Tuesday

Happy Thanksgiving to one and all!

We were very energetic today! In math, we tackled subtraction across zeros.  For example 500 - 237.  This is a very tricky concept for second graders. We worked with the blocks to help us understand.

In reading,we read a book about Thanksgiving and then did an unscrambling sentences activity. Finally, we finished up any work we needed to do for the workboard.

In writing this afternoon, we edited our published pieces (personal narratives).  Some of us are in the publishing stage!

No homework this week!  Enjoy the break!

Monday

We started our day with Mrs. Jones coming in and doing some number sense activities with beans. Mrs. Maynard was supposed to come to read, but had another commitment, so students had free choice time after snack and morning meeting. This was a treat! In reading, we read a Thanksgiving book and did a basic retelling of the beginning, middle and end on paper. Students got a chance to go on our Kidblog site and respond to a few questions I put out there. They really love this. It is my hope that they will begin to add things to their own blogs as soon as they are familiar with the idea.

This afternoon, we read a book called Saving Sweetness. After that, we wrote notes to go along with food baskets that are being delivered to families who need them. Next, we picked out things for our portfolios.

Please remember there is no school on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday this week. Also, the holiday concert is Dec 4 at 1:45.

Thankful

I am so thankful to have had the opportunity to go to a national conference in Boston yesterday.

Please see the kidblog to find out what else I'm thankful for........

http://kidblog.org/JoanFollansbeesclass

Wednesday

Today in math we talked more about subtraction with regrouping. Students then broke into small groups to work with an adult. After music, where we practiced in the Multi-purpose Room for the concert, we had morning meeting and snack. Students had a movement break outside and came back to work on the work board for reading. We listened to 2 more book talks this afternoon and worked on revising our narrative stories.

Monday and Tuesday

Have you heard?  We used iPads today to record our book talks!  Very exciting!  Students were really excited to do this and watch their videos.  Between that and MAP tests yesterday as well as Fire Prevention things, we are a little off the beaten path as far as normalcy goes this week. That's okay, though. We've been having fun!

In writing, we are revising up a storm! Students are making their changes on the computer but yesterday, we took out SPECIAL pens!  The revision pens that have the power to revise.  So, exciting!!!!  We learned to revise by answering questions within our writing.  Adding carets to insert sentences was a skill that we practiced.

In math, our math stations are going really well! Subtraction with regrouping is still the focus. We are so busy!  Life is good in 2F!  It's really clicking for us now.  

Friday

What an exciting day!  We went to the computer lab this afternoon and went on our own blogs!  Each child has their own blog on Kidblog.org.  They learned to log in, change their avatar and post a comment on a general question that I posed.  I plan to use these blogs in many different ways.  I hope to share this work with you as we get it up and running.  There is power in children writing for an audience.

Mrs. Jones came in for math this morning and worked with us on some mental math strategies.  We are reviewing making a ten to help us whenever we can to add in our heads.

I hope you have a wonderful weekend! Please let me know if you have any questions.

Thursday

Popcorn Tomorrow!!!!

We are rocking it in math.  The assessments are showing improvement in their computation skills.  I'm thrilled!  We learned to regroup the hundreds and tens today.  We will need more work with this skill.  It is tricky.

We had art in the classroom due to the artist in residence.  In reading, we read another Ladybug book: Creepy Carrots.  We went outside to draw the naked tree!  It was gorgeous out this afternoon. Finally, we did some word sorting with 3 letter beginning blends.

Wednesday

This morning in math, we began regrouping with 3 digit subtraction. We regrouped in the tens and ones and then tomorrow we will do the hundreds and tens. Using blocks is the best way for students to see concretely what this process means.  I'm seeing lightbulbs come on daily!  It's great.  We were able to do math stations as well.  Small group work is the way to go!

Mrs. Kaplan came in to read us a Ladybug book. That was fun to have a visitor. We are also fortunate to have a high school student come in and work in our room every other day. Jed Aubertin (Mrs. Aubertin's son) will be here for the remainder of his semester.

During reading, students found tricky words in their reading and thought about the strategy they used to solve it. This was an interesting activity.  It's difficult for some to think about how they are solving words when they read.

In word work, we searched for beginning blends in the books which are in our book boxes. This was challenging, but I am proud of our class for sticking it out!  They did great!  Finally, we were able to write the questions down from yesterday's writing activity when we used the iPads.

Tuesday

I hope you all had a wonderful long weekend.  Today seemed like a Monday for sure. We began our day doing something different.  I started with a math lesson and then we broke into groups for math stations. Some students played a math game, some worked on math facts, others did independent work,  some worked on the computer and others worked with me.  It was great!  After PE, we had snack and morning meeting. Next came reading.  I showed students what we were doing this week for Write About Reading. Students this week will be preparing a book talk on a favorite book from the classroom library. This week, they will brainstorm the important parts of the book for this book talk. It is my hope that students will share their favorite books with each other by the end of the week.

After lunch and recess, we read The Paperboy. Next I introduced the 5 new word wall words for the week: street, long, give, through, and school. Finally, in writing workshop we began the revision stage of our narrative writing. Students partnered up and asked each other questions using the iPad to record the questions. Tomorrow we will learn to take those questions and add them in somewhere to our writing.

New homework went home today. Let me know if you have questions!  Thanks!

Thursday and Friday

We had some fun with the Artist in Residence.  Students got to use digital cameras and take pictures of their environment that looked like the letters of the alphabet. They worked in partners for this fun activity.

In math, we learned how to check our work in a subtraction problem by adding.  We also are continuing to work on regrouping. I introduced 3 digit subtraction without regrouping on Thursday.

In writing, students all typed their published piece first drafts. Now we will work to revise them and make them the best they can be!

We had an assembly this morning for Veteran's Day. I have a video of us singing God Bless America that I will post this weekend.

In reading, we are continuing to fine tune our work with retelling stories. Also, we are reviewing strategies for solving words in text.

Have a wonderful weekend!  Remember, no school on Monday.

Wednesday

Sorry for the late post! We had a visitor from the Math in Focus program come today. She introduced bar models to our class.  They did a great job listening and focusing. In writing this morning, we read a book Fireflies and wrote about when we went on a hunt for something in nature. In reading, we talked about strategies for what to do when you come to a word that you don't know in text. We did a fun activity called Guess the Covered Word. In word work, we sorted pictures with beginning blends.  It was a busy day!

Tuesday

This morning, we worked on subtraction with regrouping.  This is a tough concept! We will continue to keep it going.  Tomorrow we have a representative from the Math in Focus program come into our class to teach a lesson. I can't wait!

After PE, we had reading for the remainder of the morning. I modeled how to complete this week's write about reading.  It's a summary and it's a lot of work!  We wrote one together about Gooney Bird Greene (the read aloud).  Work jobs took us to lunch time.  I enjoy having reading in the middle of the morning.  I may need to revisit the way the schedule goes!  It's good to change it up!

When the students come back from lunch and recess, I read aloud to them. This is a nice transition from the outside world back into the classroom. We finished Owen and Mzee. Next, we did word work. The focus of that lesson was beginning blends and the difference between a blend and a digraph. After that, we moved into writing workshop where some students were typing their published pieces while others did other work.

Monday

Today we had MAP testing first thing.  The kiddos worked really hard on this test!  It was very challenging but I am so proud at how well students tried.  We had snack and a movement break outside after this. After morning meeting, we had reading. We usually have this in the afternoon, but it was a zigger zagger day! We read a new story called Owen and Mzee. We will finish this tomorrow.  In word work, we have 5 new word wall words: place, friend, people, start, grade. During writer's workshop, we wrote a story together about our scarecrow experience.  Then, we went to the computer lab to type our drafts of the narrative piece that will go through the writing process.

New homework went home today.  The math is work to finish up from their folders.  Thanks for your help with that!

Friday

We had a very busy day today!  One exciting victory is that students were able to log into the server and do portfolio reflections, answer in sentences, print and save them in the correct place on their own!  Very exciting news!!!

Our MAP test (computer based standardized test) in reading will be Monday.  Please make sure your child has had a good night's sleep and a solid breakfast before school Monday.  Please let me know if you have questions about this.