Week 16

 Dear Parents, 

       We had another fun week of learning despite the full moon, Lunar Eclipse and the excitement about the upcoming break. I hope you enjoyed their special keepsake Thankful Acrostic Poem we made!

        In math we looked at division as repeated subtraction. We also had a baggie of chocolate chip cookies ( the paper kind) to practice dividing them up into equal groups depending on how many friends were to share them. We took our assessment on Thursday. 

         In writing we continued on with our expository explain why paper. We used color coding and three different graphic organizers to plan and write this paper. The children are getting better at revising and adding interesting words as well as sensory details. We will continue finishing up some of these after break. ( Most were finished and enjoyed sharing on Friday.

          In reading this week we focused on Thanksgiving stories both fiction and nonfiction. We took a comprehension/ story element quiz over one of the stories. We read two Scholastic News stories, one about the first Thanksgiving and one about a Thanksgiving tradition we have today- The Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade!

           In science we continued learning about force and motion as we painted with marbles (using pushes and pulls as they rolled around a box lid) and had investigations where we observed how objects can either roll, slide or spin. We measured and traced the paths of objects and learned that their path can be affected by their physical properties. We even saw how the hills and inclines of a roller coaster affected the speed of the marble as it traveled on our roller coaster. On Friday we began our performance task of planning a maze. 

            I hope you all have a wonderful break and can spend much needed quality time with friends and family.

 

*SSA is offering one more mini camp before Christmas break. See the attached flier.

 

• From our Language acquisition specialist: With the holidays just around the corner, your LAS team is putting a little something together to celebrate holidays around the world. We are going to change out the window case that is currently featuring Diwali within the next few weeks. If you, or your children celebrate a holiday other than Christmas around this time of year and would like to contribute, please reach out to me!

 

             We are looking for items and/or pictures that we can display in the window for Hanukah, Kwanzaa, or any other holidays that I may have missed. Ideally we would like to             feature pictures of you or our students celebrating their holiday and items commonly associated with the holiday, such as a dreidel or menorah for Hanukah. Any items shared with us will be given back after the holidays when we change out the window case again, unless donated to the LAS team for future use.

Week 15

 Dear Parents,

        This week in math we began  multiplication as repeated addition as we built buildings with floors that had the same number of rooms.We ended the week by comparing repeated addition to equal groups. We chanted the first number is the groups the second number is the dots. We showed that drawing 3x4 is different than drawing 4x3. They have the same answer, but one has 3 groups with 4 dots in each group as the other one has 4 groups with 3 dots in each group. They both have a product of 12 total dots.

         In writing we worked on our explain why papers, then took a break to make a special keepsake for each child to give you next week. We wanted to make sure there was plenty of time to do our very best. We will continue drafting our expository papers next week.

         In reading we learned about nonfiction text features and read two interesting Scholastic News stories. We answered comprehension questions, questions about the main ideas and details, as well as the nonfiction text features we saw.

         In science we had fun learning about magnets by digging for buried treasure. We saw what things were magnetic and nonmagnetic. Then we had a magnetic hunt in our classroom. We did a talk, read, talk write activity and played a vocabulary game. We are next talking about forces as pushes and pulls and will paint with marbles to test out these forces.

Week 14

 Dear Parents, 

        We had another fun filled week of learning in second grade. I told the class how impressed I am with their responsibility at school. We are working to do our best, and learn from our mistakes- with a good attitude! In math this week we continued with measuring using standard and metric measurements. We also reviewed area and perimeter with a fun activity using Cheez-It crackers! We made sure to build on a paper towel so we could eat them when we were finished. We reviewed on Thursday and took our assessment on Friday.

          In writing we worked on an acrostic poem to honor our veterans at the upcoming assembly on Nov. 11^th. A paper went home this week asking you to invite any veterans you would like to honor at our assembly. I will attach another copy of the flyer if you missed it. We then began to brainstorm and plan an expository writing explaining why we like something.

           In reading/ Social Studies we read about our three levels of Government and created a flip book about some of the facts we learned. It was fun seeing the faces of our Mayor, Governor, and President as well as learning their names and seeing the pictures of buildings in which they work. On Friday we read a story about reading and chose our favorite book to create a chatterpix telling why we liked our chosen book.

          In science we continued investigations and learning about the three forms of energy. We learned the parts of the ear and eye that help us experience this energy. We added heat to chocolate and observed as it turned from a solid to a liquid and then back to a solid as we added heat, and then removed heat. We really had fun drawing in the chocolate when it was in a liquid state. We took a vocabulary cloze procedure and finished up our assessment on Friday. Next we will be learning about force and motion!

 

*We are almost out of classroom snacks again. If you would like to donate some snacks it is appreciated. They really love goldfish and Cheez-Its!

 

*For the Veterans Day Assembly second grade is to wear a blue T-shirt.

 

*The November Habit Newsletter went home today in your child’s Coyote Folder- If you fill them all out- you will become a lighthouse Family! They are to be turned in by Wednesday November 10^th.  The grade level that completes and turns in the most habit newsletters will receive a grade level choice reward!