Did you know...
One tree removes the same number of pollutants as a car emits in 26,000 miles.
Arbor Day is a holiday for the future, whereas most holidays celebrate the past!
Half the world's trees were cut down during industrialization--from 6 trillion down to 3 trillion!  

Well, Celebrate the Beat is just about the most fun we've ever had at school. Thanks Ms. Colleen and Ms. Emma.  We can't wait to keep learning and dancing with you over the next three weeks.

Here are just a few pictures of an amazing day as we rotated through some fascinating learning stations with RMBL scientists today. We learned about Gothic history (Ute Native Americans, miners, scientists, and RMBL). We learned about fossils and LONG ago history (did you know Gothic used to buried under a mid-continental ocean?). We learned how to classify plants using a dichotomous key. We learned how to take a transect of an ecosystem to learn about the biotic and abiotic elements in an area. We love being scientists! Thanks RMBL!

We're so lucky to have Mountain Roots helping us with our ecosystem science unit.  We've learned all about ecosystem components and now we're learning about classification.  We started in the garden today with classifying all the different plant families.  Check it out!

This year we're learning math in a workshop format.  This means we are usually working in small groups, learning from each other, and working through our struggles collaboratively.  
Right now we're working on solving multi-step number stories.  We're figuring out what to do with the information presented and solving problems in many different way.  It's hard work and it can be frustrating, unless we work together and share our thinking.

Today we shared our ecosystems.  It was a really cool celebration of this amazing place we call home.  The diversity of plants, bugs, and soil types we have hanging out on the windowsill is pretty impressive.  We're especially excited to see how ecosystems from different parts of the same area (like Slate River) compare over time.  We'll be observing until October break.

We've been talking a lot about belonging as we create our fourth grade classroom community.  We have the unique privilege of spending the year together and we want to make it THE BEST for each and every individual in the classroom.  Check out this awesome, award winning video based on the book The Lost Thing by Shaun Tan.