OES Mini-Relay for Life 2014

What an emotional day! For those of you like me who have known or lost someone from cancer, this day is always a wonderful day to celebrate and remember. The sun was shining down on us as we heard from a cancer survivor, Mrs. Stacey Johnson, a 4th grade teacher. She spoke of the importance of friendship during tough times and then had all of OES singing the touching chorus of the Bruno Mars song, "Count On Me." If you're not familiar with it, you should listen to it! Loved ones are so important and essential in our daily lives! We then cheered on the survivors for the Survivors Lap and then took our lap as a grade level. The students were so excited and looked great all dressed up in their 50s attire! Later in the day, we walked our class laps while drinking a coke or root beer float. Yummy! At the end of the day we had our balloon release, which leaves me speechless each year. Watching hundreds of balloons fly up to the clouds toward heaven is just a magical sight. And to see the students understand the meaning and importance of all of these festivities makes me so proud to have grown up in this community and work in this fantastic school!

OES is full of talented All-Stars

Tuesday night, we had our 1st annual OES Fine Arts show. It consisted of the art show, a drama club performance of Hansel and Gretel, and the Honor Choir singing. This show was fabulous! The artwork was so impressive....much better than my artistic abilities for sure :) The drama performance blew me away! What an amazing amount of time and preparation that must have taken and it definitely showed. The student actors/actresses did a fantastic job! Reagan was one of the characters and I'm so proud of her.Their expressions and voices were priceless. The honor choir sang beautifully, as always. The kazoo song was my favorite. All in all it was a terrific night and the students enjoyed it as well because we got to see them all perform Wednesday afternoon. Way to go All-Stars!

Career Day

A few weeks ago, we had Career Day. Here are the thoughts of Elnur and Carolyn:

Have you ever had a Career Day at your school? Well, if you haven't then you should. At OES every year, we have people with important jobs come to our school and teach us about their job. This year in Mrs. Wise's class we had a sports doctor, a soldier, nurses, and a lawyer. The sports doctor taught us about living. The soldier told us about what they do in the Army. The nurses told us what to do in case of a heart attack. Last, we had a lawyer and she told us about what a lawyer does to help others people's concerns. We wish we had a Career Day every day at OES!

Earth Day

Tuesday, April 22 was Earth Day. Third graders here at Oakland celebrated by doing different Earth Day inspired activities all week. They read a Judy Moody story about saving the world, wrote persuasive letters to other classes convincing them to help our planet, and even planted flowers or picked up litter around our school. We are so proud of what they accomplished and the impact they have made on other students in the school. Here are the thoughts of Aaron and Madison Lynn:

This week in Mrs. Wise's class we are trying to persuade the teachers about Earth Day. We are writing letters to classes to try to convince them to help the Earth. On Earth Day the whole third grade either planted flowers or picked up litter. During recess, all the girls in Mrs. Wise's class helped Mrs. Debbie put the mulch around the flowerbeds.
You should also plant more flowers and trees to make the Earth a better environment. We enjoyed helping the Earth!

"Snow" Much Fun

Before the real snow hit Boiling Springs, it came to Oakland Elementary! OES students surpassed a goal set by Dr. Patterson prior to Christmas to donate 3000+ items for the needy. Of course, our students went above and beyond and we collected over 5000 items! Their reward was to play in the snow and have hot chocolate. So once we returned from Christmas break, it was time to play! They got to drink their hot chocolate first AND eat a snowball, which was cotton candy. Then, they took off their shoes and socks and played in a classroom full of snow. Frosty even joined them! It was a fun, slippery, messy time and their smiles were priceless.

What's the Matter?

We had been learning about observable properties of matter, so I had a fun activity planned. I placed 5 different white substances in bags and had each group predict what it was and then use their observations to test their hypothesis. And yes, they even tasted them, which worried a few of them until I assured them I wouldn't let them taste anything that could hurt them. But I'm glad they know to be cautious scientists when experimenting :)  By the end of the activity, they discovered each group had a different substance. There was powdered sugar, baking soda, salt, sugar, and flour. Needless to say, they weren't too thrilled if they didn't have the bags of sugar. It was fun watching them and hearing all of their wonders and observations.

Pancakes with the Principals

I hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas break spent with their family and friends! When we returned, the students turned in their 100BC logs to show how much they read during the break. Our class read almost 300 steps, the most in 3rd grade. So our reward was eating pancakes with the principals. Yummy! I'm proud of each of them. Hard work does pay off! :)