We started talking about the Earth when Earth Day was near. We read The Lorax and put up posters of animals, talked about caring for the earth, planted seeds and went on a Nature walk. We know that every day is Earth Day because we live on it, but Earth Day is a special day to double remember and think of ways we can help keep our earth safe and clean for the animals and the kids.
Then, we started really thinking about the earth so we made a popplet “All About the Earth”. Here it is!
The next week, in math, we were talking about measuring things and the languages of measurement. Someone said, “But Ms Echternacht, you can’t measure everything! You can’t measure the earth!” Ms Echternacht said, ” Actually that is a very, very interesting question! I will tell you they DID measure the earth. But I can tell you have already thought of a problem! What are the problems with measuring the earth?”
“Its a circle! It’s a sphere! It’s very big!” We thought maybe they measured it from space in a spaceship, but then someone said, “But they would just be looking at it, they still wouldn’t know!” Someone else thought about using a very, very long tape measure. “Why did she think of using a tape measure and not a ruler?” Ms Echternacht wondered!
“I will tell you they measured the earth before there were spaceships. They used a secret code. The secret code is m-a-t-h”. Ms Echternacht found some videos on the computer that told kids about the man who measured the earth a long, long, long, long, long time ago. His name was Eratosthenes (air-a-toss-10-knees). Here is the video telling about how he cracked the code:
Now we are tracking the sun in our classroom. We put tape where the sun is on the floor. The sun keeps moving! Or is it? Did you know in olden times before there were clocks, they used the sun to tell time? Can you make a sun clock?
The Treehouse 