

Extra! Extra! Blog all about it!

I am so excited to work with this fantastic group of 3rd graders and hope that you (parents and students alike) have taken the time to check out our class blog. Each time that we have gifted, a different student adds a post to our blog about various activities that we worked on in class that particular day. I can't help but to join in on the fun and will be adding my own posts to update everyone on our classroom events as well. Over the past few weeks, we have been working with one another to create our own civilizations. After reading the book Weslandia by Paul Fleischman, the story of a boy named Wesley who creates his own civilization and names it quite appropriately, we were inspired to do the same. We researched several ancient civilizations in order to understand what elements they were comprised of, and coupled with Weslandia, took off on our own adventure. Each pair of students planted seedlings (or crops), came up with a list of various components of their civilization and are now working on maps to display their civilization. We have also been studying various artists and composers including Van Gogh and Handel. We painted our own versions of Starry Night and constructed opera houses out of paper. Whew- and our field trip to the Cummer Museum is just around the corner. We are having such a great year and I'll continue to keep you "posted" each week!

Awsome day at gifted!

I cant wait until next week becase next week is our fild trip!
we had an awsome day at gifted today we did Tea anyone?,witch is when we rubed tea bags on a sheet of paper witch is a map for our civilization in our classroom and we also practiceed for our musical witch is in January.



Writen by,
Lauren

what I did in gifted today

I relly liked still lifes and I painted a water bottle.A still life is when you paint something like an object that dosen`t move.We researched ancient civilizations.Kyle & I studied ancient Egypt.We did a riddle rebus & we practiced for the musical.Bye,Bye-Jake.

The most fun day at gifted

We started are own land this week.It was cool because we got to do a cutting of a plant.Today we made Handel opera houses which we decorated to look like a real opera house.Gifted is so much fun!
caitlin Lexi

The most fun day at gifted

what I did in special class

I like letter tricks I like stacking letters on top of each other.we finished starry night.we did wanted posters about scientists.we learned two new songs for
our musical.
bye,



abby and madeline

Greetings and Salutations!

Hooray- I am so excited because tomorrow is finally the first day of gifted for third grade! What a long wait it has been between the first week of school, Labor Day, etc--but here we are- we've found our way to the first day. I am really looking forward to meeting and getting to know each and every student. We are going to have such a fantastic time learning together- I can hardly wait!

Me-The Little Mermaid?

One of my favorite Disney movies to watch as a kid was The Little Mermaid. I think that my sister and I had the entire movie memorized- we even had a tape of the soundtrack so that we could sing alond to every song. I think that I secretly wanted to be Ariel- a free spirited explorer who swam around wither her friends all day. This week, the teachers had to do some fun activities on our first day back to school and would you believe that one of these involved logging on to a website, taking a quiz, and finding out which Disney character you were most like?! Well, wouldn't you know, much to my excitement, I was most like Ariel. I guess some dreams really do come true -in a funny roundabout way! Which Disney character are you most like? Click the quiz to find out.

Blogging 101!

Yeah! What an accomplishment! I've survived "Blogging 101" which is certainly a feat in and of itself, as I do not consider myself technologically savvy by any means. Now that I have my very own window into the world, I am excited to begin exploring. What a fun way for me to integrate my love of writing and constant desire to learn. I always say that if I could afford to spend my life taking classes and learning, I would!