December News

       

                               

       December News

   This is always such busy time for students, teachers and families! The advent of various holidays, winter holiday concerts, and the anticipation of winter vacation, all contribute to student excitement this month. Santa Claus is coming, and there are letters to be written to this “jolly ol’ elf”, for example.  This alone keeps a second grader in a nearly perpetual state of heightened vigilance, enthusiasm, and occasionally fatigue!  Still important learning must and does go on in the classroom.

  Work on the art projects, research, and writing in our World Cultures and Traditions continues in earnest. We’re planning on a book share with our families in February.

  We did research on penguins and students wrote science reports on selected penguins.

   In-class word work (Fountas and Pinnell) on our whiteboards includes consonant work such as double consonants in the middle of words and blends in the beginning and ends of words. Review of “muscle words” on whiteboards is a regular part of practice in class.

  Building stamina in reading, and retelling stories with attention to including important details from the beginning, middle, and end of the story are a focus this month.

   In math, sharing ways to add numbers using double tens frames, adding and subtracting with double numbers without regrouping, adding and subtracting 10 to numbers, telling time to five minutes on an analogue clock, are some of the skills students are working on, as well as learning strategies when solving story problems.

   Second grade students participated in a memorable holiday concert on December 10 at Traip Academy.  Ms. Moon the Mitchell School music teacher led K-3 students through a joyous chorus of winter-themed songs with third graders performing on ukuleles, and various students using percussive instruments to accompany selected songs.

  The day before vacation, students were invited to wear pajamas to school, and second graders had some special seasonal foods for morning snack, and settled in for a day of grabbing a pillow and a book for sustained reading. 

   

November News

                                   

  

     November Notes

   This month we began work on our handmade books on world cultures and traditions. This project will encompass science, social studies, art, reading, and writing. We have completed the cover. To support and enrich this study we took a field trip to Strawbery Banke in Portsmouth, NH on November 5. Students learned not only about the harvest festival of Thanksgiving in early America, but learned about harvest festivals that are celebrated in selected countries around the world.

  Later, to inform a writing project, on a large chart we constructed a collaborative class web naming the old houses we had visited, along with the historical facts we had learned about the lives of the people who lived there long ago. We learned the characteristics of a good lead when writing, and students shared and critiqued leads from their Strawbery Banke writing. When learning about this type of non fiction writing, students were taught the importance of including the who, what, where, when, why, and how in their reports.

  A springboard for a creative writing homework assignment was to color and decorate a drawing of a turkey, and then write an imaginative story and description about “Tom Turkey”. This collection of writings and artful turkeys turned into a very entertaining “turkey trot” indeed!

   Reading continues to focus on matching appropriate books to readers, comprehension, and practicing strategies for making predictions and practicing summarizing stories orally and in writing.

  Students are learning how to use number lines, number grids, doubles facts, to help with adding and subtracting numbers. They have also been working with double tens frames from the Everyday Math program. During morning meeting, students have daily practice with telling time and counting money.

  This month each second grade teacher represented a country (ms. J.-R.:China, Mrs. Staulcup: Ireland, Mrs. Howe: Kenya, Mrs. DeLuca: Brazil, Mrs. Hartley: Australia).  All the second grade students visited each classroom for a couple of days and learned about the country that teacher was representing.  In their own classrooms, they learned about the cultural traditions of the U.S.A., and visited Antarctica. In the end, all the students had “traveled around the world”,

And recorded their adventures in their World Cultures and Traditions Books.

  With the arrival of Thanksgiving, it is a reminder that fall is winding down, winter is on its way, and winter holidays, celebrations are approaching fast with Christmas vacation only several weeks away!  

  

October News

Here's Brownie the bat being introduced to students., 

   Wow! What a busy month this has been! We were "feeling the burn" immediately with fire safety week! It's a good time to review fire safety and escape plans at home, as well. Along with a number of fire drills at school, we visited the fire station where we saw a film on fire safety, students were invited to explore a fire truck, and they met some local fire fighters who imparted more fire safety tips. At the conclusion of the visit, students crawled through a furniture and blanket "tunnel" pretending to crawl low under smoke when exiting a burning building.
   Getting started on our year-long social studies unit, a  project which will culminate with a handmade book on the state of Maine, we invited a representative from the Weathervane to come visit us in our classrooms. Since our state produces 90% of the lobsters in the country, a program on "Lobster Lore" was the kick-off to our Maine Unit, with live lobsters "Larry" and "Lucy" representing themselves in this educational presentation.
   Another October highlight was a bat program presented at Mitchell School for second graders through the York Center for Wildlife.  Students learned about the nine insect-eating bat species that are found in Maine, along with additional information about the habitats and characteristics of some of the fruit and pollen-eating bats that live in warmer climates.  Best of all was an up-close look at two live brown bats named "Betty" and "Brownie".
  Because we're "batty about bats", we decorated the whole classroom with our handcrafted paper bats, making it look spooky for Halloween!

September News

Larry and Lucy the lobsters being held and "petted". 

 And we're off! I have seventeen students who are a lovely group of eager learners!

I appreciate that the students are coming to school prepared with the necessary supplies and a healthy peanut and tree nut-free morning snack. The morning begins with a snack, a necessary energy boost to help students focus and do their best academic work. Lunch isn't served until 12:20p.m., so second graders need a nourishing breakfast and snack every school day. It's a long 4 hours until lunch.

At 9:00a.m. we begin Everyday Math, Unit I. We 're reviewing some first grade math. Highlights include simple addition and subtraction facts, skip-counting, number lines, and number grids. Memorizing all the combinations of ten will be emphasized.

   Writing personal narratives with attention to audience awareness for details and a story with a beginning, middle, and end is the focus this month.

   Students will be assessed on a list of 138 high use words to determine what words need spelling practice. Word work in class will be phonics- based.

   Lessons on how to choose a "just right" book for reading, care of books, location of books in the classroom library, along with learning how prediction about the book's content and story can help with comprehension when reading text will be a focus this month. We will also work on reading stamina and learning some behaviors of fluent readers, i.e., what a fluent reader sounds like when reading out loud.

   Reading homework involving book bags begins this month. Book bags will go home M-Th. It is expected that students will borrow soft cover books over night. Parents, please sign your child's book log indicating he or she has read for 15-20 minutes, and please make sure the book is returned each day, even if the book comes home for several nights in a row. The book bag has reading strategies sheets you may refer to in book talks with your child.

  It's going to be a wonderful year of growth and discovery! We have some field trips to look forward to, as well, beginning with Strawbery Banke in November.

  Check out the grade two website http://2ndgradesandpipers.blogspot.com/ for more information.