Yay! Classroom Switch Day!

Hello future readers!

Well, Miss LaSalle and Mrs. Johnson finally let us have Classroom Switch Day! That means that last Friday, all day long,  Miss LaSalle's class all spent the day in Mrs. Johnson's. room. Far out! Mrs. Johnson's class is a little smaller than ours, and her class pet is a turtle named Toby. Since she used to be our music teacher, she keeps a big collection of records and a record player in her classroom. She gives out commendation cards too, and has class helpers, just like Miss La Salle, Both teachers agreed to just have this be a fun day for both classes as a reward for all our hard work this year.

 We got to play Hangman.

Nobody got it. The word was "phonograph".

Then Mrs. Johnson wrote a big word on the board, and we had to see how many smaller words we could make using the letters of the big word.

We did better with that game.

We played a few more games and then had silent reading time. After lunch and recess, we did the only real classwork we had done all day. We each had to write a composition about why Classroom Switch was a good idea.  She'd give them to Miss LaSalle after school to grade over the weekend.

At the end of the day, Mrs. Johnson said that we were well behaved and that she had a good time along with all of us.

And then she gave us all candy bars before we got dismissed! Dynamite! What a groovy way to start the weekend!

It was a really super day, and Mrs. Johnson is really nice. I wonder if kids in the future get to do fun stuff like switching classrooms for a day? It's cool to see how other teachers do things and set up their classrooms. I sure hope we get to do this again next year.

Until next time future readers,
Your friend,
Julie Newman

It's Final Project Time---with a boy??

Hello future readers,

I never thought it would happen. Usually, we get to pick our partners for end of the year final project. Well this year, Miss LaSalle decided to pick for us. I got...Kyle. It's not that I don't like Kyle. He's pretty nice, as far as boys go, but after what happened when I went over to Danny's house that time, I wasn't sure working with a boy was gonna be such a good idea. Kyle and I rapped about it in the lunchroom and decided we'd do our project about bears, and I'd go over to his house on Saturday (after the cartoons were over), so we could work on our project.

I could tell Kyle was really into superheroes. They were on his walls, his bed, even on his lamp. And he was reading a Spider-man comic book when I came into his room. I sat down on his Batman bean bag (oh brother!), and pulled out a book on Bears I had gotten at the library.

So we started talking about who was gonna do what. I said that I could do the writing since I had neat penmanship, and he said "Why don't I just type it?" Type it? Hmmmm....

Kyle told me he'd been practicing typing on his mom's beat up portable typewriter for the past year, and he got his own typewriter last Christmas. Far out! Now the written part of our project would really look like a grown-up did it! So I read out loud from the book, and Kyle typed it out in our own words.

And you know, he's pretty good with that thing!

Wow! Just like  grown-up! Then Kyle pulled out a large oak tag board and some crayons,  and thought we could make a neat poster to go with the report. Outta site! We looked in the book for a good picture to draw and got to work.

I'm not that great at drawing, even though I really like to do it. I draw OK for a kid, but I'm not an artist. But Kyle can draw really good, (OK really well!), so I did stuff like the trees, the grass and the sky, and Kyle drew the bear. Working with Kyle was turning out to be pretty neat! When we were done he held it up and asked me if I liked it. No, I didn't like it---I LOVED it! It turned out super!

Now we had a groovy poster and a neatly typed report to turn in. I was sure we'd get 100% for our grade!

Kyle asked me if I wanted to see his pet lizard, Lobo.

 I wasn't sure about that. When our cabin caught a lizard for our scavenger hunt at camp, Kim was the brave one who picked it up. But I didn't wanna hurt Kyle's feelings, so I said OK.

It wasn't so bad, except that he moves pretty quick and I almost dropped him.  So Kyle put him back in his tank, and said it was pretty cool that I didn't say lizards were icky. (Even though I sorta think they are!)

Kyle wanted to know if I wanted to play action guys.

Then I remembered I still had my Wonder Woman doll in my book bag from when I took it to Susan's house after school a couple of days ago.

Kyle said we could play Super Friends. He pulled out his tape recorder and tape box, and told me that sometimes he likes to record the Super Friends cartoon on Saturday morning, and act it out when he plays action guys with Danny and Jason.

I watch Super Friends on Saturday mornings, and I knew there wasn't too much fighting in them, so I agreed to play.

Would you believe I actually had fun! And I felt kinda dopey for not wanting to be teamed up with Kyle to do our final project. And just because Kyle digs superheroes, doesn't mean he acts like he's tough, and he's better than girls. (well, at least he didn't this time!) I know it's probably different when he's playing with Danny and Jason,though.  But I guess it's just like when I first met Danny...I shouldn't think all boys are gonna be rough and act crazy all the time. I guess sometimes they can even be kinda cool.

Until next time, future readers,
Your friend
Julie Newman

Take A Look At Our School Photos!

Hello future readers!

Well, it's that time again. This past Friday, Miss La Salle passed out our class pictures! Check 'em out!

Here we are! Top row (L-R): Kyle, Robyn, Stephanie, Shante'. Bottom row (L-R): Miss LaSalle, Bridget, Danny, me, Susan and April.

Here I am.  I'm wearing almost the same color as the background!

This is a really groovy picture of Stephanie.

I guess Shante' likes blue flowered dresses too!

Danny looks so much more relaxed in his picture this year. His mom even let him wear sneakers!

I just love Bridget's curls. She reminds me of Shirley Temple. (She was a child movie star!)

Susan looks so pretty in ruffles!

Here's Kyle. He's pretty good looking, for a boy, I mean. He was really nervous, 'cos he wanted to take a good picture. He was squirming so much, the photographer had to take his picture twice!

April takes a nice picture, too. My mom says she has big "doe eyes".

I think Robyn looks far out in orange! I just love her hair, too!

Here's Mrs. Johnson's class:

Top Row (L-R): Cheryl, Lisa, Melody, Jennifer, Crissy. Bottom row (L-R): Mrs. Johnson, Wendy, Raychel, Jason, Sunny and Kim.

Cheryl's so pretty, I don't think it's possible for her to take a bad picture.

Wendy and April dressed like twins again. The photographer knew their mom would want one of them together.

Aren't they outta site? It must be really neat to have a sister.

That patchwork shirt looks dynamite on Raychel!

Jason's dad forgot it was picture day! Good thing he didn't wear a t-shirt!

I really dig this picture of Lisa.

Crissy always wears the grooviest clothes. I bet it's cool having a mom who used to be a fashion designer.

Sunny got to wear her pretty party dress for picture day. I wish I had one like that.

Melody just got over a cold. I'm glad she got better in time for picture day!

Kim has the most beautiful brown eyes!

I love this shade of green on Jennifer. It shows off her super tan!

Well future readers, that's it! I hope you liked looking at our class photos!

Until next time,
Your friend,
Julie Newman

All Right! The Last Book Report of the School Year!

Hello future readers!

On the first week of every month of school, all 4th graders have to do a book report. These are not my favorite things to do. Not because I don't like reading, 'cos I do. I just don't like having a set time to read a book, and do a report on it. I like reading just for fun. For the last book report, Miss LaSalle said we couldn't do it on some small, skimpy book. We had to pick a thick book with lots of chapters, and we have the rest of this month to turn it in. Well this month, I was in luck! My Auntie Jeanette sent me 2 "Little House" books for Easter. I've seen these in the library before, and even checked one out, but I was too busy to finish it before I had to take it back.

 In case you don't know what that is, there's a series of books by  Laura Ingalls Wilder about her life as a little girl back  in the pioneer days. There's even a TV show about it called "Little House On The Prairie." It's one of my favorite TV shows. I love the girl who plays Laura, (Melissa Gilbert). She's got lots of spunk. Anyway, my mom has been reading to me every night from the first book in the series, "Little House In The Big Woods.". I just have a couple of chapters to go on my own, and then I can do this darn report and get it over with!

I don't know if any of you have to do book reports in the future, but this is the way we do ours. We have to write the title, author, illustrator, summary (that means what the book was about), and what we liked best about the book. I had 2 favorite parts, Christmas, and Sundays. I liked reading how Laura got a pretty new rag doll she named Charlotte for Christmas. I also liked reading about how she really didn't like Sundays, and kicked and cried in her chair until her Pa told her a funny story about when he was a boy on Sundays.

Yippee! I'm finished! Now I don't have to think about any more book reports until next September! Outta site! I think I still have time to catch the last half hour of Madman Mike's radio show before "Zoom" comes on.

I'll bet in the future you can do your book report by talking to your computer, like they do on "Star Trek. I bet you don't even have to use a pencil or pen. It probably appears on your teacher's TV monitor on her desk. I don't really know if that's what kids do in the future, but it's fun to think about it! Just like maybe it's fun for you to wonder what life was like in the 1970s.

Gotta go now, future readers. Madman Mike is having another contest!

Until next time,
Your friend,
Julie Newman