Picture day went very smoothly, but I was sad that two students were absent. Thankfully, the photographers and their helpers came to get us right at 8:30, while we were still clean! In science today, we studied how things move on an incline. I had a piece of dry wall board and some Hot Wheels cars and Thomas the Tank Engine trains. Students made predictions about which would get to the bottom first and explained their reasoning. We tested our theories and discussed what happened. We talked about the weather changes that Fall will bring (I wish it would hurry and happen) and made our calendar reflect the current season.

Today was American Indian Heritage Day. I planned a lesson that required going onto the Montana Office of Public Instruction web site to view a portion of a video titled Long Ago in Montana. It addressed how Native Americans got the things they needed before money was invented. However, the school district server was down most of the day, so we only had a book to read about a chicken who wanted a scarecrow's hat for her nest. The scarecrow wanted a walking stick. The chicken made a number of exchanges to eventually get the walking stick for scarecrow and was able to exchange for the hat. It was a cute story that had several wonderful vocabulary words, including "delighted." Each student was supposed to come home and tell you something that delighted them. I'm curious to see who remembered.

Starting next Wednesday, a college student who studying to become a teacher will be in our room each Wednesday and Friday for the next six weeks. Her name is Jamie Swan. She will most likely spend the first day or two observing, but she and I will be planning some lessons that she will be teaching. I look forward to meeting her.