2H Class Blog!: Mar. 13th News

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Mrs. Healey’s Classroom News (3/13/16)

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Bring on the spring temperatures! 2H had a ball soaking up the rays this week!

*Reading: Our Iditaread is well underway! This past week, every musher has made significant progress on their reading journey towards Nome. I have been extremely impressed with each reader’s motivation in this challenge. Keep it up contestants! We’ve also been having a lot of fun closely following the real Iditarod race as those mushers make their way towards Nome as well. We celebrated Friday as our very first student made it across the finish line this week. Way to go, Erik! A few more students are right on his heels, many more nearly reached the halfway point, and a bunch are bring up the rear. The challenge continues until the last musher makes their way to Nome (just like the real race!) Just a reminder, students need a parent or teacher signature for each entry and need to turn their reading log in everyday (they have been doing a fantastic job with this!) Please help remind your child of the importance of reading every night. It has been so fun seeing what books are hooking each reader and helping them make it to the finish line.

*Fairy Tales: Our reading work with fairy tales continues and students did a great job this week really stepping into a character's shoes. We talked about villains and their role in a story and shades of feelings we can use to describe character emotion. Many have been surprised with how much work goes into reading these fun stories!

WANTED posters for all those evil villains!

Using emoji's to create a feeling scale.

We also began using our compare & contrast skills to explore the multiple versions of some classic tales. We looked closely at versions of Cinderella as there are over 1,500 versions worldwide! Glass Slipper, Golden Sandal, by Paul Fleischman, is a beautiful Cinderella story that takes pieces of the tale from around the entire world and creates one fantastic story.

Working with their reading partner, students compared a version of Cinderella and compared it to the American version of the traditional tale. They had lots of fun with fractured tales like Bigfoot Cinderrrrellla, Trollerella, and Cinderella Penguin!

For a fun science connection, the Owls planted their very own "magic beans" and created their own version of the Giant's castle. Will their beans reach the castle providing Jack a way up? Only time will tell!

In addition, we thought it would be fun to create a giant beanstalk for our classroom! Would you climb up the beanstalk? Ask you child what they would do!