Happy Holidays

 Happy Holidays from Room 206!

Wishing you a new year full of joy.

Weekly Updates December 14

We have had a busy week! We were troopers with some end of the 9 weeks tests, finished our social studies unit, completed our math unit, and we had a great day celebrating holidays around the world with all the second grade teachers!

It's the final countdown until winter break. Here is what is going on next week.

Phonics

There will be no spelling list next week due to the short week.

ELA/Writing

We will finish our personal narratives about a time we got hurt or sick.

Math

On Monday we will introduce our unit on geometry. Chapter 5 is about lines and shapes.

Science

We will not start our new unit until we come back in January. It is a really fun, engaging unit that I am excited about. We will be moving on to learning about matter. We will have lots of hands on learning in science. I will show them a video to introduce the unit on Monday, and we will delve into the content and experiments after break.

Class Party

Tuesday we have our class party at 11:00. The kids will be making gingerbread houses. Anyone is welcome to join us.

Pajama Day

Wednesday will be a special treat. It will be pajama day in our room. We will do a craft, read The Polar Express by Chris Van Allsburg and then watch the movie. Just will be a good, relaxing last day.

Supplies

I will send an e-mail out, but I am going to ask for supply repleneshment for the new semester after winter break.

All I am asking they bring is a school box, one box of colored pencils, and one box of markers.

At the beginning of year we did communal supplies, and I am not liking it. I guess you live and learn as a first year teacher! They are running low quickly and it has become a mess.

 If they just bring a school box, markers, and colored pencils, they can keep those coloring supplies in the school box, and I will give each child a pair of scissors and gluesticks from our supplies we already have.

I hope everyone is ok with this.

If they could bring it next week we can get them ready for January.

Thank You

Thank you for a great first semester class. I couldn't have asked for a sweeter class. Thanks for sharing your children with me everyday.

Holiday Rotation Pictures

The class had a great time celebrating holidays in all of the second grade classrooms today!

They celebrated Christmas, Kwanzaa, Chanukkah, New Years, St. Lucia, and Las Posadas.

Here are a couple pictures of them playing dreidel in our classroom for Hanukkah.

Marin and Luke playing dreidel. Marin is wearing a St. Lucia crown from the St. Lucia activity.

Carter and Jia playing dreidel.

Mollie playing dreidel.

Spencer playing dreidel.

Comma Game

Here is a link to a game we played in class to practice using commas in a series.

Commas in a series is when we use commas to separate a list of items or phrases in a sentence.

Example: Josh put apples, grapes, and cherries in the grocery basket.

The family went to the movies, played at the park, and ate at a restaurant last weekend.

Comma Confusion!

Happy Chanukkah

Chanukkah Sameach to all in our class who celebrate!

Weekly Updates December 7

Here is a look into what we are doing next week!

We had a great field trip to the Fox Theater today to see the Atlanta Ballet perform. I think the girls were definitely more enthralled than the boys, but so goes it!

Phonics

Next week in phonics we will explore the vowel-consonant-e pattern, which makes an "open syllable".

This is when a syllable has a vowel, consonant, followed by the silent E that makes the vowel "say its name".

Example- cape, cone, like

Phonics lessons are definitely not our most exciting part of the day, but the system we use is proven to be effective for increasing spelling skills and reading skills.

ELA/Writing

We will continue a little bit with commas in a series for ELA, but the kids pretty much have this down-pact so we won't spend too much time on it.

We will have an ELA test on Thursday to cover the second nine weeks: adjectives, commas in a series, friendly letter format, adverb identification. I will send home a review on Tuesday.

We are working on a personal narrative in writing. They are writing an Ouch! story about a time they got hurt or were really sick. We made brainstorm webs, had a lesson on transition words in writing, and started our rough drafts. I plan on finishing rough drafts, doing a lesson on editing marks, self-editing our rough drafts, and hopefully we will have a "published" personal narrative piece before the break.

Reading

We have been integrating story elements into literacy centers and guided reading.

In guided reading some groups are doing "book club" (literature circle), some are working on reading strategies with leveled readers, and we are re-inforcing phonics skills.

Math

On Monday we will do a review in class for the math test, which is on Tuesday.

I will send it home with them if you want to review it with them after.

We will also do math centers exploring clocks, shape attributes, and equal sharing.

Social Studies

We will wrap up our unit on Exploring Georgia. We will test on Friday.

Extra Info

Wednesday 12/12- Cultural Arts Performance at school

Friday 12/14- Second Grade holiday rotations

Tuesday 12/18 Class party

Wednesday 12/19- Pajama Day

Social Studies Test Date Change

Due to Challenge being on Mondays, we will have the test next Friday, December 14. I will send the review home on Tuesday, and we will play a review game the Thursday before.

End of the Semester Fun!

The post below has test dates. This post has dates of FUN things we will be doing.

Friday December 7

Field Trip to Atlanta Ballet

Friday December 14

2nd Grade Holiday Rotations

The second grade teachers will each be coming up with a holiday lesson and classes will be rotating from room to room.

Tuesday December 18

Class Party

Wednesday December 19

Pajama Day!

Please allow your child to wear their pajamas as we will be doing crafts and having a movie party for the last day of school before break with fun snacks!

Test Schedule for Remainder of 2nd Nine Weeks

Here are the test dates for the rest of the 9 weeks.

Friday December 7 - Spelling Test

Tuesday December 11- Unit 2 Math Test

Review will be done in class on Monday.

Thursday December 13- 2nd 9 Weeks ELA Test

I will send home a review on Tuesday.

Friday December 14- Spelling Test

Monday December 17- Social Studies Test

I will send the review for this home the Wednesday before for them to work on.

It will be due the Monday of the test. They can get it done before the weekend and keep it until Monday in case they still want to look at it before Monday.



High Touch High Tech Pictures

We had a great time today with High Touch High Tech's lesson called Gas Blast about the states of matter.

Bailey grimacing at the smell of vinegar!

Charlie and Sophia shooting the foam darts.

Jeremy and Nikoloas investigating mass.

Caleb and Carter checking out liquids.

Luke looking at the liquids.

Marin playing at the liquids center.



Important Note About 2 Digit Addition

Looks like the post about partial sums did not format the way I had typed it!

I will send home a hard copy of how to do partial sums this week in your child's binder.