Skype: Gracyn demonstrated all the gymnastic moves she's been practicing all year: walkovers, 1/2 handed cartwheel, handstands, headstands, flips, back walkovers and splits. She practiced them several times during class. Gracyn had lots of energy today.

Gracyn did science through Skype today. She took an end of unit assessment on living things and their young. She also began a lesson on the life cycle of a butterfly. We discussed the different stages of the butterflies life and drew a diagram of each stage. She watched a video on the life cycle and we began reading a book on a butterfly called, "Marc Learns to Fly".

Gracyn continued practicing how to add coins. She drew each of the coins, wrote the name, and the amount. Then, she determined how many of each coin was needed to make one dollar. I also verbally gave her an amount of coins that she added to find the sum.

Gracyn and I read another chapter of our read aloud book, 'The Little Princess', with lots of stopping to think aloud about the characters and actions. We began a new word study of long and short /u/ including cvc, cvce, cvvc (oo) and cvvc (ui) patterns. We cut and sorted the words and did a speed read of all the words. Gracyn started a new Katie Woo book, to be completed tomorrow.

Today we discussed the difference in sound between major and minor pieces. Gracyn listened to several pieces in minor keys. We did some improvisational playing, and played through several pieces in the Bastien primer. We also practiced "It's a Small World."

Gracyn and I reviewed and went over topics covered in our last class. Gracyn used maps to locate regions and identify cardinal and intermediate directions. We read about Harriet Tubman and about Sacagewea and her travels with Lewis and Clark to the northwest territory. Gracyn has seen the Natural History Museum in New York and plans to visit it. We read in "Time for Kids" magazine about a current exhibit there called "Cuba". We also discussed again famous African American heroes in honor of black history month and saw a gold coin that will be minted in the next year with the face of an African American woman on it to honor the diversity of our nation. We reviewed continents, oceans, directions, and landforms. Gracyn created a Maps and Globes mini book. We began a lesson about Lewis and Clark from the textbook. We read in "Time for Kids" about salt and about ocean explorers and different zones in the ocean.

design fundamentals. Gracyn started a new painting today. She is using the "element" of "impressionism" to do this piece. Using spring colors, she will complete this picture next week.

Gracyn used a place value mat containing the ones, tens, and hundreds place. She picked 3 digit number cards from a pile and used base ten blocks to accurately represent the number on the mat. Then, she practiced grouping tens into hundreds and adding the remaining tens to make 3-digit numbers.

Gracyn and I went to the library to exchange books for the week, she made some good selections. We worked on her narrative for much of our lesson, she wrote the lesson and high point of the story, she is thinking about her ending. We started the read aloud, 'The Little Princess'. Gracyn saw the connection to the story of 'Annie' immediately and she predicted that Miss Minchin would not be as kind as she promises to be.

I am still working on "mental math" with her. I want her to be able to do some basic addition and subtraction in her head without using her fingers. I am focused on working to the 10s with her (pairs that create 10). For example, 6 and 4, 7 and 3, 5 and 5, 8 and 2, 9 and 1. She started to show memory of her 'pairs.' I was able to do some subtraction using the concept of the 'pairs that create 10' and then go into addition and subtraction to the 100 (eg. 100-60 = 40, 6 and 4 are paired to create 10).