Wednesday, February 20th, 2013

Good snowy afternoon!

I apologize for not getting this to you yesterday. Better late than never :) Especially since there is so much important information in this week's addition.

This week's IA: Art
Next week's IA: Music

We have been busy preparing for our Voyage the last couple of days. Today, we played a game called "Airport." This game gave us a chance to practice collaboration, empathy, and trust. One student was the pilot while another student, the air traffic controller, guided the "blind" pilot down the runway using only verbal cues. After we all had a chance to participate, we talked about how we can use what we learned from this experience in the classroom and on our Voyage next week. 

Today, we also went over our gear list and talked about packing. I will be out on Monday and Tuesday at a Writing Conference. So, students will not bring their gear until next Wednesday morning. I have told the students that I am trusting that they will make sure they have packed all their gear and won't be missing any essential items. Please make sure to have their daypacks packed with a sack lunch and 2-4 snacks, packed separate from their lunch, labeled with their names. On Wednesday morning, students will leave their duffel bags and other gear outside by our bus. There will be 3 buses in the same area, as other grade are leaving the same day. Please be sure to find the sign with 2nd grade on it, and place your child's gear by the correct bus. Students should come into school with their daypacks. Plan on arriving at the normal time on Wednesday, there is no need to be early. If you have ANY questions about gear, please don't hesitate to email me. I will resend the gear list today as well. 

*In addition to the gear that is on the packing list, please write a note to your child for them to read on Wednesday night before they go to bed. These little reminders from home are a wonder to help with homesickness. You can tuck these letters in their gear bags. 

Monday, February 11th, 2013

Hello!

*Our Crew will be sharing our community poems and spirit read at All School Meeting this Wednesday morning at 9am. We would love for you to be a part of the audience, if you are able to attend!

*Our Valentine's Day Party is this Thursday at 3pm. Please have your child only put his or her name on the valentine cards in the "From" section and leave the "To" section blank. This makes passing out valentines much easier. Students will need to bring in a valentine's box on Thursday.

This week's IA: PE
Next week's IA: Art

On Friday, we created our Crew Life is Art Project that will be available during the auction at Life is Art on Saturday, March 16th.

Reader's Workshop
As we get further into 2nd grade, we will focus on supporting our thinking with examples from the text. This evidence will be visible in our Reading Journals. We are currently learning how to write complete sentences and include good conventions (capitals and end marks) in our writing during Reader's Workshop as well. We're learning how to begin our sentences with words like, "I think, I wonder, I infer, I predict..."

Writer's Workshop
Now that we've finished up our poetry genre study, we will begin learning about our next genre study, non-fiction. We will read many different examples of non-fiction text before we begin thinking about how to compose our own non-fiction piece. This will connect very well with our new science expedition, which we are also beginning soon.

Math
Our new unit is all about patterns and rules in numbers. We will review skip counting as well as continue to work on differences between 2-digit numbers. In this unit, we will also learn how to analyze data using mean, median, and mode.

Expedition

Thank you so much for supporting us last week at our Poetry Reading Night! What a wonderful evening we had. Before we launch our science expedition, we will be learning about personal financial literacy. During this brief study, we will learn about short and long term goals, as well as decisions that must be made with finances.

Monday, February 4th, 2013

Hello there!

I hope everyone got out and enjoyed the beautiful weather last weekend. I enjoyed a nice long, though brisk, thanks to the wind, walk on Saturday.

This week's IA: Music
Next week's IA: PE

*Ms. Diana is wondering if anyone can let her borrow a costume police hat for next week. She said a child's costume hat would be perfect. Please let me know if you might be able to help her out with that.

*Our Poetry Reading Night is this Thursday, 2/7, at 6pm. I am hoping that all students and their families will be able to attend. If you have any questions, please let me know. You will be receiving a sign-up genius in the next day or two for that evening. Our Crew will need drinks, plates, and napkins for that night. Also, if anyone has plastic table cloths we can borrow, that would be great! I will need 5 of them. Your children have worked so hard on their poetry about community, I can't wait for you to hear all of their hard work!

Last week during All School Meeting, Mr. Doug hosted our annual Cup Stacking Tournament. I'm very proud to announce that our very own Keanan won the tournament!! He beat every other student in the tournament. Way to go, Keanan! In class, we talked about how this proves how much perseverance pays off!

Monday, January 28th, 2013

Good afternoon!

This week's IA: Art
Next week's IA: Music

Reader's Workshop
Currently, we are paying attention to how readers infer while reading. We are reading many poems and using our background knowledge along with the text clues, to infer, or guess, what the author really means. We've discovered how much fun it can be to be detectives while reading these poems that use such great word choice. Here's an example of one of the poems we read today:
From the book, If Not for the Cat
By: Jack Prelutsky
Boneless, translucent,
We undulate, undulate,
Gelatinously.
We had to use our background knowledge and the text clues to figure out that the poem was talking about jellyfish. We also had to discuss the vocabulary of this poem. We learned the meaning of translucent and undulate.

Writer's Workshop
Since we are spending so much time reading poetry, we are trying our hands at writing poetry. Our main focus for poetry is to include descriptive words that really paint vivid pictures in our readers' minds. We have started the publishing process for our poems. Some children are choosing to publish by hand while others are choosing to publish their poems on their Kidblog sites. We will share our poetry with you at are Student Led Conferences coming up in March. Just wait until you see how descriptive our writing has become!

Math

Last week, we began using Khan Academy as a way to practice our math. The kids have been super motivated to use this tool! I hope this will help the students practice their basic math facts as well, as I've noticed that not knowing these facts has made the tougher addition and subtraction problems even harder.

Are those Legos? Yes. What do they have to do with math? Let me tell you. Today, we began learning about multiplication. We used Legos to help us begin thinking about this concept. I introduced arrays. We will be using arrays to help us visualize multiplication. Legos are perfect examples of arrays. Arrays are anything that have equal amounts of objects in a certain number of rows. So, the top Lego is an array that has 4 rows with 6 dots in each row. This is a 4x6 array and has 24 total dots. 4x6=24. The bottom Lego (same Lego turned the other way) has 6 rows with 4 dots in each row. This is a 6x4 array. 6x4=24. If you have Legos at home, this would be a great way to practice multiplication.

Expedition
As we are wrapping up our Community Expedition, we are beginning to work on our final product, community poems. We are writing poems that show all we know about community. We will perform these poems for you at a special Poetry Reading Night on Thursday, February 7th at 6pm. This will be held in our classroom and all families are invited. The students will also create a visual presentation to go along with their poetry, which we will show that evening as well. Be on the look out for a Sign-Up Genius for this night. I like to make it a very special night with hot chocolate and treats for the kids.

Tuesday, January 22nd, 2013

Hello! I hope everyone had a wonderful four-day weekend!

This week's IA: PE
Next week's IA: Art

*Please mark your calendars for our upcoming Poetry Reading Night. This will be on Thursday, February 7th, at 6pm. This is a night for students to perform their poetry about community in front of their families. I will send out more information soon.

Our kiddos sure did an amazing job leading the All School Meeting last week! They received many compliments on their professionalism. It takes a lot of courage and perseverance to get up and speak in front of that many people, and everyone of the students showed exactly that. I apologize for the quality (or lack there of) of the photos and I apologize that I wasn't able to snap a photo of each student in action, but please, enjoy the following glimpse into All School Meeting.

Monday, January 14th, 2013

Hello there!

After last week, it seems that we're finally starting to get back into the swing of things. Then we're hit a four day weekend :) Oh well, what can you do?

This week's IA: Music
Next week's IA: PE

*Please don't forget that we are hosting the All School Meeting on Wednesday. We've been practicing really hard and are ready to lead this big event. We will begin at 9:00 in the gym. Everyone is welcome!

I've heard such amazing feedback from our 16 Random Acts of Kindess project! Thank you again for participating in this. Here are some more pictures of our kids in kindness action. These students made and delivered cookies to the Buddy Center and the ER at Castle Rock Adventist Hospital, donated toys, and helped parents find Christmas presents for their kids, who may not have otherwise been able to provide toys on Christmas morning.

I am going to try to get each child's picture up on their Kidblog page for them to write about their experience. Then, you can share their blogs with family and friends and let them get feedback from their posts. I will let you know as soon as I get that done. 

Winter Voyage

We go on our Winter Voyage at the end of February. To help us prepare, Mr. Cody came to our class today. He spent some time playing some community building games with us. This is a great time of year to do these games. Our Crew is just like brothers and sisters, and we all know that sometimes, even though we love our siblings, we can begin to irritate each other. So, today was a great reminder to work together and be respectful. Mr. Cody reminded us that we cannot succeed without each other's help and dedication. 

There is more to these activities than just having fun (which we had plenty of!) After each activity, Mr. Cody debriefed the play and the learning. He is awesome at making connections from these fun games to the classroom and our voyage. He reminded us that when things get too chaotic, it can be hard for the group to concentrate. We also saw just how important it is to pay attention to directions and show integrity. 

Wednesday, January 9, 2013

Wow! Can it really be January already? I hope everyone had a wonderful winter break and is feeling refreshed.

This week's IA: Art
Next week's IA: Music

*Next Wednesday, our crew will be leading the All School Meeting. We would love it if you would be able to come watch as we take on this huge responsibility. The All School Meeting will start at 9:00, next Wednesday, January 16th.

A HUGE thank you to everyone for showing beneficence and performing random acts of kindness over break! It was incredible to hear all the stories over the last couple of days. We did everything from offering our seats on the bus, to adopting a Veteran, caroling at a retirement home. These are all truly moving! Please enjoy some of the pictures of our kiddos showing beneficence. The world is a better place because of our kids!