Feb. 5th News

Thank you for all of your help with our 100th Day project! I still cannot believe that our 100th day of school is already approaching---our year is going by so fast! I look forward to a fun day together on Monday as we celebrate this milestone!

Highlights from our week:
*Science Magic: I don't know if you've heard, but second graders had a BLAST participating in their very first "Science Magic"! Every Wednesday in February, they will be challenged to think like scientists and complete various science experiments. While using those skills is nothing new for the Owl class, what IS new is where they'll be completing the experiments and with who! They will be traveling to each second grade classroom and working with that teacher to think scientifically. This past week, in Mrs. Atherton's room, they explored Pop Rocks and the gases they release when placed in liquids.

Mrs. Atherton said that our scientists knew SO much about solids, liquids, and gases, and worked incredibly well together throughout the experiment. Bravo, Owls! You can look forward to visiting Mr. Saltus' class for Science Magic next week!

*Writing: To wrap up our creative writing unit, we read a fictional favorite: The Day the Crayons Came Back. We decided we'd like to write our own crayon tale: The Day the Crayons Came Back to School!

Taking on a crayon character, each Owl student wrote a postcard with voice and detail to create a page for our class book. We were able to send yet another book off to our publisher. Each Owl is anxiously awaiting its arrival so we can enjoy reading our version of this fun story. 

Taking a break from all of the fun fiction writing we've been doing, the Owls began a Picturing Writing project. They will be working on a research-based animal poetry piece. They are all VERY excited and have already begun their research. Ask your child what animal they chose for their project. We'll begin the art component next week as we continue our research.

 *Reading Buddies: Our engineers were up for yet another design challenge this week. Working with the same material this time, each partnership was challenged to create a heart. It was so fun to see how different all of the designs were even though we all used the same materials. The room is just filled with SO much creativity!

 *Progress Reports: On Friday, a progress report was sent home with your child. Please sign and return the progress report envelope (the report itself is yours to keep!). If you have ANY questions or concerns, or would like to set up a conference, please do not hesitate to contact me. Thanks!

Have a wonderful week!

Let's go, Pats!

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Coming Up:

-100th Day Homework Due: Wednesday, Feb. 1st

-100th Day: Monday, Feb. 6th

-Valentine's Day Class Celebration (kids only): Tuesday, Feb. 14th

-Early Release: Wednesday, Feb. 15th

-Winter Break, No School: Monday, Feb. 27th-Friday, Mar. 3rd

Jan. 29th News

I hope everyone had a great snow day! It's hard to believe that was the first snow day of our school year. With another short week on our hands, we had a lot to cram in! Everyone worked hard and made it a fun, productive week!

Highlights from our week:

*Reading: Reader's Workshop this week had us, "Amping Up Our Reading Power!" in our latest unit. Throughout this unit, we'll be revisiting good reading habits, learning new ways to improve our fluency (how we sound when we read), interpreting literary language, and setting personal reading goals.

Beginning with fluency, we learned a song to help us remember the importance of rereading.

Sung to the tune of, "The Wheels on the Bus"...

Read parts of our books again and again

Out loud and in our heads

Out loud and in our heads

Read parts of our books again and again

To make our reading smooooooooth!

In addition to rereading, students learned that they can improve their fluency by:

-scooping words into longer phrases

-talking like the characters

-making your voice match the mood

-reading with a just right pace

To help reinforce all these fluency strategies, students created their first "Selfies!" Students chose a picture book that they had never read before and recorded themselves doing a first read. They'll reread their chosen story each day during reader's workshop and then create a second "selfie" to see how much they're fluency has improved. They had a TON of fun creating these videos and I can't wait to see their next one!

*Writing: As students finished up drafting and editing their gripping, fictional stories, it was time to put on the finishing touches and get their books sent to the publishers. Each Owl wrote an "About the Author" page and illustrated a beautiful cover using a crayon resist technique. We hope to celebrate these exciting stories next week!

*Science: We continued investigating matter this week and started exploring what can happen when you mix different materials. We began by exploring what happens when you place an M&M in water. After making a hypothesis, it was time to watch!

Students were AMAZED (as was I!) to see the printed M had floated to the top!)

Recording observations after the 1 minute, 3 minute, and 5 minute mark, the Owls quickly realized that the M&Ms candy coating had dissolved, while the chocolate center remained. We left our experiment up and running overnight and discovered that the chocolate STILL had not dissolved. Wanting to see if the chocolate would EVER dissolve, we left the cups out over the weekend---what do you think we can expect to see Monday morning?

*Reading Buddies: It was another great week of design engineering with our fifth grade reading buddies! Following suit of last week, partnerships had to choose a different material for this weeks challenge: building a slide! They had 10 minutes to build this time, but many quickly realized a slide was a little more challenging than a house. Again, Mrs. Loh and I were SO impressed by the perseverance and ingenuity of each designer. Keep up the great work!

Have a great week!

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Coming Up:

-100th Day Homework Due: Wednesday, Feb. 1st

-100th Day (tentative): Monday, Feb. 6th

-Valentine's Day Class Celebration (kids only): Tuesday, Feb. 14th

-Early Release: Wednesday, Feb. 15th

-Winter Break, No School: Monday, Feb. 27th-Friday, Mar. 3rd

Jan. 22nd News

We are officially halfway through our school year!

On Friday, SMS students celebrated Day 90---our halfway mark! It's hard to believe we have already flown through half of our year together. While we'll be celebrating Day 100 more extravagantly, we couldn't help but recognize "Half Day" (which I had to quickly clarify, was not an early release "half day" from school :) )!

Highlights from our week:

*Kindness Project: After all of our talk around Dr. King's hope for peace, each Owl student was given a special MISSION POSSIBLE. To help fill our room with kindness, each student was given the special task of performing random acts of kindness for a fellow classmate. The goal is to keep their identity a secret, feeling good about being kind and not looking for a "thank you" or recognition in return (meaning they might have to perform additional kindness acts to other classmates to help throw their friend off their track!). While our challenge isn't over yet, it has been amazing seeing our already kind class go above and beyond for others. Ask you child about their top secret envelope and some of the acts of kindness they have performed.

*Math: During our math workshop time, we have been working especially hard in the area of money. Students should be becoming fluent in coin identification, counting a given amount of coins, and finding multiple coin combinations for given amounts. As students show success with these skills, they are being challenged to find total costs for numerous items and count back change. Practice of these skills has given us a lot of opportunities to play games, work with partners, and use technology. For additional practice at home, have your child:

- count loose change piles

- draw coin combinations for items in a supermarket flyer

- visit these websites:

         -ABCya Counting Money

         -ABCya Money BINGO

         -IXL (P.3, P.6, and P.7)

*Reading: Throughout our reader's workshop, we have continued to study the characters in our stories. This week, 2H had to start comparing their characters. At first they compared a character in their story with a character from their reading partner's story. Using venn diagrams, they made detailed entries into their reader's notebooks. Later in the week, the real challenge began as they had to compare the characters in their stories to themselves. Using this information, they were able to see if they would act the same or differently as their character did. They are all doing such incredibly impressive reading work!

*Science: It was another exciting week in science here in 2H! We learned and explored some new science vocabulary. First, we discussed atoms and molecules. Each Owl created a representation of what the molecules look like in a solid, liquid, and a gas using cheerios!

Later in the week, we learned about insulating and conducting materials. Using various materials, they created "mittens" out of foil, socks, and Styrofoam cups. Using each mitten, they had to close their eyes and see if they could feel the difference in temperature between two water bottles. If they couldn't, then the material had insulating properties. As always, it was a blast!

*Reading Buddies: As we have reached our midway point in our school year, Mrs. Loh and I decided it was time to take reading buddies up a notch. On Friday, we participated in our very first STEM BIN challenge. Buddies each chose a bin containing a building material and were challenged to build a HOUSE! They could ONLY use the material in the bin and had only 5 minutes to build. Mrs. Loh and I were SO impressed with the creativity, thinking, and teamwork that went into this challenge. We can't wait to participate in more challenges!

Have a great week!

Go Pats!

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Coming Up:

-100th Day (tentative): Friday, Feb. 3rd (more information to come!)
-Early Release: Wednesday, Feb. 15th

-Valentine's Day Class Celebration (kids only): Tuesday, Feb. 14th (more information to come!)
-Winter Break, No School: Monday, Feb. 27th-Friday, Mar. 3rd