Ocean Study Highlights

Our ocean study made a real splash with students this month! We began by identifying where the different oceans are in the world and created a mini-book.

After reading Wish for a Fish, we learned that the ocean has different zones where certain types of sea life can survive.  We decided to map out the zones in one big poster:

We practiced ordering numbers by placing cards with the measurement in feet of each zone and placing it in the correct section on the poster. Then we used cards with measurements in-between each zone section and put them in the correct spot. After that, we drew pictures of some of the animals and plants that live in each zone!

Students even made their own "Oceans" in a jar, using various materials (corn syrup, water, rubbing alcohol, vinegar and food coloring) to create a division of each zone.

The bottom zone is the trench, which is the darkest, coldest zone. The top zone is the sunny zone, where some of our favorite ocean life lives!

The students particularly enjoyed visiting the tide pools in Corona del Mar, especially after reading all about sea anemones. It was exciting to actually see a few in the rocks around the tide pools!

When we learned about ocean habitats and animal adaptations, we also learned a lot about the ocean food chain. We figured out how and where many creatures obtain their food. For example, when we put a few grapes and some pepper with some water into a container, we realized that it is easier for whales to collect the pepper (which is similar to krill) with their baleen (straw like teeth--we used a toothbrush) than try to bite the grapes (seals). Sharks can more easily use their sharp teeth (we used forks) to bite down on the seals (grapes!)

We spent a lot of time reading about many different sea creatures-- whales, sharks, seahorses, octopuses, jellyfish, dolphins, and manatees to name a few. Each child picked an animal and spent some time researching that animal and completing a mini booklet about that animal-- including it's life cycle, what it eats, how it protects itself, and where it lives. It was so much fun to wrap up our study of these animals with some fun puppet shows and posters that were presented by the students before our end of unit trip to the Aquarium of the Pacific!

We loved visiting the coral reefs, especially after we had explored them via webcam and completed some activities about which animals live in the coral reef habitat v. the kelp forest habitat!

It was awesome getting in some "touch time" with the rays and sharks, and even witness a feeding time!

It was great to get "up close and personal" with some sea anemones, especially since these are so colorful and beautiful!

The aquarium was the perfect way to wrap up our ocean study. It was so impressive to hear the children identify and discuss all that they had learned about each animal as we walked past them in the aquarium!

Ocean Study Curriculum Overview

11/9

• What do we know about oceans? What do we want to know? What/where are the oceans in the world?
• Maps: where are the 5 oceans? Create a mini- book.
• What sea creatures do we know? What do we want to know about them? read aloud (Wish for a Fish)
• Discover ocean layers (chart the layers and the animals that live there--kids fill out chart on own)
• read aloud (A Day in the Deep-- adding information that we’ve learned about layers to our chart)
• Math connection: layers of the ocean in feet- look at a number/match it to zone

11/11

• Ocean zones in a jar project
• What is a habitat? What do we know about Ocean Habitats?
• read aloud (A house for hermit crab) and activity (hermit crab fact book)/drab crab vocab
• read aloud (anemone fish) and create an anemone facts booklet
• mystery science video on habitats

11/16

• What do we know about sharks? what do we want to know about sharks?
• Addition and subtraction games using shark word problems
• Discuss predators/prey, create an actual food chain

11/18- tide pool trip

11/23-

• Food chain/adaptations through hands- on sea urchin activity
• tide pool dioramas
• Ocean animal research (pick animal/KW(L) chart)

• shark
• octopus
• crab
• squid
• seahorse
• anemone fish
• whale

12/2

• Shell investigation/-ell word family
• ocean animal research project
• math connection: shark teeth missing addends game
• Reading comprehension: shells group reading passage
• unscramble shells digraph game (sh/th/ch)

12/7-

• ocean animal research project (research our animal’s life cycle-- look at diagrams, etc.)
• acrostic poems about our animal
• shark subtraction game

12/9-

• Finish animal project poems/life cycle sheets
• Fish for a day aquarium activity
• Ocean animal project

12/14-

• Finish ocean animal project presentations
• Ocean habitats aquarium activity
• Present projects

12/16- Aquarium of the Pacific field trip

One Cup of Flour Recipes

Chocolate Chip Cookies

Ingredients:

1 stick soft butter

¾ cup brown sugar

1 egg

1 tsp. vanilla extract

¼ tsp. salt

1 ¼ cup flour

1 cup chocolate chips

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. Cream butter and sugar together
3. Add egg and vanilla. Mix.
4. Stir in flour, salt, and chocolate chips
5. Scoop into mounds (about 2 tbsp.) and place on greased cookie sheet
6. Bake for 8-12 minutes.

Pretzels

Ingredients:

1 ½ cups warm water

2 ¼ tsp. yeast

1 tsp. salt

1 tbsp. sugar

3 ¾ cups flour

1 egg (beaten)

Sea salt for sprinkling

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Dissolve yeast into warm water. Stir.
2. Add 3 cups flour one at a time. Mix with wooden spoon between each cup.
3. Knead dough on floured surface for 3 minutes. Form a ball and divide it into ⅓ cup sections.
4. Roll out section into long rope. Form into a pretzel shape.
5. Dip pretzel into beaten egg mixture. Place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
6. Bake for 10 minutes.

Vanilla Cupcakes with Buttercream Frosting

Ingredients (for cupcakes):

3 cups flour

2 cups sugar

1 tbsp. baking powder

1 tsp. salt

2 sticks butter, softened

1 tbsp. vanilla extract

4 eggs

1 cup of whole milk

For frosting:

1/4  cup whole milk

2 sticks butter, softened

1 tbsp. vanilla extract

Directions (for cupcakes):

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place paper cups in muffin tin.
2. Mix all of the dry ingredients.
3. Add butter and vanilla. MIx.
4. Add eggs one at a time, beat well.
5. Add milk. Mix.
6. Spoon batter into cups, filling each half way.
7. Bake 18-20 minutes

For frosting:

1. Beat butter and sugar together
2. Slowly add milk and vanilla extract
3. Refrigerate icing for 10 minutes
4. Frost over cooled cupcakes

Challah Bread

Ingredients:

2 tbsp. yeast

3 cups flour

2 tbsp. sugar

2 tsp. salt

2 eggs

1 cup water

(For glaze: 1 egg, 1 tsp sugar)

Directions: Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

1. Mix all of the bread ingredients into a dough, knead for 10 minutes over floured surface.
2. Cover dough in a bowl with a dish towel for one hour.
3. Punch the dough down and let rest another 15 minutes.
4. Divide dough into 3 parts. Roll into thick logs.
5. Put logs onto greased cookie sheet and join logs at the top. Braid the sections together.
6. Cover braid with towel and let rest for 45 minutes.
7. Make glaze and brush onto braid. Bake for 45 minutes.

White Bread

Ingredients:

2 tsp. yeast

2 cups flour

2 tsp. sugar

½ tsp. salt

2 tbsp. butter

¾ cup milk

Directions: Preheat oven to 350 degrees

1. Combine ingredients in a bowl and mix well with wooden spoon.
2. Knead dough on floured surface for 10 minutes.
3. Grease a bowl and put dough in. Cover with dish towel and let sit for 1 ½ hours.
4. Punch dough down. Let it rest for 5 minutes. Grease bread pan with butter.
5. Put dough into bread pan and let it rest for 30 minutes.
6. Bake for 35-40 minutes.

Nutella Brownies

Ingredients:

1 ½ cups semi-sweet chocolate chips, divided

1/2 cup Nutella

1 stick butter   

1 cup sugar

2 large eggs + 1 egg yolk, at room temperature

1 cup all purpose flour (be sure not to pack your flour!)

For topping (optional):

1/2 cup Nutella

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees (F).
2. In microwave, melt the butter and 1/2 cup of the chocolate chips, stirring frequently. Once the butter is completely melted and the chocolate has completely dissolved, stir in the nutella.
3. Add sugar and beat well. Then add eggs, yolk, and finally flour, stirring until just combined.
4. Fold in remaining chocolate chips. Be sure not to over mix the batter or your final product will be cake like brownies, not chewy ones.
5. Pour batter into a lightly greased 8×8 baking dish and bake for 25-30 minutes.
6. Remove from oven; let cool for at least 30 minutes, then cut into squares and serve!
7. If topping, slather with additional nutella

Bakery Study Highlights

Our second project theme we explored was opening a bakery! We introduced the project by brainstorming about different types of bread (sandwich bread, bagels, baguettes, pita, etc.) and some of their countries of origin (France, United States, Egypt, etc.) through a read aloud of Ann Morris' book Bread, Bread, Bread.

After discussing different types of bread, we revisited the scientific method through an experiment using sandwich bread, milk and food coloring. We made a hypothesis about what would happen when we used droppers of milk mixed with food coloring on plain bread and toasted it.

Some thought that maybe the colors would absorb into the bread and disappear. Others thought maybe the colors would seep into the bread and make the bread different colors. That was what happened! We even tried toasting the bread first and then putting the colored milk on top, which had the same effect.

We had been practicing understanding area and perimeter in our planting unit, so we returned to perimeter using bread!  We found the perimeter of a slice of bread by measuring the crusts using materials like rulers, base ten blocks, or small pebbles.

 

We were all so excited to begin baking! Our first recipe was plain white bread. We realized that we would have to know how to tell time, as the recipe called for a lot of waiting for dough to rise! We worked on some time telling skills, such as understanding what each hand on the clock stands for and the increments of minutes between numbers on the clock. We were so happy when the bread was finally done, and it was certainly tasty!

 The next bread we decided to bake were pretzels, in connection with Eric Carle's Walter the Baker. This story teaches about honesty and perseverance, as Walter had to work hard to impress the Duke of the Kingdom with a new type of bread after he admitted his old recipe didn't taste as good because he used water, since he had run out of milk. His new creation ended up being a hit! Pretzels! After reading the story, children brainstormed some of Walter's qualities and created Eric Carle style collages to illustrate a scene where Walter demonstrated this quality in the story. 

When making the pretzels, the kids had fun making all kinds of different shapes.

During our bakery study, we went on our first field trip to Cinderella Cakes! The people there were so nice and let us go into the kitchen and see what working in a bakery is all about!

 

We even got to see some of the bakers decorating special cakes for Dia de los Muertos and Halloween!

And we got to leave with a special sweet treat!

After seeing what it looks like to work in a bakery, we were ready to open our own shop! We decided on the name One Cup of Flour and quickly got to work making signs and menus.

In the days prior to our grand opening, we baked Challah bread, chocolate chip cookies, Nutella Crownies and vanilla cupcakes. We also mixed up some beautiful frosting colors!

One Cup of Flour Bakery was a HUGE success! Thanks to all who helped bring up ingredients and materials!

Bakery Study Curriculum Overview

10/12/15

Question: What do we know/ want to know about bread? brainstorming session

• read aloud (From Wheat to Bread) add to chart with questions and what we’ve learned

Read aloud (The Little Red Hen Bakes Bread): Students use cut out pictures of breadmaking process and put them in correct sequence

Painted toast experiment: Review scientific method and record results.  

Bread perimeter activity: Students predict how many cubes in length each side of the crust of bread is, then measure and record.

Survey: crust or no crust? Students chart the results on a bar graph.

10/14/15

• Read aloud “Bread, Bread, Bread”/discuss and record the types (shapes/sizes/names) of breads we see in the book. Identify and list the countries where they are located-- record what we know/want to know about these countries (look at maps of each country)
• Guess my shape (circle/oval) identify circles and ovals of types of breads from book, outside/around the room
• Kitchen science experiment (use our senses to record what happens to mixtures of baking soda, water and cornmeal with water and vinegar)

10/19/15

• Baking white bread
• Telling time exercises (alongside following recipe for timing--letting bread rise for an hour and a half, baking for 45 minutes, etc.)
• read aloud (Bread and Jam for Frances)
• Rhyming poetry for bread (adjectives)/list poetry
• Sensory journals about bread we baked

10/21/15

• Read aloud: “It’s Challah Time”, talk about food and traditions
• Make challah bread
• Guess my shape (rectangle/square) and explore
• Money math: observe coins and their values. Try to make a dollar using different combinations of coins.

10/26/15-

• Read aloud: Walter the Baker
• Pretzel Making
• Walter the Baker activities

1. Brainstorm characteristics with the whole class. For example: kind, mean, generous, selfish, fair, unfair, etc.

2. Read the book together. The first time, for the story content, and the second time, for character study.

3. Identify the traits of main character (Walter the Baker: hard working, generous, kind, fearful, etc.)

4. Children must prove what they say using evidence from the story.

5. Make a collage using one characteristic.

6. Illustrate the page using Eric Carle painted paper collage techniques.

10/28/15

• Bakery visit Cinderella Cakes
• Read aloud: “Tony’s Bread”
• Cupcake baking/Cookie baking for our own store
• Thank you cards for bakery visit

11/2/15

• Measurement activities based on measurements in recipes (fractions)
• Bake Challah loaf for our store
• Read aloud (Everybody Bakes Bread)
• Bake brownies for store
• Create menu/signs and invitations for store
• Money math/pricing of items/get classroom ready for bakery opening

11/4/15- Shopping day for families/friends.