Things finally got back to normal today, and it was great. We started with our read-aloud and trying to figure out why the chapter title was about a library. Bisola remembered that people visited a library to cure their hiccups, so she thought that might have something to do with it. Teddy thought they might be visiting it to help write a funny joke, while Yianni knew that libraries are good places to get information and make plans. Turns out, he was right, as the story ended with Mrs. Frisby discovering that the rats had a plan, even though she didn’t find out what it was. Unsurprisingly, we talked a lot about what the plan might be. Paolo thought they might be making a plan to improve their cave and make it better, which Tove thought would help them stay safe. Rebecca wondered if they were making a plan about the cat, but Niki thought the plan would just be to kill the cat. Either way, we’re excited to find out what they are planning.

In our building challenge, the class today used clay to sculpt something from the story. Paolo wanted to make the tunnel they walked through, while a number of the girls worked together to make a giant cave complex. Gia was happy with how many rooms they had made. Rebecca pointed out all of the people inside, but Gia asked if she meant the rats, not people, which Rebecca agreed with. Jerome thought creatively, found the Halloween cat cookie cutter, used it, and placed “Dragon” outside the girls’ cave. We haven’t done much clay sculpture, and it was cool seeing the work they created and how creative they were.

Our other work today was a final piece to get ready for the celebration of culture. The social committee supplied some blank flags along with a small picture of it and asked us help them by coloring them. Some of us were wondering if we could color them anyway we wanted, but we talked about how the colors on the US flag have meanings and so do the colors on those flags. Niki thought it was best we stick to the colors in the real flag, which was a degree of restriction we weren’t really used to facing. This made Jerome wonder if the yellow he was using was the right shade. Paolo asked Timo which stripe on his flag was supposed to be blue; Timo looked closely and said that the middle was supposed to be blue and the two outside stripes should be yellow. Teddy was coloring his flag in and wondered, since the colors meant something, if the blue stood for water. Rebecca kind of liked coloring like this, since it was pretty easy. Sokrates agreed that it was easy, but it was still fun to do his own drawings too. This was a different kind of coloring than we normally do, but it was interesting to see them attend to details like this, consider symbolism, and follow a plan.

Thanks to Yianni and the Prutsos family for the book donation! The kids loved both of our new books and they were a blast to read. Also, book orders came in today and, thanks to everyone that ordered, we were able to get a series of sand timers for the class that everyone was SUPER interested in. I hope everyone has a great weekend and see you Monday!