January 2, 2013
Back to school!  I faced today with both excitement and trepidation.  I know I wanted a few more days of vacation and I am sure the kids did, too!  But once I beeped into the school and saw how the custodians had really worked to shine it up, I was actually glad to be back and looking forward to seeing my kids.

We had a sad occurrence during the break, as we lost a student to a very rare, but fatal infliction, (HLH) I asked Paulette if she knew anything about it, and in her 40 years of being a Pediatrician, she had neither seen nor heard of it.  This, I passed on to the kids who were struggling with Julio's death, and were confused at how and why he caught it.  I used Paulette's word, "just, dumb, awful luck.....really bad luck...."  This seemed to help.

I got my lesson plan binder back from Rich, today....looks like I dodged that bullet.  There were no comments!  I may have Stephanie Doucette look at it anyway to get some insight.  But for right now, so far, so good.

I firmed up the lunches for the field trip on the 10th.  Looks like we are set to go!  I just have to get the permission slips out and signed... collect $3.00 from each student and hold my breath!  I LOVE field trips, and I know something will go wrong, but I really think we will have an amazing time!

My 6th graders came in today, with tales of seeing Orion in the sky during  break and had truly checked it out on the Internet!  They even asked what was that big bright, non-twinkling star-thingy in the low horizon.....JUPITER!  They were psyched, but not as much as I was!

This week, I am going to have them play with the triple beam balance and try to grow some soil/yeast.......

Next week we move on to the ice-age in anticipation of the Wooly Mamouth and Mastidon exhibit at the museum,

I am saving up some of the Know Atom activities for Spring, when I know we will have some down time to fill.soil growing may be one of them!