What a marvelous first day!

MORNING CIRCLE

After our first ‘22-’23 Flag Assembly, 2G experienced their first Morning Circle.

Everyone introduced themselves to Meara, and shared with her one thing they enjoyed over the summer break.

(A few students claimed their summers were endless misery, but later revelations suggest they were pulling our legs—hard—at Morning Circle!)

For our daily world tale, Ms. Cunningham chose a fairy tale from Austria, “The Frog’s Wedding.”

2G names the seven continents and established that Austria was in Europe. Along the way we discovered that San Diego is in the state of California, Seattle is in Washington state, and Russia, though certainly a “large land mass” was a country rather than a continent.

Then it was “I’m Going to the Moon,” a fun game to check that story details were noted and remembered, and could be recalled.

With young students, memory is one thing and memory retrieval quite another! (The information is “there,” but can I get to it and express it in a timely manner?)

BREAKS

Dr. Cat got his guitar out for Snack Break and was surprised to learn many students already knew “The R.E.S.P.E.C.T. Song”!

He’s guessing Ava’s older sister, Theo and Dean’s older brothers, and Nicson’s older brother and sister might have had something to do with it.

Our first recess on the makai (lower) playground was with 1G! Such fun! Such ENERGY!

Emily, one of our 2G Mentors, brought her sketch book and together with her sister Lauren are inspiring a new generation of artists. (Lauren and Emily were awesome artists when in 2G, many years ago, and they’ve only gotten better since!)

TREE HOUSE NEWS

2G began its first Tree House News today. “My Summer” was the topic.

We divided up into our 3-Station Rotation groups — Red, Rust and Purple — with Ms. Cunningham, Lauren and Emily leading. Dr. Cat hovered over and dive bombed all the groups!

Step 1: Drawing. Drawing is writing for young students. Drawing what you know you’ll be writing about helps prime all the writing neurons in the brain!

Step 2: A rough draft. “Don’t worry about spelling and punctuation—we’ll make it perfect LATER—just get your ideas down!”

And while only three sentences were required, some students went to town writing as much as two pages!

Step 3: Making it perfect. Rough drafts were reviewed with Ms. Cunningham, Lauren, Emily and Dr. Cat and “made perfect”!

Students did an awesome job sounding out challenging words and phrases like “people,” “friends,” and “The Statue of Liberty.” Great listening to the phoneme in the words, great letter choices, letter choices correctly ordered, and known phonics rules applied! Bravo!

Step 4: Final Draft (and finishing up drawings). With a “made perfect” copy in hand, students—showing their best handwriting—wrote their final drafts below their pictures.

We hope to have all Tree House News stories 100% complete by the end of the week! Stay tuned!

LUNCH: FAMILY STYLE

In 2G, we eat lunch together family style!

Seating is determined by The Bucket of Randomness, so students may well find themselves sitting next to someone “new” every day!

Our first 10 minutes are silent, allowing us to focus on recharging our batteries (rather than chit-chatting!). Then student can talk, play on the green—or in our sandbox. We think this year is going to be a sandbox year!