Weekly Update 1/16

It’s been great to be back in school after the holiday break, and the kids had a very busy yet fun two weeks!

We began this past week with a whole class introduction to the reading strategy of "making inferences." The kids learned that sometimes an author doesn't come straight out and tell you things and that you have to "read between the lines" to interpret what they are saying. The students learned that in order to make an inference you use both the text clues and your background knowledge. Throughout the week, the students had the opportunity to practice this skill in their reading groups. We will do some more follow-up work in our groups this coming week.

In math the children made pretend purchases to work on their money skills. We practiced paying exact amounts as well as paying more and finding the change. We also spent some time doing our Unit 5 Exploration activities, which focused on making arrays, matching clock faces to digital notation, and constructing shapes on geoboards. Finally, the kids learned to use open number lines as a tool for solving number stories.

In the content areas we completed our last 2 science lessons of the unit. The kids conducted experiments to explore mixing various materials. The best part of the experiment was trying to get the materials to separate back out! Some of the mixtures included oil and marbles, and flour and pepper- messy, but fun!! The other lesson looked at heating and cooling materials (eggs, bananas, water, lettuce, popcorn kernels) and again discussing whether the change could be reversed.

We are looking forward to starting our Social Studies unit on mapping this week. On Thursday we took a pretend airplane trip to our first country of study, which is Mexico! We will first spend some time learning about the continent that we live on-North America! Then, we will move onto Mexico and will learn about the culture of the country and compare and contrast it with the culture of the United States.


The students are off to a great start with our Opinion Writing unit. They learned how to write an opening sentence, filled out a graphic organizer about a restaurant of their choice, and began to write their first review. Next week we will focus on specialized language and discuss that a review should not sound like a "story" but should use persuasive language.


Finally, we finished off the week learning about Martin Luther King Jr. and the amazing impact he had on our lives today.


Friendly reminder that there is NO SCHOOL Monday and Tuesday next week.
Monday- Martin Luther King Jr. Day
Tuesday- Professional Development


*** One final reminder that the students should be answering the reading comprehension questions on the back of the Reading Log each week. These questions are to be answered in at least 2 complete sentences. Many of the kids are doing a great job with this. Please take the time to review the comments with your child and make changes if necessary. We appreciate your support with this important component of their homework.


Here's what the kids had to say about the past two weeks…

“My favorite part of the past 2 weeks was when we mixed materials because we wanted to know what materials could not be changed back and if they could be changed back.”
- Sarah


“My favorite part of the past 2 weeks was when we played Beat the Calculator because it’s a new game for me.”
- Dylan

“My favorite part of the past 2 weeks was when we had school store because I donated to the kitty foundation.”
- Allison


“My favorite part of the past 2 weeks was the trip to Mexico because all the second graders got together.”
- Alison


“My favorite part of the past 2 weeks was learning about Eve Bunting because I like learning about famous authors.”
- Vineeth