Exhausted from testing ....Let's make Pi Skylines

     Once again, testing season is here.The way we scheduled testing in my building was to take one test per day and then see all of our classes for shortened periods of 30 minutes. We were able to do the paper pencil test this year as our school does not have the infrastructure in place to test the entire school on computers yet. The district I teach in has over 40,000 students so to have computer access for so many students is quite a task to undertake. So after the third of five days of testing, my students didn't want to do anything. They were exhausted and you know how kids are when you change the schedule. That third day was the Friday before Pi Day and we were having our annual Pi Day competition during the lunch periods and they were excited about that. I had all kinds of fun activities planned but the kids were too crazy so I know how to calm them down. We color. Yes, in 8th grade sometimes we color. It always calms them down. I found this activity at  What do we do all day  on how to make a Pi skyline. This was a perfect activity to help the kids relax and it fit the theme of the day. All you need for this activity is graph paper, rulers, a list of the numbers of Pi and colored pencils. I put on some music and we all just relaxed and colored. Everyone was happy and smiling. What could be better than that and it was a great way to end the week. I love how the pictures turned out and it puts some needed color in my classroom.

     

I love how these turned out!

A close up of some of the pictures.

This one is my favorite.

A night scene.

Very colorful.

This one looks like a sunrise. Nice!

If you have some ways that you add math and art into your classroom, I would love to see it.

Til next time,
Jan

And now for something completely different - Monarch Butterfly Habitats

      I love gardening and getting into the garden during the summer is something I look forward to all year. Flowers are my passion and my hubby plants a large vegetable garden for us. I spend hours a week in my garden working in it and enjoying my flowers. Everyday when I walk into school, I hate looking at the front of our building because it doesn't have flowers anywhere. It's just plain out boring. There actually use to be beautiful flowers in front but someone pulled them all out. UGH! So to remedy this situation, Donna, a science teacher at my building and I are starting a gardening club with the kids. What fun! While I was trying to decide what we should plant, I ran across interesting pins on Pinterest explaining how to plant butterfly gardens, specifically Monarch Butterfly gardens. I've always wanted to plant a butterfly garden and when I read that Monarch Butterflies are endangered I knew I needed to plant one. Well actually, I will be planting two, one at school and one at home. (Shhh, don't tell my husband, he doesn't know yet that he is going to be building it for me. I just plant he does the rest. LOL ) The nice weather cannot get here soon enough for me.

 Here is some information I read on the National Wildlife Federation site:

• The Monarch Butterfly has declined 90% in the last twenty years. 
• One-third of the summer habitat has been destroyed mostly in the Midwest. (That's my area.) 
• Milkweed is the only plant that the Monarch caterpillars use and it has declined because of the use of pesticides. 

I feel I can do a small part to help these beautiful creatures. So I've decided to share our journey creating the garden with all of you. I will be able to find math to talk about during this project and hopefully lots of awesome pictures. I'll keep you posted. 

     

Check out my pinterest board on  Monarch Butterflies. 

Gorgeous

If you are interested in starting your own Monarch Butterfly Garden go to any of the following sites for more information.

Monarch Watch

National Wildlife Federation

gardeners.com

I'll keep you posted on how it is going. We have our first meeting tomorrow. Wish us luck.

Til next time,

Jan