Celebrating Veterans Day!

On November 11, America celebrates Veterans Day. It is the day we honor the men and women who have served in the armed forces. Veterans Day is a national holiday. This year, Veterans Day is observed on Monday, November 12. 

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Photo by Mrs. Yollis

Veterans: Men and women who have served in the armed forces.

Soldiers: Men and women who are currently serving in the armed forces.

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Here is a link to a wonderful BrainPop

 video about America's Armed Forces.

What did you learn about the 

Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, and Coast Guard?

Here are some fabulous "Make a Map" 

examples made in class!

Kishor's Map

Samantha's Map

Katie's Map

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To help us learn about Veterans Day and the men and women who serve, I asked my students if any of their family members are in the military or are veterans. We honor our veterans and soldiers with this blog post! 

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Our superintendent

NAVY: Meet our district superintendent, Dr. Stepenosky. As you can see, he served in the Navy. From 1990 to 1994, he was on the USS Chancellorsville which was a guided missile cruiser. It was 9,000 tons and had a crew of 330. Notice the destroyer in the background.

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Lily's grandfather

ARMY: Meet Lily's grandpa, Dr. William Zanger. This photo was taken in 1971. He served in the Dental Corp as a Captain of the United States Army. He was stationed in Fort Benning, Georgia and Fort Polk, Louisiana from 1970 through 1972. The baby in the picture is Lily's mother, Sybil.

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Scarlett's grandfather

NAVY: Meet Dr. Tocchet who was born and raised in Summit Hill, Pennsylvania. He joined the Navy in 1963 while attending medical school at Temple University in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Following his studies, Paul assumed active duty as an intern at Camp Pendleton, California, before serving overseas. He was attached to a Marine Corps combat M.A.S.H. unit in Viet Nam from 1966-67. He then completed his final two years as a general medical officer at the Naval Station in Monterey, California, until his honorable discharge in 1969. 

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Hana's uncle

MARINE: Meet Hana’s Uncle Josh who served in the United States Marine Corps. He was an electrician who worked on FA-18 jets. He was stationed at Miramar Air Station and was deployed to the Persian Gulf twice. He also went to Australia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates.

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Rebecca's grandfather

ARMY: Meet Rebecca's grandfather Barney who served in the army during World War II. He was a private and served in the Aleutian Islands in Alaska. His brother Sammy was also a private in the Army and fought and died in the Battle of the Bulge.

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Faith's great-grandfather

NAVY: Meet Grandma Barb's dad, Faith’s Great-Grandpa, who served in the Navy during World War II. He served on a destroyer called the USS Gainard. Though his mother was a widow and none of her five sons would have had to enlist, they all did. 

Faith’s great-grandpa was the youngest in his family, only 17 years old, and a few months away from graduating from high school when he wanted to enlist in the Navy. Since he was under 18, he had to get special permission from his mother, Faith’s great-great-grandma, to enlist. At the time of his high school graduation ceremony, Faith’s great-grandpa was already in the Navy so his mother went to school that night to receive his diploma for him. 

Faith’s great-great-grandma was very proud of all of her sons. The second photo shows all five sons in their uniforms. One son was in the Navy, one was in the Air Force, two were in the Army, and one was in the Marines. They were stationed all over the world. During the war, families put a star in the front window of their homes to indicate they had a loved one in the war. Faith’s great-great grandma had FIVE stars in her front window. Miraculously, Faith’s great-grandpa and all of his brothers returned home from war safe and sound and proud to have served their country.

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Ben's great-grandfather

ARMY: Meet Ralph Linore, Ben's great-grandfather. He was a United States Army sergeant who proudly served from 1942 to 1945 in WW II.

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Are any of your relatives or friends veterans?

Please tell us about them and thank them for their service!

Video: America's Landmarks

Although the school year is coming to an end in the northern hemisphere, we made time to create a wonderful global project with our blogging buddy, Mrs. Morris, and her students in Australia.

This project celebrates TEN years of global collaboration with Mrs. Morris!

Each class wanted to share their country's landmarks, so students researched famous landmarks, created a script, located Creative Commons images, and then filmed a fabulous movie. The Do Ink app was used to take each student to the location being shared.

Enjoy America's Landmarks!

Here is a link to our Australian buddies Landmark Video!

We hope you enjoy visiting these famous American landmarks! 

What questions do you have? 

We will try and answer questions before school gets out this week!

Global Project: Same Day in March

As is so often the case, I found a wonderful global project via Twitter! 

The global project is called Same Day in March! 

This collaborative project is a fabulous way to learn about weather, geography, technology, and culture. Thanks to Mrs. Ladd and Ms. Stefopoulou for creating and facilitating this project! Follow the project on Twitter using the hashtag #sdim18.

Today was day 1, but you can join at any time during the month of March. To kick off the project, we went outside with some weather tools. 

Photo by Mrs. Yollis

We used thermometers for measuring the air temperature and set up a rain gauge to measure the forecasted rain on Friday. 

Photo by Mrs. Yollis  

Learning how to read the thermometer was one of the first lessons we learned. 

Photo by Mrs. Yollis 

 From the NOAA National Weather Service, we learned that it will definitely be raining tomorrow! Good thing we have our rain gauge out to see how many inches of rain we receive. 

Don't forget your umbrella tomorrow! 

Photo by Mr. Seliskar 

UPDATE:

Although rain was predicted throughout the day, we only received .3 of an inch from 8:00 until 2:00. 

We used Google Earth to "visit" the communities that are in the project. As we zoomed out, we tried to classify each community. Is it an urban community, a suburban community, or a rural community? Some students took a screenshot and uploaded the information to Seesaw and added it to our "Same Day in March" folder. 

We also placed sticky notes on the locations. What do you notice about the classes that joined from the United States?

Are there any classes in the project that live in a place that is new to you? Because of their location, will their weather be similar to ours?

What are the names of some clouds we might see? What do they look like?  

Happy Independence Day, America!

This post was first published on July 4, 2010.

By Mrs. Yollis 

Buck says, Happy Birthday America!#doink @DoInkTweets #4thOfJuly pic.twitter.com/tALMm3BQFQ

— Linda Yollis (@lindayollis) July 4, 2016

July 4th is Independence Day in America!

On July 4, 1776, the Declaration of Independence was adopted by the Continental Congress in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. This document announced America's independence from Britain.

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Seven years ago I was with my family on the Fourth of July, and we had a special event planned for the day.

My family had three old, tattered flags that needed to be retired. So on July 4th, we had a retirement ceremony.

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The United States Flag Code states: "The Flag, when it is in such condition that it is no longer a fitting emblem of display, should be destroyed in a dignified way, preferably by burning."

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First, we sang some patriotic songs!

Then, my cousin Jon gave a short speech. Finally, we retired the old flags to the fire.

Click here to learn how to fold an American flag. 

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How will you spend the Fourth of July?

Decades Day!

Last Friday was a special school spirit day, 

Decades Day!

This spirit day gave us a chance to talk about fads. A fad is something that is very popular for a short time, and fads can be a lot of fun! Fads often involve fashion, an activity, or some kind of toy or trinket.

The 1950s were popular!

Check out those poodle skirts, rolled up jeans, white t-shirts, and even a pink lady! 

 A 1950s black leather jacket. 

I see two pairs of saddle shoes...very 1950s.

How many poodles? How many poodle legs?

Hint, use mulitiplication! 

The 1960s hippies were happening!

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Cool man! Look at those groovy threads! 

I see head bands, daisies, peace beads, and braids.

Photo by Stella

1980s

Nice looking neon colors and wild hair! 

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Often times, there are dance fads that are associated with a decade.

We learned The Twist from Chubby Checker. This dance craze was popular in the 1960s.

We also learned a more complicated dance from the 1970s, The Hustle. For this dance, we needed to take: four steps back, four steps forward, a grapevine turn to the right, a grapevine turn to the left, ten "Travoltas", two egg beaters, two chickens, and a front, back, side, turn. Repeat.This group dance was a lot of fun! 

Photo coming soon! 

We had 100% participation, so we get to keep Corky, the school coyote mascot, for the week! Here are some photos of Corky and students during Fun Friday!

What was your favorite decade and why?

Tell us about your costume!

Tell us about your decade! Who was president? What was a fad?  What musical groups were popular? Movies? What fashion was popular? Popular phrases?  (Ask your parents.)