We finished our class novel, When You Trap a Tiger—a story that was so beautiful, sad, and hopeful all at once. After finishing, students were inspired to dive into our mural project and collaborated on how they wanted it to look. We’ve named it A Visual Ode When You Trap a Tiger , as it beautifully captures the imagery and emotions they visualized while reading. Some students added favorite lines from the novel to the mural. The mural is still in progress, but we can’t wait to share the finished product next week!
We also discussed what an ode is and began writing our own—each student choosing something meaningful to celebrate through poetry. I’m looking forward to reading these!
In Everyday Math, students continued practicing unit conversions and discussed why this skill is so important in solving real-world problems. We also worked on finding the volume of rectangular prisms and other 3D shapes.
In Science, with Ms. Anna’s class, each group planted their seeds according to the diagrams they created last week. Students carefully measured and recorded how much water they added, then covered the bins with plastic wrap to create a greenhouse effect. Our class variable is organic vs. regular potting soil—half of the groups used organic soil, while the others used standard potting mix. We’re eager to observe how this affects the growth of our plants over time!
Low on pictures this week, but will have more next week!
We are now in the final chapters of When You Trap a Tiger, a book filled with beautiful imagery and descriptive language. To bring the story to life, students have begun sketching illustrations inspired by specific lines from the novel. We’ve also started our class mural, and students are truly taking the lead—deciding how they want the images to appear and bringing their own interpretations of the story to the artwork. This is one of my favorite parts of the process, as it shows how deeply immersed each student is in the novel and what they are taking away from it.
This week, we also watched a video about the parting of the Jindo Sea, an incredible natural phenomenon known as a tidal miracle, which is described in one of the folktales the tiger shares with Lily. (Ask your student about it!)
Next week, we will continue exploring the story by researching more about Korean history and culture, especially the role of tigers in Korean folklore.
In Mindset Math, we completed the exploration Solids, Inside and Out, where students built connections between 2D and 3D representations of solids. Using different views of a rectangular solid, groups worked together to construct a model out of 60 cubes in four equal color sets so that it matched the given 2D views. This was a challenging task, but students rose to the occasion and groups worked together to build successful models!
The final challenge was to determine what the inside of the solid looked like—a puzzle we worked through together until we figured it out.
Activities like this strengthen students’ spatial reasoning, problem-solving, and perseverance—important skills not only for math but for many real-world situations where they’ll need to visualize, analyze, and stick with a challenge.
In Everyday Math, we continued exploring volume and learned a new game called Prism Pile-Up. Students also revisited unit conversions and began practicing early geometry skills, including identifying line segments and angles formed by intersecting lines. These skills are important building blocks that will help students make sense of shapes, space, and measurement in more complex problem-solving situations.
In Science, we continued our seed planting experiment with Ms. Anna’s class. Each group began designing their planting bins by creating detailed diagrams in their lab books to show where their two types of seeds will be planted. This required thoughtful group discussion and collaboration as students worked to decide on the best planting arrangements.
Next week, students will move from planning to action—planting their seeds, determining the appropriate depth, setting a watering schedule, and deciding on the best placement for sunlight.
We also began collecting images for the covers of our writing notebooks. Students enjoyed cutting out pictures from magazines that reflect things they love. This activity is always a favorite—it’s creative, personal, and helps build a sense of community in our classroom.
