Let it Snow!

Let it snow! Let it snow! Let it snow!

I hope you stayed warm and that your kiddos enjoyed their two snow days this week! We have had a very busy start back to the month. Here are a few curriculum notes about last week and this current week. Following the notes you will find a few dates and events to make sure to add to you calendar!

Writing: We are really enjoying our study of poetry! So far we have learned about the basic couplet. (two lines of poetry that rhyme) This type of poem serves as a building block to many poems we read. We have also learned about list poems. For these poems each child chose a color to create a “list” of all the things they think about when they see this color. They have really surprised me with all of the creative and thoughtful things they have thought of! Our favorite poems so far are shape poems! We love writing and creating different shapes! There is a link on our blog to make your own shape poems at home!

Math: In math we have been spending a lot of time looking, creating, and interpreting graphs. Collected data has been displayed in bar graphs, tables, pictographs, and picture graphs. Along with basic practice of graphs, this unit is also highlighting patterns, problem solving, and basic fact fluency.

Science: The falling flakes from the sky have been a great introduction to our new unit about weather! So far we have had a review of the four seasons and have studied about the main types of clouds. Everyday we make written observations of what the weather is like. This week we will be creating our very own clouds while highlighting the basic details about each. We will also study about the Beaufort scale for measuring wind… along with other weather instruments used by meteorologists. There will be new links on our blog for weather practice!

Dates:
January 26th- The 100th day of school! (a note will follow soon about materials for this day)
January 27th – Leid center in the afternoon
January 28th- Kansas Day
February 7-9 Book Fair/ Pancake dinner on Wednesday
February 11th- Poetry Café performance (in the afternoon time TBA)
February 14th- Valentine’s Day Party

Warm Winter Wishes

I hope you were able to stay warm this windy and cold weekend! Our recess times have brought with them chilly play and bundled up second graders!
As we enter our last week together in 2010… here are a few notes from the classroom!
Many children are starting to run low on classroom supplies like glue sticks, crayons, markers… and especially dry erase markers. We use dry erase markers every day for math, so these have become quite important! I am now out of my class supply. Please ask your child if they are in need of any supplies for when we return in January.
Writing- We have been working really hard on a special writing project. This project has put to use our paragraph writing skills and knowledge of the writing process. Your child will be bringing this project home this week to share with you! This week we will also be thinking about our favorite winter things to do. The class will be making their own snow globe to go along with their writing!
Math- This week we wrap up our current unit. I am continually impressed with the hard work your children are showing me everyday. Thank you for helping to make sure homework is completed and returned to school. Sharing and correcting their homework with a math partner has proved a great opportunity to enrich so many math skills and math language.
Health- Over the last few weeks we have spent time talking about personal safety, staying well, and how to make good choices with medicine and drugs.

• This Thursday we will have our Gingerbread day! On this day our first and second graders will rotate between six different classrooms participating in many kinds of gingerbread activities… to many a favorite day of the year!

• Birthday breakfast is this Wednesday.

• Winter party Friday afternoon.

• This Friday we say goodbye to one of our classmates Miles. He and his family will be moving and not retuning in January. If your child has a special note they would like to send with him, I encourage them to bring it by Friday. We will plan to keep in touch and write to Miles whenever we get a chance! We will miss you Miles!

I hope you all have a safe and restful break with your family! I look forward to seeing you when we return in 2011.

Amber Crooker

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving!

I want you to know how much I enjoyed visiting with all of you at conferences. I am enjoying sharing your children with you this year!
Here are a few curriculum notes before we leave for break:

Social Studies- Last week we began a new unit about our past. We started looking in depth at the first Thanksgiving and the pilgrim’s journey. We spent sometime studying totem poles and even created our own in class! We also extended on our understanding of picture/symbol writings and took some time to write our own symbol stories in class. This week each second grader was paired up to research two different Native American tribes and created a venn diagram comparing how they are alike and different.

Writing- Our writing last week followed the theme of… turkeys! Monday each child took a basic everyday work and used a thesaurus to come up with more interesting words. Each of the “interesting” words was displayed on the feathers of a turkey… our thesaurus turkeys! We have spent a lot of time thinking about the things we are thankful for and even wrote a journal from a pilgrim’s point of view. This week we took some time to write funny made up stories about silly turkeys.

Math- In math we have been working on estimating, odd vs. even, and two digit addition. This week I introduced the paper pencil strategy of carrying. This is one of the new strategies they can use when solving problems on homework.

I hope you have a restful and safe Thanksgiving break with your family. Enjoy!

Conference Week!

I can not wait to meet with you at conferences this week! If something has changed in your schedule please let me know as soon as possible. As always with conference, it is important to arrive on time, as many conferences are scheduled back to back. I am looking forward to sharing all of your student’s great work with you!
Last week we wrapped up our study of the human body and have spent this short week studying the food guide pyramid. We constructed a class pyramid and have created our own healthy menus!
Last week we also wrapped up our study of time telling and will be spending the next few weeks focusing on place value and representing numbers in different ways. We will also be learning about two digit addition strategies.
In writing this week we spent some time writing about things we are thankful for and have wrapped up our “How to Draw a Monster” how- to activity.
I hope you have a restful long weekend and I look forward to seeing many of you soon!

Happy Halloween

Happy Halloween!
This week a conference form went home with your child. Please confirm your conference time and return the form to school as soon as you are able. If for some reason you are not able to attend your conference time, please let me know and we can look at rescheduling. You should also see coming home a pink pre-conference form. If you could take a few moments to fill this form out, it will let me know what specific things you would like to discuss at your child’s conference. Return this form to school by November 3rd.
This week we have been celebrating red ribbon week! Friday is the last day as we say “boo” to drugs. Tuesday we were the audience for the sixth grade music program, dress rehearsal
Curriculum information-
Writing- This week we have continued our unit on descriptive paragraphs. Monday each child was given a paper bag with an object inside. Using descriptive writing each child took turns trying to get their friends to guess their mystery object! Last week we used apples as our inspiration. First we collected information using our five senses as we “experienced” an apple. Step by step we took this information through the writing process. The end result was a descriptive paragraph about apples. This week we used another fall favorite to inspire our writing… pumpkins!
Math- Last week we wrapped up our unit on story problems. Our focus now shifts to telling time. Wednesday we had a “mix it up” day. In efforts to focus instruction to our students needs, we grouped our second graders for additional practice in telling time, using the clock, and other time skills.
Animated literacy- We continue to work on parts of speech and are practicing contractions.
Science- We are studying about the 6 body systems in science. So far we have learned about the skeletal, muscular, digestive, and respiratory system. We even made our own skeletons… Thursday we will decorate them for Halloween! Next week we will take a look at the last two systems and will take our end of unit test.

Friday is the big Halloween class party. Just a reminder that we will begin putting on costumes around 2:10pm and to refrain from blood and weapons on costumes. I am looking forward to seeing all the fun costumes! It sounds like the room moms have a fun party planned.

Have a safe and fun weekend!

Beautiful Autumn Day!

I hope autumn is treating everyone well and that you and your 2nd graders are finding time to enjoy the beautiful weather! This week we made stain glass pumpkins to hang by our window… and spooky bats to hang from the ceiling.

Curriculum for the next few weeks is as follows:

Math - In the third unit of Math Expressions, students continue looking at different types of story problems. I am really impressed with the progress they are making in showing their thought processes for various types of problems! We continue to look at examples of change plus, change minus, comparison, and collection story problems. This week, we have examined story problems that have either too much information or not enough information as well as solve story problem with multiple steps. Thank you for your continued support with math homework!

Writing - Students have been working on different paragraph writing activities. We touched on descriptive paragraphs about autumn (be sure to check out the 2nd grade display in the pod!) and are currently working on paragraphs about memories. They are wrapping up these paragraphs about their memory boxes!

Spelling - As spelling lists and pattern sorts become more challenging, it is so important that students continue to practice at home. Please help your child remember that some sort of spelling homework is due at least once a week...this can be anything from an art project using spelling words to words written out on a sheet of paper to a sticky note from you saying he or she wrote words with sidewalk chalk. It is also important to spend time studying the meaning of these words.

Health - This afternoon, students were assessed on our unit on taking care of the body, eyes, and ears. Next week, we will begin to study the different body systems, starting with the skeletal system and the muscular system. Thanks to those of you who have sent in books, X-Rays, and models...a big thank you to Mrs. Knapp for coming in to share the spine and heart with our class!

Reading - Students continue to work hard in their guided reading groups! Don't forget that reading group books that come home can be used on daily reading logs! Our author of the month is Mem Fox; we continue to read many of her best loved stories from Australia.

There will be no school next Friday, October 22.
There are sixth graders at school raising money for the oil spill in the gulf. This will continue through October. If you would like to send a check make it payable to: National Wildlife Federation.

Have a wonderful weekend!

Autumn Has Arrived!

It sure feels like autumn has finally arrived. We have been enjoying this cooler weather at recess. We are waiting patiently for our Monarch butterflies to emerge… many of our chrysalises are turning transparent. Hopefully by next week we will have 11 beautiful butterflies!
Last week each student performed their reader’s theatres for the kindergarten classes. They did such a fantastic job showcasing their reading fluency.
This Wednesday we wrapped up our study of butterflies and moths. The class did a really great job on their tests! This week we will begin our next science unit about the body. We will first take a look at hair, skin, and nails… followed by a study of the eye and ear. We will be looking at models of the eye and ear to study how each of them help us and how they work. Next week we will be visited by an ophthalmologist who will speak to us about proper eye care. There are a few health links on our blog to check out!
In writing our class has been working on using good word choice. They have been participating in fun class activities to help us “spice up” our writing and even got to use a thesaurus. Next week we will put our sentence writing skills to the test as we begin paragraph writing. Now that all of the memory boxes have been shared, each child will select their favorite item they brought in and will write their first published paragraph!
Tuesday our Boys and Girls Club leader Miss Laura came to show us a presentation on internet safety. I have added a link to Netsmartz on our blog. This is a safe site that teaches about internet safety in a fun way.
Our class earned their first marble party Wednesday and celebrated with pjs, stuffed animals, and a short movie! This was a fun reward for all of their hard work and super behavior!
Next week we will begin our new author study featuring Mem Fox. She is the author of the book our memory box project was based on Wilfred Gordon McDonald Partridge.
Have a wonderful weekend and enjoy the weekend!