Hi, my name is Ivy. I play soccer/football and it is my favorite sport. Soccer is the most popular sport in the world. It is played in North America, South America, Europe, Asia, Australia, and Africa. I have been playing soccer since age 4. I play for the Stonington Sharks and my number is 11.

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I have practices every week and I practice hard. I play striker. It is also known as center forward. Striker is an offence position. It is in the middle of forward. My team is fun to practice and play with. My coaches give me encouragement and tell me to “practice the way you play.”

Communicating with my teammate

We have games most weekends. I play spring soccer and fall soccer. Spring soccer is the most fun because I like playing outside. Our colors are red and white. The shirt is red, and the number is white. Also, our team is too big so we divided it into two teams. One is the red team, one is the white team. I am on the red team.

Playing a little defense

I mostly focus on scoring goals and improving my kick when I practice. My dad is the coach of my sister’s team and he helps me train. I like to practice with my friends at my house. My sister (Margot) helps me and practices with me, too. I just really love soccer and have too many reasons to explain it!

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Chelsea FC

Chelsea FC (football club) is my favorite team. Chelsea is a British league team based in Fulham, London. They play in the premier league. Their home field is the 41,837 seats Stamford Bridge stadium.

My favorite team

Chelsea FC’s main rivalries are (these are not in order) Manchester United, Arsenal, and Tottenham Hotspur. Frank Lampard is my favorite player on Chelsea. Here is a link to the official Chelsea fc website. As you can see, I really like this team!

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Lionel Messi

Lionel Messi is my favorite player. He plays for Barcelona FC and Argentina. Luis Lionel Andres Messi was born on June 24, 1987 in Rosario, Argentina. As a boy he played with his brothers and friends playing soccer. He has 2 brothers, Rodrigo and Matias and one sister named Maria Sol.

My favorite player

The Barcelona team is lucky to have him as a teammate. In March 2010, France Football ranked Lionel Messi at the top of it’s lists of one of the world’s richest soccer players/footballers, above Cristiano Ronaldo and David Beckham. Here’s a link to the official Barcelona fc website. Lionel Messi worked hard to be at the top of professional soccer/football, and now he is there.

Soccer is not just a sport, it is life.

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Do you have a favorite soccer/football team?

Who is your favorite soccer/football player? (if you have one)

What sport do you like to play?

Hey there! You might remember me, Pico de Gallo, from the Mathlete Show: Graphing Data. I went on a vacation to San Diego, California and I want to tell you all about it.  Well, here it goes: 

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When I went to SeaWorld to see the Shamu Show, I didn’t really see the real Shamu Show. Instead, I saw the Baby Shamu Show because on Valentine’s Day a baby orca whale was born. I didn’t really see it until my mom pointed it out. It was so small, about the size of a dolphin. The baby swam so close to its mother so that you could only see it a little when it came up for air.

Sea World

Before the show started people walked around the stadium selling stuff like popcorn, kettle corn, and soda. We didn’t get any of that. As we watched the show, they said that the baby does not know how to turn or stop swimming, so the mother couldn’t stop for food. They thrust the fish into her mouth while she swam past them.

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The day after I went to SeaWorld, I went to LegoLand, a world of Legos.  There I drove a Volvo made out of legos (obviously!).

Lego Car

I drove a red car while Luke, my brother, drove a blue one.  It was a 45 minute wait, but we did it anyway.  This was exciting to me because when we were younger we went to LegoLand and did the drive for little kids. Now we were back and could do the driving for bigger kids.  On our way from the “Coastasauras” ride we saw a little shop.  My Baba pointed out a Lego Harry Potter and Lego Hagrid.

Lego Hagrid

I started looking for Lego Harry Potter stuff but I had no luck.

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At Roppongi, a fancy Asian restaurant, we tried some delicious foods like crabstack, sushi, and a wonderful tasting shrimp and crab roll.

Sushi 

The yellowtail sushi tasted like soft and salty raw fish with a little bitterness.  I also tried the shrimp and crab roll which is shrimp and crab rolled up with sushi rice, seaweed and topped with avocado and fish eggs and a special sauce.  I had two big bites.  I did not eat any of the crabstack.

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I went to the Children’s Pool in La Jolla.  It had seals that were giving birth.  A baby seal we saw was crying for its mommy who was out swimming in search of food.  The little baby tried to swim, but he did not know how to.  A big lazy, chubby seal taking a nap on the rocks grunted as the baby seal cried for it’s mommy like a real baby. “MOM-ma! MOM-ma!” it said.

Chubby Seal

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We visited the World Famous San Diego Zoo in San Diego, California.  There we saw a baby panda with its mother.  The baby panda was so popular that they even made a panda gift shop!  

Baby panda and mother

Before we saw the pandas in “Panda Canyon” we saw a big gorilla getting fed.  Zookeepers threw down big chunks of lettuce for the five gorillas.  The gorilla ate from a big bunch of lettuce in his hand.  He held it with his other hand, taking the lettuce and shoving it in his mouth.

Snack Time!

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What did you think about my post?

Have you ever been to any of these places? If not, which one would you most like to visit?

In our class we love to connect and learn with our friends around the world.

Today we are launching a new global project called Our World, Our Numbers.

We have a blog http://ourworldournumbers.edublogs.org where we’ll meet up with our blogging buddies to learn together for the next five weeks.

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In late 2011, many of us worked on an award winning global project called Our World, Our Stories. This latest project is based on a similar format with a mathematical focus.

Classes involved

The students are all from primary (elementary) classes and are from three different continents and five countries.

Mr Avery’s sixth grade class from Massachusetts, USA

Mrs Monaghan’s 3/4 class, Room with a View, from England

Mrs Morris and Miss Jordan’s grade four class, 4KM and 4KJ, from Victoria, Australia

Mrs McKenzie’s 2/3 class, B4, from New Zealand

Mrs Yollisí 2/3 class from California, USA

Mr Salsich’s third grade class from Connecticut, USA

Mrs Watson’s K/1/2/3 class  from Canada

How will it work?

Students from all classes will connect and collaborate by sharing their mathematical lives. This will happen through the blog and involve a variety of media.

A different class will lead a mathematical topic every four days or so, publishing posts and replying to comments.  The other classes will read the posts, possibly publish their own posts, and leave blog comments.

We will share topics such as currency, seasons, time zones, population data etc.

The learning

Through blog posts, the students will teach each other about different aspects of mathematics based on aspects of their own culture.

The learning will continue in the commenting section where students, teachers and parents will engage in conversations to explore mathematical and cultural topics further.

Students will gain an understanding of mathematics through the eyes of children in different countries and cultures. They will make comparisons and contrasts between their lives and other students’ lives.

If you want to keep up to date with how the fun and learning unfolds, there is a “subscribe via email” box on the right hand side of the Our World, Our Numbers blog.

Get Involved

We encourage all members of our blog community to get involved!

4KM and 4KJ are leading the first topic by sharing about Australian currency.

Head over to the Our World, Our Numbers blog now to check out 4KM and 4KJ’s post and leave a comment.

What do you think about our new global project?

We had a HUGE snow storm last weekend! Our town got about 21 inches (53 centimeters) of snow. In fact, because we got so much snow and the winds were over 35 miles per hour, the storm was categorized as a blizzard!

Almost two feet of snow!

Since the roads were so slippery and a lot of places lost power because of the winds, we had snow days (no school!) on Friday and Monday and a delayed opening on Tuesday.

Slippery Roads

Snow days are one of the most exciting things about winter in Connecticut. The students (and teachers!) get a surprise day off.

In this post we are going to share some of our thoughts and experiences from the blizzard.

Deep snow!

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During and after the blizzard we took pictures of what it looked like at our homes. Then, when we finally got back to school we talked about our experiences and wrote some descriptive paragraphs about the blizzard.

Here is a slide show with our writing and pictures from our snow day, blizzard experiences:

Have you ever been to a American Football game? I went to one last month. As you probably guessed, it’s me, “Nugget”, on the left. (You might remember me from The Mathlete Show – Comparing Quarterbacks.)

At the Patriots game at Gillette Stadium

Well, this was actually the Houston Texans against the New England Patriots playoff game, on January 13, 2013, at Gillette Stadium.

This was a good game because both the Texans and the Patriots were 12-4 in this season. We got there kind of early, so it wasn’t that packed, so we could easily see them warming up.

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Right before the game starts, in a playoff game, the home team runs out of a big inflatable helmet or their symbol, between giant sparklers.

The Patriots making their entrance

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Don’t you think it would be cool to be a professional sports player? I do, because I think playing sports is extremely fun!

From where we were sitting, this was what the view looked like. So, we had pretty good seats.

Our view of the field

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You would think that our flat screen tv’s are big, but they’re nothing compared to these:

Enormous TV screens!

The fans were going wild! It seemed like it was impossible that it would be even a little quiet.

It was good that the the score ended 41-28 for the Patriots!

Victory for the Patriots!

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Did you know that the win was Tom Brady’s 17th postseason victory?  That is one more than Joe Montana, making Brady the winningest player in NFL playoff history!

Of course, there was a ton of cheering when the Pats scored, but there was also a lot of cheering when they got an interception, because it doesn’t happen often. 

“Wow.” I thought before I went to sleep, “WOW!”

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Have you ever been to an American Football game? If so, where?

What is your favorite sports team? 

If you could be a professional athlete in any sport, what would it be?

We have been using a set of 5 iPads in class during the last two months!

We got the iPads through a generous grant from the Stonington Education Fund. So far we have been using them in reading, writing, and math.

Using the iPad during math

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In writing, we have been using an app called Comic Life to make nonfiction text features (like diagrams) to go along with our informational writing pieces.

Here is a diagram we made in Comic Life showing the main parts of an iPad:

Front of iPad

Back of iPad

(Look for lots more diagrams and illustrations in our own informational writing coming soon!)

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In reading, we have been using the iPads to listen to audiobooks while we follow along in our own books. Listening to reading like this helps improve our fluency, accuracy, and vocabulary. (And it is just plain fun!)

Listening to Reading

Listening to Reading

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We have also been recording our own reading using an app called Evernote. We practice reading a short passage fluently and then record it on the iPad. Then we practice some more and record it again after a few days. On Evernote we can see how much our fluency improves the more we practice.

practicing fluency

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In math, we have been using an app called Educreations to demonstrate and share different ways to solve math problems. Using this app we can make short tutorials and also explain to our teacher how we are solving the math problems.

Here are a few different solutions for solving a math story problem that had the equation 72 + 134:

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What do you use an iPad or iPod to learn?

Do know of any other great learning apps (not games) that we could try?

What is your favorite thing about using iPads in class?

Mr. Salsich’s class is back in action for another exciting year of learning and blogging together.

We get more done as a team!

On our blog we will share lots of the amazing things we are learning together. Families, friends, and other students can follow along with our adventures and leave comments or ask us questions.

To learn how to leave a comment, click on the How To Comment tab on the top menu. We love hearing from other people!

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We will have pictures, articles, drawings, and videos of our learning on this blog. To stay up to date on what we are doing, you can subscribe to the blog using one of the methods on the left below the visitor’s map.

We have only been back at school for a few weeks and are still getting to know each other. Please leave a comment to introduce yourself. You can answer one of the questions below, or just tell us a little bit about yourself.

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What fun things did you do over the summer?

What has been your favorite part of third grade so far?

What are you looking forward to this year?

Today is our last day of school before summer vacation!

We have had a great year together and have learned so many things. Luckily we have the blog to remember it all. You can always re-read posts, watch videos, or listen to voicethreads from the year by using the “tag cloud” or the archives on the sidebar.

Here is a slideshow with pictures from the first day of school right up until Field Day.

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Thanks to all of our blogging buddies, commenters, and followers that have helped us learn and given us support and ideas!

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What is one of your favorite memories from the year?

Do you have a favorite post, video, or voicethread from the blog this year?

A few week’s ago our classmate Anthony went to Hershey Park for a family vacation.

At Hershey Park in Pennsylvania

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Hershey Park is located in Hershey, Pennsylvania. It was started in 1905 by Milton Hershey as a relaxing park for the people that worked at the Hershey Chocolate Company. Now it is a popular family theme park with roller coasters, water slides, and a zoo.

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/ File%3AInfobox_collage_for_Hersheypark.jpg

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Here are some pictures from Anthony’s trip:

The chocolate Anthony made being boxed up at Chocolate World

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Racing bumper cars

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The Count's Splash Castle at Sesame Place - EVERYONE gets wet!

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Waves beat Anthony as he tries to save his glasses! Whooosh!

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Have you ever been to Hershey Park?

What is your favorite amusement park?

Would you rather go on a roller coaster or a water slide? Why?

The other day we created a Wordle. A wordle is made from a bunch of text that is entered into a program that arranges the words into different colors and shapes to make a design. The more times a word appears in the text, the bigger the word gets in a wordle.

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We decided to experiment with wordles by combining our names with the answers that we wrote to these questions:

What word would you use to describe our blog?

What word would you use to describe our classroom?

What word would you use to describe your classmates?

What is the most interesting thing in the classroom?

What is your favorite classroom subject?

What has been your favorite activity so far?

What was your favorite read-aloud book?

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When we entered all the text into a wordle this is what we got!

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(Click on the image to see it in full size.)

As you can see; awesome, fun, marble-maze, coyote, and reading were written down the most!

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What do you think of our wordle?

If you are in our class, explain your answer to one of the questions for the wordle.

How would you describe our blog?