Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween!

Today the students had a fun day filled of learning mixed with some Halloween fun. We did our usual Daily 5 routine and then made a special treat (part healthy, part “not”).  We did writing about our “Witches Brew” discussing our favorite and least favorite ingredient. We then extended the lesson into math where we did graphing and tallying. After, students played the “Fact Family Game” with our fact triangles.

Ms. Paxton continued her lesson on leaders and students got to interview each other to discuss what qualities make them a leader in school and at home.

Later in the afternoon, the one and only Cosmo visited the class!! (my dog) The students had so much fun playing with her and asking questions about her.

I hope you all have a very happy and safe Halloween! Please keep all treats at home :)

Witches Brew:

Math Games:

Happy Monday!

Happy Monday!

Today our Pre-Student Teacher, Ms. Paxton came back and began her integrated Social Studies and Language Arts unit. Today, students discussed leaders and what makes a leader. We talked briefly about presidents, the leaders in our homes, and the leaders at school.

In reading, students continue to do Word Work, Listen to Reading, and Reading to Self. Next week, if all continues to go well, we will add in writing. Our final section of Daily 5 is Partner Reading.

This week, our spelling skill is contractions. We will do Word Detective tomorrow to find patterns that will help us with our spelling list.

In math we continue to practice naming numbers with tallies, coins, base-10 blocks, pictures, addition, and subtraction number models.

Halloween is on Wednesday. Students can dress in orange and black, however, no costumes or costume accessories. We will do some Halloween Math activities to celebrate the day with a healthy snack. Please also have your child refrain from bringing candy to school after Halloween. Thank you!

I will not be posting tomorrow due to conferences.

Have a wonderful rest of your Monday and a terrific Tuesday!

Artist in Residency

Greetings 2^nd Grade Families-

This week has been very busy! On Monday, we began an artist in residency with Susan Armington. Susan is a mapping artist and is working with the second grade classes to create a map of the Dodge Nature Center pond. The students have been working on making plants, animals and insects around the pond. In two weeks, a poet will becoming to help the students create poems that go along with their pond creation.

This week, we also began Word Work in Daily 5. The students have been using the iPod touches to practice skills of the week. The app that we have been using is called Montessori Crosswords. The students love it! We continue to listen to reading, read to self, and meet with me in small guided reading groups. 

Today we became Word Detectives! We first sorted 8 words into either –or or –ore groups. Students then got out their Word Detective Notebooks and searched for more words in their books. A little while later, we came back together and made a bigger list under each category. We then used our detective skills to find a pattern to help us remember when to use each. The pattern the students found was “If the “or” sound is sandwiched between two other sounds, it is –or” and “If the “or” sound is at the end of the word, chances are its is –ore”. We did find a few exceptions but for the most part, our pattern was always true.

In math, we have been reviewing fact families, addition and subtraction. Our math block gets cut a little short due to our Artist in Residency, but we are getting all of our work done J

Conferences have been fabulous so far! It is so nice to see all of the families again and let them know how their child is doing. It is important that we work together as a team, to make sure that our children are getting the best education possible.

I will not be blogging tomorrow due to conferences but will do my best to post again on Friday.

Friday is the Moreland Masquerade!!! Dress up and go Trick-or-treating on our trail through the hallway! I hope to see you there!!!!

Tues & Thurs.

Sorry no blog tonight or Thursday due to conferences. I will post news and pictures of our Artist in Residency tomorrow.

Thank you to everyone who came for conferences tonight!!!

Picturing Writing

This week was very fun! Yesterday, we finished our picturing writing with the writing piece of our spider paintings. We had made the paintings using glue resist and discussed what the background might look like. The student chose the time of day to showcase their spider and web. We have been reading the book Charlotte’s Web and have learned quite a bit about spiders and have compared them to our caterpillars/butterflies. We made a list of different facts that we have learned about spiders and used the facts in our writing. We will need to continue to practice writing using capital beginnings, spacing, and ending marks in the correct places.

In math, we reviewed fact families and finding missing numbers. We also learned some “tricks” to help us find sums of equations faster using what we know about our doubles facts.

In reading, we lost the privilege of the listening center :( Our reading stamina decreased last week and this week-- we needed to review how to read to self. The listening center will return next week. Students have been working with me in small groups (2-5 kids/group) to work on reading skills with me. Please continue to read with your child at home.

Next week Susan Armington, an artist, will be joining our class and will help the children create a wetland environment. The students will discuss the different animals that they saw while at the Dodge Nature Center back in September and will also explore different life cycles around a wetland. Susan will be with us all week long to finish the project on Friday (in time to show it off for the Moreland Masquerade).

Have a wonderful long weekend! 

Sorry for the delay

Sorry for the long break from blogging. Here are some of the things we have been doing:

Morning Messages:

Morning Meeting Games:

 Picturing Writing (we are reading Charlotte’s Web and making spiders on webs to motivate and enhance our writing)

In math, we created apples that helped us practice naming numbers. Students created the number in the "core" of the apple using base-10 blocks, tallies, coins, and addition or subtraction (their choice). They are hanging up in the hallway for you to see at conferences.

Word Hunt

We had a wonderful day in the classroom. The students worked really hard in reading and in math. We continue to search for words that end in –ch and –tch to help us make some good connections when trying to sound spell words. We also went on a word hunt while reading one of our paper books and highlighted the words when we found them. Our healthy snack this week is broccoli! Some of the students LOVED it, however, some did not. All of the students tried it and could throw it away if they didn’t like it.

Word Detectives

Another great day! Today students became word detectives. I have noticed that spelling test scores have started going down-practice or no practice. I decided to try one of the strategies I have learned in grad school where the students sort words that make the same sound (this week –ch and –tch). One the list has been sorted into two groups, the children look for patterns with the vowels in each of the words. Today we noticed that if there is an I or an A, the word usually ends in tch (watch, itch). If the word has an O or a U it ends in ch (munch, porch). Students then got a "Word Detective" Notebook and searched the room for words that fit the rule or for exceptions to the rule. We did find some exceptions (which and rich) but students now know that if they come to a word that has a /ch/ ending sound to figure out which vowel is in the word and then guess. We will continue to practice this skill this week. In math, students continue to work with addition facts and number stories.

Happy Monday!

Today was a wonderful day in 2^nd grade! A new student joined our class and all of the other children were very welcoming. I must say-I am already dreading the end of the year when I need to say goodbye to this class. I receive so many compliments about their behavior and over all kindness; it warms my heart.

In reading, we read to self, listened to reading and added a new poem to our poetry journals. We also discussed fact vs opinion and searched for diagraphs in our reading and spelling. In math, students played “Name the Missing Number”. 2 students came to the front of the room. I gave them each a card with a number on it (that they couldn’t look at).  The cards together made the sum of 10. When I said “1-2-3 Open” the students opened their eyes and tried to figure out what number was on their head by looking at the other student’s number. It was a lot of fun! We will continue to play this game so that we can practice automaticity with our sums of 10. We will then slowly make it more difficult. The students finished their butterfly journals today and will bring them home at conferences.

PLEASE REMEMBER TO RETURN YOUR CONFERENCE FORM!

Student work sample of our life cycle writing:

Happy 3 Day Weekend!

It is Friday and the kids I am sure are playing outside and running around. I, on the other hand, am at school coming up with lesson ideas that will help support our arts & health sciences magnet theme. FUN!!

Here is my post for Wednesday and Thursday in the classroom:

This week we have had a lot of fun continuing our learning about our butterflies. Yesterday, some of the students noticed that some of the butterflies were “connecting” with another butterfly friend. They were witnessing the mating portion of the butterfly life cycle.

In reading we continue to read to self, listen to reading, and work in small groups. One of the groups read a story called How to Make Sock Puppets. They had so much fun reading it and told me that they were going to make their own sock puppets over the weekend. All of the stories we read in our small groups have a worksheet that goes along with the story to support comprehension, rhyming, writing, and other skills. These sheets are at times done in our small groups and are also sent for individual work time.

PLEASE TAKE TIME TO PRACTICE SPELLING! (not in order to memorize, but to really know and understand how to spell the words correctly)

Yesterday, students took the end of the unit test. Tests will be graded and returned soon. Next week, we will begin Unit 2 incorporating supplemental materials from CGI training.

We have also been doing a lot of creative writing. It is not structured-as in students are not given a topic to write about. The kids LOVE writing and it is great to see!

HAVE A WONDERFUL WEEKEND!!!!!!!!