March 19, 2017

Happy Saint Patrick's Day! This has been a busy couple of weeks with the Alice Drill, Living Lab, Snow Day, 2 Hour Delay, and Play Rehearsals. Although there have been a lot of special activities, we have also been hard at work in the classroom. 

Last week we worked on making inferences and visualizing while reading books. We began with a whole class lesson that not only reviewed these reading skills, but also introduced the kids to poetry which is our March writing unit. This reading skill was reinforced during our reading groups. 

In terms of Poetry, we will spend some time this week talking about what the kids already knew about poetry, reading a few fun poems, and writing couplet poems to get us started. The kids will be writing their own 2 line poems that rhyme. Over the next couple of weeks, the kids will also get the opportunity to write several different types of poems, some of which will rhyme, and some of which will be template poems.  We will also be writing some free verse poems. 

In math we finished up Unit 6 and have started Unit 7 which focuses on whole number operations, measurement, and data. The children practiced finding differences between 2-digit numbers and multiples of 10 by playing a game called Hit the Target. We also spent some time talking about adding multiple numbers in a logical way to make the problem easier. The children were encouraged to look for "friendly numbers" which could be a multiple of 10 or a doubles fact. 

Last week we finished up our travels to Australia by visiting the computer lab to learn more about the Great Barrier Reef. The children then created their own coral reef scrapbook page and included facts that they learned in the computer lab. After Australia, we traveled to the amazing continent of Europe. The kids learned about Europe as a whole, and next week we will focus on the country of Italy!! 

The Second Grade performance is coming along nicely and we are excited to perform for you Friday, March 24th at 1:45 in the Robinson Cafeteria! 

I look forward to meeting with you all during Parent Teacher Conferences March 29th and 30th. 

Here are some of the kids' favorite parts of the last weeks...

"I liked practicing for our school show because I like my part."
                                  - Daniel

"I liked learning about the Great Barrier Reef because I like nature."
                                  - Allison

"I liked flying to Europe because we learned about countries in Europe."
                                  - Aashrith

"I liked learning about the Great Barrier Reef because there were sea turtles and I love sea turtles."
                                 - Ava

"I liked visiting the Living Lab because we got to make waves."
                                 - Alison

"I liked learning about the Great Barrier Reef because it has pretty colors."
                                 - Giana

Upcoming Events:

Tuesday, March 21st - School Store for Grade Two (rescheduled due to Snow Day) 

Wednesday, March 22nd- Performance for the School 

Friday, March 24th- Performance for Parents at 1:45 

Wednesday, March 29th- 2 Hour Delay for Parent Teacher Conferences

Thursday, March 30th- No School for Parent Teacher Conferences 

March 5, 2017

I hope you all enjoyed the week off from school for February vacation and got to spend some quality time with your families and friends. It’s always nice to have a little extra time at home to refresh, especially when the temperatures allow for some outside time! I want to make sure to thank Debbie Porthouse for planning and running the parties this year for our class. The 3 parties were lots of fun! Thank you also to all of the other parents who came to help out and/or provided snacks or paper goods. We certainly couldn't have these celebrations without your support!

Here is a look at what we accomplished this last week in school...

Our rehearsals began this week for the upcoming second grade show entitled "Colors". We had 3 practices this week, and the actual performance will be on Wednesday, March 22nd for the school and Friday, March 24th for parents. The kids were excited to learn what parts they would play in the performance, and I’m sure you’re already hearing the songs being sung at home!

During reading time this week we finished up some loose ends from before vacation. I also met with a few remaining kids to assess their reading progress in preparation for our upcoming conferences. We continue to practice comprehension strategies during our groups, including summarizing, discussing problem and solution, visualizing, and making connections.


In math we taught the Partial-Sums Addition Method to combine two and three digit numbers together. This method should look very familiar, as it is most like the traditional way of adding multiple-digit numbers together. We began the week trying this out with base ten blocks to provide a physical model of what happens when we combine 100's, 10's, and 1's to add two and three digit numbers together. We then transitioned to trying this out without the base ten blocks to help us. For some kids, this is a difficult concept. We will provide much more practice in this area in the coming weeks.

Our travels around the world brought us to the continent of Australia this week! We spent some time learning more about this beautiful continent, and next week we’ll be doing a fun project to explore the incredible Great Barrier Reef!

During our spelling time next week we'll be checking on the spelling of the 100 High Frequency Words. The list of words is in your child's take home folder. It's always helpful to be reviewing these words with your child.

On Wednesday of next week our class will be visiting the Living Lab at the Day School. We already have signed permission slips from all of you from the beginning of the year, so the kids are all set to ride the bus over. Please check the weather and make sure your child has appropriate clothing and footwear for some outside time by the brook.


Coming soon...

Monday, March 13th- Online Conference Sign-Up Begins
Friday, March 24th- Parent Portal Opens to View Progress Reports
Wednesday, March 29th- 2 Hour Delay, Conferences 9:00-11:00
Thursday, March 30th- No School; Conferences 2:00-8:00