Taking the Common Core standards outside.
This past week I spent a good portion of my Facebook time gazing longingly at photos our science teachers posted from the Monterey Bay Aquarium. These teachers advise our school’s Plastics Club, so they were at the aquarium learning how our plastic trash raises havoc with the oceans. Speaking of plastics, our high school’s Plastics […]
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Since I go back to Montana at least annually, I’d heard of Red Ants Pants and its music festival for years. My mom is a fan of Red Ants Pants owner Sarah Calhoun, who created her own line of outdoor work clothes for women when she discovered women were expected to just put on what […]
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We hadn’t been on the Sacramento Regional County Sanitation District’s nature trails in almost a year, so we jumped at the chance of a bird watching hike when the e-mail invite landed in my inbox. A bunch of people beat me to the reply button, though, and Sacramento Sewer placed us on a waiting list. […]
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The Sacramento region has so many museums people who live here can be excused if they aren’t aware some of them exist. Several area businesses are helping people become acquainted with their museums with Free Museum Day on Saturday, Feb. 2. Participating museums will open at 10 a.m. and close at 5 p.m., but the […]
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The Elk Grove Fine Arts Center is kicking off a series of children’s art classes that are aligned with California’s visual arts standards. The focus of the first series of classes is “the many shades of fruits and vegetables,” using children’s picture books as resources. Core Art for Kids, described as “an introduction to California […]
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There’s nothing like a long walk to kick off a new semester at school and shake the holiday off. We jumped at the chance to join Fleet Feet for a four-mile fun run (which we walked) even though it meant an end to our leisurely days sleeping in. Fleet Feet, our go-to store for running […]
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We lived many, many years in Riverside County, California and, I’m sad to say, never made it out to The Living Desert Zoo and Gardens until a couple of months ago, and this after living in the Sacramento area for a decade. Don’t be like us. Plan a family trip out to the Living Desert, […]
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Happy Halloween! Lots of teachers dread this time of the year as they fight to keep kids focused on lessons and, on the morning after Halloween, deal with students who stay up too late and then decide to cart their entire bag of treats into the classroom for non-stop snacking. I, however, look forward to […]
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A summer barn quilt tour through Meagher County, Montana got me thinking there must be a kid-friendly way to do this in the classroom. With the help of my intensive intervention reading students, I figured out a process and presented it to teachers attending the California Foundation for Agriculture in the Classroom state conference a […]
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I’m still sifting through all the amazing brochures and packets that I brought home from the state California Foundation for Agriculture in the Classroom conference. Finals Week at school delayed me a bit, but I have finally unpacked the suitcase and put it away. Here are some of the gems I discovered in the process, […]
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