Thank you so very much for the sweet gifts for Teacher Appreciation!  I absolutely love working with your children, and you are all so kind to spoil me with the wonderful treats, presents, and lovely notes!
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We had a fantastic last day of Target for the year!

We challenged our convergent and divergent thinking skills along with our teamwork skills to program our robots to maneuver both an obstacle course and a search and rescue mission.  The kids did a great job with that!  

We followed that with some fun with coding to create our own games using our convergent thinking on Code.org.  The kids had a blast!

We also finished our book.  What a surprise ending!  The kids loved it, and are eager to read the next 2 books in the series.

We finished the day with a wonderful robot movie called, Big Hero 6.  It is a wonderful combination of robots, dealing with giftedness, and working with others.  We had a really good discussion about how all those pieces fit together.

Have a wonderful summer!

Dr. Kraeger

We had so much wonderful learning today in Target!

Unit Study:
We started off with a Guest Coder-Mr. Adam Edwards, Mrs. Lobello's son-in-law.  He works for Career Builder, in the IT Department.  He shared a video of the cool Robot Conference Assistant and taught us some challenging concepts about coding, even some Java code!  He also answered questions about robots in everyday life, different jobs that involve coding, and some of the interesting things he gets to do in his job.  It was a great session!  
Next, we moved on to Lesson 16-"Flappy Birds".  The kids got a chance to create a mini-game.  Mr. Edwards enjoyed seeing their games and offered feedback on several.  
Finally, the kids planned out obstacle courses for their Robots next week.  They also wrote the programs, so they can put the Robots through their paces on their self-designed Obstacle Courses next time.  It should be so much fun!

Novel Study:
We read more of our novel, and unfortunately found out what happened to E.  He was disassembled!  Now, we just have to find out who the Robo-Napper was!

Algebraic Thinking:
We finished our Hands On Equations with the last lesson in Level 1.  The kids have done a great job with this curriculum!

Affective Skills:
We discussed "Strengths of the Heart"-Love, Hope, Gratitude, Curiosity, and Zest.  Ask your child how they remember the meaning of Zest!  It's a funny story!

Until next time,
​Dr. Kraeger

We had so much fun in Target today!

Unit Study:
We started our day with a fun learning game called, BUZZ! The kids rotate around the room reading and examining different resources about Robots to answer questions. They love the movement and learn a lot during this research activity.

Next, we took our dance moves from last week and programmed our Robots to dance. The results were hilarious! The kids absolutely loved this! I enjoyed seeing their creativity!

Novel Study:
We read a few more chapters of our book. The kids are inferring and predicting who "Robo-napped" E. We're still trying to figure out what's up with the Black SUV too!

Stations:
We used our convergent thinking to work on a logic puzzle and stretched our divergent thinking and communication skills to finish our Ninja Comic strips. Check them out by our classroom!

Until next time,
​Dr. Kraeger