Oktoberfest

Our class had the opportunity to visit with Mrs. Sobanksi's class as they hosted an Oktoberfest.  The kids enjoyed reading and math games as well as a snack.

Math Workshop

View the students while engaged in several math activities during our Math Workshop.  The workshop is focused on Math facts, At Your Seat, Teacher's Choice, and Hands On activities.  In addition to our daily math lesson, the kids work through workshop activities.

Domino sorting

xtramath.org

Domino Sorting

Base Ten Structures

Base Ten Structures

xtramath.org

Number Scrolls

At Your Seat

Base Ten Structures

Second Grade Team Building

During the first few weeks of school, the kids participated in team building activities while grouped with students from the other second grade classes. They rotated into our three classrooms and engaged in collaborative activities. In these photos, the children are building structures with marshmallows and glue.

New Happenings

Science: 

Our class has been really enjoying the rock unit.  We had the opportunity to explore rocks in the classroom and discuss their properties such as texture, color, size, etc.  In the LMC, we broke into three groups to research different types of rocks (igneous, sedimentary, and metamorphic).  The kids used a website called Facts4me to find information about how the rock is formed, what it looks like, examples of the rock, and how it is used today.  Then, we created a class document to share and teach each other about the different rocks we researched.  Coming up, the kids will learn that rocks are made of minerals.  We will also explore fossils as each child will make their own fossil.

Writing:

The autobiography unit is complete and each child is very proud of their book.  We are now learning about personal narratives and how these stories are about a personal experience and include a problem or conflict and solution.  We are at the beginning stages of this project and we are hoping to have each child type and publish their personal narrative.  This will require the kids to go through the revision and editing process.

Throughout the year, the kids will be writing poetry about topics we are studying in class, seasons, current events, and many other topics.  This poetry book will be published into a hardcover book that is highly motivating to the kids.

Thank you for allowing your child access to our kidblog.  As a parent, you may also read the student blogs and provide a comment to your child.  All posts and comments are filtered through Mrs. McLoone and Mrs. Boyle, so this is a monitored activity.  The link to our kidblog is available on our class blog homepage.

Math:

Unit 2 has a strong focus on developing fact power.  Many of the students are already on their way to mastering addition facts to memory.  Thanks to the families that are regularly practicing facts and using the xtramath.org website.  Daily practice will be very helpful to the kids.  We have been using doubles facts and other strategies to get to our facts quickly.

The math homework has been going great.  If you can encourage the kids to staple or clip their Home Links to the end of the packet and put their name on each paper, it would be helpful to our classroom organization.