Experiment with Homework

Dear parents,
I am going to be trying a new way of letting you know your students' homework assignments for the week. I will be using either this blog or yourhomework.com to post homework online. Keep checking back to this site so that I may keep you informed on my class blog on this and other class projects.

This week's homework is:

Monday, September 17, 2007

1. Bring recorder and book Test is on page 3
2. Spelling Pgs. 30,31,32,33 -due Wednesday
3.Math P.W. + P.S. 3.3
4.Reading textbook pg. 82-90 or the whole story
5) Record any A/R book Title and Author in your journal.

Google news found over 282 stories on the web today about a huge spider web in texas. Most articles were very simple- they told of the place(Lake Tawakoni State Park), speculation about which variety of spider created the web(no one seemed to know), and finished off with speculation about why it happened(voodoo? new variety of Spider?).
After some searching, I finally found a web page created by the Park Ranger who found the web. Turns out it's a lot less mysterious than I thought. The spider is actually a well known one: its a member of the long-jawed orb-weavers(see photos here and here. The bug guide is a wonderful tool when you're trying to figure out what that wierd bug is that's crawling up your window). We don't have the same species of spider here in California, but we do have spiders that to the unexpert eye, look exactly like it. Check out the photo of the web these spiders wove:


According to this web site there are over 25 species of lon-jawed orb-weavers in the United States. There's got to be one in Novato..

First Week of School

We have been busy getting acquainted and learning the classroom procedures. The class has been earning (chocolate) gold coins for their group efforts in practicing these procedures. These gold coins are being accumulated in a container, and when it is full we will have a gold coin party.

Full eclipse of the Moon this tuesday

There will be full eclipse of the moon visible from Novato Tuesday, August 28th early in the morning. We're going to try to watch it (and take pictures). The San Francisco Sidewalk Astronomers site has all the information here. For even more detailed information, see the lunar eclipse page that NASA has put up here.NASA says you can watch a live webcast of the eclipse(weather permitting) here. Read the MSNBC article here to see why the moon appears red during the eclipse.
If you don't want to stay up late, download the latest version of google earth, which now allows you to search the sky as well as our planet earth.

My first Blog Posting of the year

Hello to my new , wonderful, fourth grade class. I look forward to an exciting year working with you and your parents in and outside the classroom. The students will be helping me use this blog to keep their parents informed of all the work that is going on in class throughout the school year.
Stay tuned for more news.
Mrs. Catherine Stanek