we had several lessons from Ms. Rosa this week. Ms. Rosa Newman Hall is the Program Coordinator for Black Belt Garden Center for the Study of the Black Belt, which is located on UWA's campus.

our first lesson was on sharks and their teeth.

here is a pic of teeth found in montgomery. she showed the students, with several different examples, how a shark's teeth are constantly regenerating and once one tooth falls out, another tooth is ready to fall into place. she said some sharks can go through 10,000 in their lifetime!

this jaw is from a shark that washed up on shore in Bon Secour. They believe it was hit by a boat but are unsure. the teeth were very sharp so the students were only able to observe but it was an excellent example of seeing how many teeth the shark had in its gums just waiting to take the place of a lost tooth.

our second lesson was about fossils and fossils found in Alabama. we learned about the Mosasaur and looked at a 65 million year old fossil.

this is a cow's vertebrae

we learned that the mammoth and saber tooth tiger both lived in Alabama.

this is a replica of a saber tooth.

this is a crab fossil!!!

this jaw is over 5 feet long which meant the animal was over 60 feet long!

our final lesson was on sea turtles

we learned the 2 parts of a turtle's shell:

The upper shell of the turtle is called the carapace.

The lower shell that encases the belly is called the plastron.

Wikipedia

we learned that sea turtle eggs are about the size of a ping pong ball. the top layer of the nest is made of empty eggs to deter predators. the sex of the turtles depends on the temperature of the nest. a warmer nest will produce male turtles, and a cooler nest will produce female turtles. eggs are laid 5-6 times per season. the turtles will begin to hatch after 60 days.

William got to dress up as a turtle!

a special thank you to Ms. Rosa! we learned so much from her and cannot wait for her to come back and teach us something else!

Sumter County's Sheriff Department visited our school and spoke to the children about getting lost or abducted. As much as we don't like the subject or how often we think it can't happen to us, the reality is just the opposite.

the students then helped the team members create Child ID kits. height, weight, sex, hair color, fingerprints, etc... were recorded on a card that will be sent home to parents to keep in their records just in case the unthinkable happens.

we are also making books to go along with our biome, oceans. the students are choosing what animals they would like to include in the story and are illustrating the cover and each page. We are using Bare Books for all of the student-created books. click {here} for more information!

Miss Shemshat provided us a lesson on manners Tuesday.

the students brainstormed a list of good manners...

and then went around the room using those manners on their friends.

the students watched a short video on good manners...

and then watched an episode of

Маша и Медведь

(pronounced Masha i Misha)

even thought the cartoon is in Russian, the students could understand that the young girl was not using good manners and it was causing some issues. Miss Shemshat translated for us, too.

we are still enjoying our atlas lessons each day. we have learned the difference between a map and a globe, what we can and cannot see on a globe vs a world map, we have learned what a continent is and how to locate them on a world map/globe,

we have learned interesting facts about the blue-ringed octopus, spiny lobster, Portuguese man-of-war, grey seal,

here are some of our journal topics this week:

Dr. Green-Burns and Miss Shemshat held a group session about manners at home.

I taught the students how to play a friendly version of hangman.

we had a lesson on nutrition Thursday. the students chose a food from the bag and then had to hold their food up when the corresponding food group was called.