Day 2 at Bourton Meadow, Home of the "Baby Owls"

                                                                                                                          

    I spent the morning at Bourton Meadow School in Year One (Kindergarten). They were the cutest little owls (kindergarteners) and SO SMART. (for those of you who don't know, I call my little ones at school "little antlers", so I thought since Bourton Meadow has the mascot "owls", the little kids should be called "baby owls"~I know...I am a dork.)  I was so impressed with the things they were doing. They spent the first part of the morning doing Literacy. They were working using describing words to make their writing more interesting. They are studying the theme of "mini beasts". They used a graphic organizer to describe various aspects of bugs, such as where you would find them, what they look lide and what they would eat. They were preparing to write their shape poems about a bug using their descriptive words.     

     We spent the middle part with me telling them about America, Oklahoma, tornadoes and Prairie Vale. They saw pictures of all of our PV Kindergarten teachers and their classrooms and wanted to see a picture of our playground equipment. We talked about all the things that were the same and different between England and America.     

     After their recess break, the class started their numeracy (math) lesson. They worked on measurement, including length, width, weight and capacity. When the group lesson was over, the class divided into groups to explore each of the measurement types. I took a group of them onto the patio to work on predicting the capacity of water in different types of containers.     After a "lovely" lunch of roast beef and vegetables, I went back to Year 6, were they were working on their enterprise projects. Each group has to come up with a product that they can market and sell in stalls at the school. They are busy planning and writing their business plan which they will present to Mrs. Hopkins in an "Apprentice" like fashion. Apparently, in England, there is a similar show called "The Dragon's Den", where budding entrepreneurs pitch ideas to a business person and it is decided if the pitch will be funded.     

     Mrs. Howard had "clubs" after school this afternoon, where I got a preview of next weeks' production of the now famous radio show, "Bourton Meadow at Breakfast"~my new personal favorite!! One day next week will feature a celebrity guest interview...bet you can't guess who it is.    I went to eat dinner with all the Year 6 teachers after a car tour of beautiful downtown  Buckingham.