Important Dates: Monday, Dec. 19: No School - Start of Winter Break Monday, Jan. 2: No School (New Year's Day Observed) Tuesday, Jan. 3: School Resumes Tuesday, Jan. 10: Field trip - Mercer Slough Monday, Jan. 16: No school - MLK Day Hi families, This week day by day: Monday: Penguin craft day was a hit! I hope you enjoyed the stuffed penguins that came home. Let me know if you would like the directions to make your own at home. Tuesday: We prepared for our writing celebration by editing, coloring and reading like experts. In math, we practiced our 2-digit addition strategies with a new game called Save Twenty. Wednesday: We wrapped up our first non-fiction writing unit with our non-fiction writing celebration on Wednesday. Thank you to all who could make it. For those of you who could not, students' writing will be on display in the hallway for a few weeks in January. Please come and check it out! Students went around the QAE neighborhood to deliver our New Year's cards. Students did a nice job knocking on doors saying hello to folks around the school. Thursday: Students started writing their own gingerbread fairy tales, changing settings, characters and plots to create their own fractured fairy tales. In math, students played 100-chart Hop Scotch. Friday: We finished up and shared our fractured fairy tales and celebrated our hard work with hot chocolate and Inside Out. Thank you to everyone for the thoughtful and generous gifts. Have a lovely winter break, merry holidays and I will see you all in 2017!
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Important Dates: Monday, Dec. 12: Penguin Day Wednesday, Dec. 14: Non-fiction Writing Celebration 7:55 - 8:15am (Yes, on Wednesday!) Wednesday, Dec. 14: Neighborhood Walk - Deliver Postcards Friday, Dec. 16: Unity Celebration - Inside Out and Popcorn Monday, Dec. 19: No School - Start of Winter Break Monday, Jan. 2: No School (New Year's Day Observed) Tuesday, Jan. 3: School Resumes Hi families, This week we have been taking a look at variations of the Gingerbread Man, reading the traditional story followed by reading corresponding "fractured fairy tales." While reading these stories, we have been working on our retelling skills, making sure to include setting, characters and plot. We have discussed how plot lines follow patterns. Plots often have characters finding or creating a problem and then they often solve these problems by the end. We had an interesting conversation about how there can be several problems in one story. Typically, the biggest problems involve the main characters, and in the endings characters often resolve these problems. These resolutions can sometimes solve other minor characters' problems as well. Next week, we will compare and contrast stories and write our own gingerbread fractured fairy tales! Writing: We are finishing up our teaching texts, adding comparison, revising and editing, and making sure our table of contents have the right page numbers. Looking forward to sharing our books with you on Wednesday first thing in the morning. Math: We are building strategies for 2-digit addition in math. So far we have covered adding by place value, adding part-by-part and adding with friendly numbers (make friendly numbers or break numbers up to find friendly numbers). Next week, we will continue practicing these strategies as we add 3 or more 2-digit addends. Important Dates: Dec. 5 -9: Food Drive for Pike Place Market Dec. 5-9: Raise for Maize Wednesday, Dec. 7: Hour of Code Monday, Dec. 12: Penguin Day Wednesday, Dec. 14: Non-fiction Writing Celebration 7:55 - 8:15am Friday, Dec. 16: Unity Celebration - Inside Out and Popcorn Monday, Dec. 19: Start of Winter Break Monday, Jan. 2: No School Tuesday, Jan. 3: School Resumes Hi families, As we prepare for the holidays and a time of giving and reflection, our school community is doing its part to contribute. Next week, we will hold a food drive for the Pike Place Market and hold a fundraiser for our sister school, Dwankhozi. Students and families are welcome to bring in non-perishable items and toilet paper on Tuesday for the food drive and the total of donations for Dwankhozi on Friday, December 9. In our own class, we discussed some of the pressing issues we've noticed around our community. Here is a list of some of the problems students have noticed around the community:
Students read about their topic, wrote down some of the causes of the problems, and as a group came up with some ideas on how to solve some of these problems. Students showed compassion and thought as they came up with creative ideas. Some included machines in the ocean to pick up trash to writing letters to the president to shut down cigarette factories. Take a look at the photo so see some of the other creative solutions students came up with. Math - Students are taking their first look at solving different types of word problems. These types fall into four categories: join, separate, part-part-whole and comparing. We will practice these word problems again in the winter. Writing - Students have been feverishly writing to teach all they know about topics they are experts on. We will have our writing celebration on Wednesday, December 14 first thing in the morning. Reading - We have been growing our knowledge across multiple non-fiction texts, comparing information between books of the same topic and taking notes on new and imporant key words. Using our wide awake brains, students have used text features such as captions, labels, subtitles and glossaries to help gain and grow their knowledge. Important Dates: Thursday, November 10 - Veterans' Day Assembly Friday, November 11 - Veterans' Day - No School Wednesday, November 16 - Early release (12:05pm) and first conference day - 2:30-8:00pm Monday, November 21 - Second day of conferences and start of Thanksgiving break (No school) Tuesday, November 22 - Third and final day of conferences (No school) Hi families, Reading and Writing After the celebration on Monday, we started our non-fiction reading and writing units. In the reading unit, students will start shifting from learning how to read and begin reading to learn. Students will build skills in looking at text features, asking and answering questions about main ideas, and finding key details out of multi-paragraph texts. In the writing unit, students will write how-to texts, using evidence from personal experience and non-fiction texts in order to teach readers and explain thinking clearly. Students will also look at non-fiction texts and try out craft moves from expert authors. Math Students have been reviewing basic facts and learning new adding and subtracting strategies to help them as we move into 3-digit addition and subtraction. Social Studies We have been talking about communities and what makes a high quality of life in a community, who helps us have a high quality of life, and how do have a high quality of life. Next week we will explore communities by looking at different types of communities and how communities change over time. We Wonder Wednesday This week we had our first We Wonder Wednesday. This is a time for students to direct their own learning based on their interests and wonders of the world. Students practice searching with key words in books and on online resources, note taking, and writing non-fiction to share their knowledge. Depending on students' interests, some projects have taken the form of plays and presentations. Students value this time and are highly motivated by the choice. Ask your student what they are wondering! Conferences Conferences start in less than 2 weeks and I have most families signed up. If you have not signed up, please follow this link and sign up for a conference time. It takes about 5 minutes! Thanks and looking forward to meeting. Halloween Pictures Enjoy! Important Dates: Monday, October 31 - Halloween celebration - Parade and class party Thursday, November 10 - Veterans' Day Assembly Friday, November 11 - Veterans' Day - No School Wednesday, November 16 - Early release (12:05pm) and first conference day - 2:30-8:00pm Monday, November 21 - Second day of conferences and start of Thanksgiving break (No school) Hi families, Writing Celebration Thank you to all the families that were able to make it to the writing celebration. Your participation makes the celebration important. You become the students' adoring fans, boosting their confidence and making their writing have value. The celebration marks the end of the writing unit. As a result, students are taking home all of the narrative writing that they have worked on since the beginning of school in their orange folders. If you would like, go through some of the writing students chose not to showcase. Ask them about the process of writing, and what's up with the green pen? Community On Thursday, students went around the Queen Anne neighborhood to pass out invitations to the Halloween parade. Students wrote an invitation and decorated the cover with a Halloween landscape. We then went door-to-door, knocking and ringing door bells. As neighbors came to the door, students presented the postcard and invited neighbors to come to the parade. Students really stepped up to the responsibility! It was charming to see students interacting and creating relationships with the neighbors around our school. We hope to continue building relationships this year, and discuss themes around our responsibility as members of the QAE community. Math We continued to play games to practice mental math strategies and practiced using tools such as using a ten frame. Reading Students worked on stamina, reading for longer and longer bits of time as we finish up our narrative reading unit. Important Dates: Wednesday, October 26 - 2-hour early dismissal - 12:05pm Thursday, October 27 - Queen Anne Walking Tour Friday, October 28 - Writing Celebration - 7:55-8:10am Monday, October 31 - Halloween celebration - Parade and class party Friday, November 11 - Veteran's Day - No School Hi families, Walking Tour Form To kick off our community social studies unit, we will write and deliver an invitation to our neighbors around the school to our Halloween parade on Monday, October 31st. In order to do this, I need you to fill out the walking field trip form that I sent home today. Make sure you get me the form by Thursday! Math In math this week we started our addition and subtraction unit. We began by reviewing our addition fact within 20 through number talks, math games and problem solving. One of the problems was Magic 10, attached below. Work with your student and see how many ways you can solve the problem! Writing We are putting the finishing touches on our pieces this week. To help us, we had our fourth grade reading buddies come give us feedback on our writing! Reading buddies looked at punctuation, spelling, and our craft moves. Next week, we will polish our pieces in preparation of the writing celebration on Friday. Reading We read and saw the performance of Last Stop on Market Street. We discussed some of the themes from the book and connected them to Wednesday's Black Lives Matter demonstration. Some of the themes were equality, empathy and race. If your student has any other questions, please discuss at home some of their feelings and reflections on this topic. After the play, we processed by writing in our reading journals a star, a wish and a compliment. Science This week we finished up our science unit with planting and examining how much water different types of soil hold. Using filters, funnels and measuring cups, students found that different soils do indeed hold different amounts of water! Some photos below. Additionally, we planted lima beans last week in different soils: sand, clay, humus and Queen Anne soil. The plants have made quite the stir as they start to sprout from our different soils. Students are already noticing the root structures and differences in plant vitality in various soil types (see picture above!). Halloween We will have a Halloween parade at 12:30pm on Monday, October 31 followed by a class party from 1-2pm. Let Jennifer Eveland know if you're interested in helping out!
Important Dates: Thursday, October 6 - Curriculum night Friday, October 14 - No school - Teacher prep day Monday, October 17 - Unity Celebration! Wednesday, October 26 - 2-hour early dismissal - 12:05pm Friday, October 28 - Writing Celebration - 7:55-8:10am Monday, October 31 - Halloween celebration - Parade and class party Hi families, Thank you to all the families that attended curriculum night last night! I appreciated meeting with you and sharing conversations about QAE and second grade. For those of you unable to attend, I have attached the handout from the evening to the newsletter. Take a look, and let me know if you have any questions. Unity Celebration Congratulations to your students! They earned their first Unity Celebration. A Unity Celebration is my way of honoring students working together as a team. Students earn a unity point by completing a task together or when someone from the school or community notices their thoughtfulness and/or hard work. From the beginning of the year until last week, students have gained these points. Our goal was 25. Now we will celebrate! On Monday, October 17 students can wear pajamas and bring a stuffed animal that fits in their backpack. We will then read to our stuffies for 30 minutes in the afternoon. Students came up with and then voted on this idea in class meeting :) . I will send out a reminder on Friday, October 14 (no school that day!) and then Monday morning to make sure everyone remembers. This week's run down: Math: Students finished up the place value unit by comparing and ordering 3-digit numbers, reviewed for the unit assessment, and then took the unit assessment. Reading: Students started to identify craft moves in Dragons Love Tacos by Adam Rubin, and in their own books; students found places in their books where the authors made them laugh, feel a strong emotion, or go, "Wow!" Writing: Students starting using the craft moves they noticed from their reading in their writing! Science: Students did settling tests in water of clay, sand and humus. We also observed our compost with and without worms, writing down our observations.
Important Dates: Thursday, October 6 - Curriculum night Friday, October 14 - No school - Teacher prep day Wednesday, October 26 - 2-hour early dismissal - 12:05pm Monday, October 31 - Halloween celebration Hello families, The Jog-a-thon went really great! This annual event is a great time in the beginning of the year to discuss the importance of and reasons why we set goals, and how our goals are unique to who we are and what we are working on. On Thursday, students set personal goals for the Jog-a-thon. Goals ranged from drinking more water, running 23 to 25 laps to being able to walk without stopping. We enjoyed the time to get to know each other and bond as a class. On Monday, we will look at our goals and talk about what went well at the Jog-a-thon and how setting a goal helped us improve and grow. Here is a quick run down of the last two weeks: Writing: Writers have come to a pivotal turning point in our narrative writing unit! We are starting to look at mentor authors and using their craft moves in our own writing. We have looked at Jane Yolen's Owl Moon, Kevin Henkes' Julius: The Baby of the World, and I Will Never Not Ever Eat a Tomato by Lauren Child to see how they start and end their stories. Students will continue to build these craft moves into our stories as they grow as writers this year. Reading: This week we worked on strategies for what to do when we come across a tricky word. The most used strategy in our class this week was sounding out words part by part, followed by using the context to help us figure out the meaning of the word. Next week, we will kick off our word work (phonics and phonemic awareness), reviewing the phonetic skills students built last year using the Reading Horizons curriculum. Math: We have been working on our counting by 10 and 100 to 1,000 and developing our understanding of place value by building, breaking apart and comparing 3-digit numbers. We will wrap up our place value unit next week by continuing to compare and order numbers up to 1,000. Important Dates:
Thursday, September 22 - Picture Day Wednesday, September 28 - Early Release - 12:05pm Friday, September 30 - Jog-A-Thon Hi families, What a fabulous first week! I have had such fun getting to know your students and celebrating our teamwork and growth in this first (full) week. International Dot Day This week we were inspired to talk about optimism and perseverance by reading The Dot by Peter Reynolds. Students talked about how Vashti pushed herself to try new, challenging tasks by staying positive and believing in herself. Students created their own dots as a way to demonstrate their individuality and as a reminder to push themselves when they come across challenging tasks. Buddy Reading We had our first session of reading buddies! This year, we will partner with Ms. Hunter's fourth grade students. Students were lovely hosts, inviting Ms. Hunter's class into our room, showing the students our library and various reading nooks. We look forward to our partnership this year! Math In math this week, students explored 3-digit numbers and the meaning of place value and found patterns within 100 through skip counting by 2's, 5's and 10's. Ask your student to teach you how to play Guess My Number. It's fun practice and brings up interesting conversations about digits vs. value of numbers. Writing Students continued to build skills for writing personal narratives. Students used story ideas from their tiny notebooks to ignite their story telling. In this unit, students will work on building their skills by making a plan for their stories and adding details to immerse their readers in their stories. Reading Students made individual reading goals this week to read more and more. Second year is a big year of growth, and students are already putting in hard work. Science Students made predictions about what is in soil, recorded their predictions in the science notebooks, and then tested their predictions by examining soil! Next week, we will look at how soil is made with the help of worms. Important dates:
Thursday, September, 22 - Picture Day Wednesday, September 28 - Early release - 12:05pm Friday, September 30 - JOG-A-THON! Hello families, Welcome to a new school year and to 2nd grade! I am so excited to have your student in my classroom. Already in this first week we have started creating a strong, supportive learning community. In this first week, we introduced ourselves, started self-portraits, and got the lay of the land. The beginning of the year is all about solidifying routines and creating and applying classroom guidelines and expectations. We have also started implementing the building-wide QAE common behaviors. This includes walking in the hallway quietly so that learners in the hallways and in classrooms can concentrate and focus. So far, we have been doing so well practicing throughout the building that we got a compliment from a third grader! Below is a brief summary of this week's academic activities: Writing: Students completed beginning of the year writing assessments for narrative, informational and opinion writing. They did great! Students were focused and applied all their skills from last year. Reading: We toured our classroom library and students practiced choosing just-right books from a small selection. Next week we will start book shopping and reader's workshop. Math: This week, students started with an open-ended problem solving question. Students organized the problem in their preferred manner using manipulatives or drawing a picture. Then I partnered students with another student in order to work together to combine solutions to come up with the most complete response together. We will continue building these mathematical problem solving skills throughout the year. I am going to send out reminders through REMIND. This is an app that allows me to send out reminders to your phone or email. Here is my class code if you would like to get reminders from me through REMIND: https://www.remind.com/join/msthibau Thanks and have a good weekend! |
Ms. ThibautOne of the second grade teachers at QAE. Read this blog and stay up-to-date on classroom activities. Archives
March 2017
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Ms. Thibault's 2nd Grade | Class Blog |