Our classroom read aloud mid morning was an information story book to practice asking questions and inferring from our background knowledge.

Written by Vivian French (author of many favourite information story books) and illustrated by Charlotte Voake, Caterpillar Caterpillar is all about a little girl learning about the caterpillar’s development through the help of her patient and knowledgeable grandfather. We realized our background knowledge related to insects has really grown because of all of our research about walking sticks (our classroom pets). We had lots of questions about the caterpillars shedding their skin and wondered if like stick bugs, they ate their skin? Do they have suction cups on their legs to be able to travel on the underside of leaves? Are the butterfly eggs sticky to stay stuck to the leaves? They must be because they don’t fall off in the rain. But then somebody else pointed out that maybe the eggs are only laid on the underside of leaves to protect them. Can caterpillars spray a substance to keep enemies away like some stick bugs can? Great questions and discussion today!

In the afternoon, we walked to Strathcona Library to visit Ms. Hong and have a story time at our public library! What a great way to fit our daily 30 minutes of physical activity into the school day! And . . . what a wonderful story!

Ms. Hong read us Orange Peel’s Pocket written by Rose Lewis and cheerfully illustrated by Grace Zong. Chang Ming goes in search of answers to the question – What is China like? by wandering into shops and businesses where she can learn more about her cultural heritage. Everyone slips something mysterious into her pocket (how fun to guess what each item might be when Ms. Hong read aloud!) – a poem, a peony, a recipe for noodle soup, etc. Now Orange Peel (Chang Ming) can share her heritage with her classmates.

A lovely end to our day. . . When we returned to class, Edwin shared a drum given to him by his grandfather and showed us a rattle carved from a special tree where eagles nested and gifted to him by his uncle. Sharing of his stories and culture – thank you Edwin!