Friday, October 30th, 2015

Happy All Saints' Day!

We started today with a free write about our costumes. We then reviewed short and long vowel sounds and continued our unit on cursive. I am happy to report that the students are able to recognize and read a lot more cursive than they could just a couple weeks ago. We also had P.E. class with Mr. Yanna and dance class this morning.

The afternoon was filled with games, candy, a spooky movie, and finished with our school's parade! It was great to many of you come out to cheer us on! I hope your child had a fun-filled afternoon.

Tonight's Homework:

• Complete Journeys Practice Book pg. 42-43.
• Complete the Think-Tac-Toe (in your child's language notebook.) The students are directed to choose three activities from the sheet. Please sign each activity they complete. All written work should be shown in your child's language notebook.
  The cartoon that the students were recommended to watch on the TTT is:
  Jane and the Dragon: Mismatched.
• Read aloud for 15 minutes and have a parent sign your reading log.
• Prepare for next Tuesday's (November 3rd) spelling quiz: peanut butter, sandwich, staring, glumly, yesterday, tomorrow, outlook, bleak, baloney, potato chips, munch, pumpkin, awful, lunch (from "I'm Getting Sick of Peanut Butter" by Ken Nesbitt.)
• Prepare for Tuesday's math quiz on chapter 4.

Announcements:

• Just as a reminder, there will be no school for the students next Monday, November 2nd, as the teachers have professional development seminars that day. 
• There will be a math quiz on chapter 4 next Tuesday, November 3rd.

Thursday, October 29th, 2015

Today in the second grade, we:

• started the day off by continuing our discussion on patriotism, this time digging into the national anthems of America and Taiwan: what they mean and why they were written in social studies class
• identified and wrote nouns that name people and continued our unit on cursive in language and spelling class
• created a reader's theater of "Hiding at the Pond" and compared the story to ourselves and which animals we have seen before, another text-"Animals Building Homes," and the world-which animal we would like to learn more about and how we can do that in reading and phonics class
• completed our review of chapter 4 in preparation for next Tuesday's quiz in math class 
• compared and contrasted fish with insects and completed our animals chart in science class
• celebrated Fiona's birthday during ECA 

Happy Birthday, darling Fiona! Your funny observations, kind help and lovely laughter fill our class with happy days. 

We loved the amazing balloon artist that your mom brought today to help us celebrate!

Tonight's Homework:

• Complete Math pg. 115-116 (most students have already completed this.)
• Read aloud for 15 minutes and have a parent sign your reading log.  

Announcements:

Tomorrow we will celebrate All Saints' Day! Please pack your child's costume with them. I can help your child if they have difficulty putting it on. Here's the schedule of events:

• 12:45-1:15: Change into costumes, Eat some candy!
  
• 1:15-2:15: Play games in our classroom, and then in the G1 and G3 classrooms
  
• 2:15-3:15: Classroom activity, kid-friendly spooky movie, and candy-eating time!
  
• 3:15: Head down to the covered area for our parade
  
• 3:20: All Saints' Day all school parade! We will start in the covered area, and go around the school. You are welcomed and encouraged to come watch, cheer us on, and take pictures. A few good viewing spots would be The grassy areas outside of the gym or the office. We will finish our parade on the stage in front of the track, when we will separate for class and individual pictures time.

Wednesday, October 28th, 2015

Today in the second grade, we:

• reviewed the check list of how to revise descriptive paragraphs (strong ending, strong beginning, stay on topic, add enough details), revised sentences by varying our verbs, and continued our cursive writing unit in language and spelling class
• worked with today's number (35) and used a pictograph to answer questions about a balloon artist in math class
• discussed what it means to be a patriot/be patriotic and identified various patriotic symbols in social studies class
• compared and contrasted features of reptiles with that of amphibians in science class 

All Saints' Day Decoration Photo Shoot!

Tonight's Homework:

• Log onto your Science Fusion account to watch the 2nd video of Unit 3: "What are Some Kinds of Animals?" and complete the accompanying worksheet. The students have already started this worksheet.
• Read aloud for 15 minutes and have a parent sign your reading log.

Announcements:

• If you are looking to rent a costume, there is a costume rental shop on the corner of ZhongShan and SiWei, kitty corner from the bowling alley, next to Aurora. It has a pink sign with the number 537.9118 on it. It closes at 7, and rents adult and children's costumes for a reasonable price.

• There will be a math quiz on chapter 4 next Tuesday, November 3rd.

Tuesday, October 27th, 2015

Today in the second grade, we:

• reviewed our weekly spelling words, popcorn read and discussed "Animals Building Homes" from Journeys, and reviewed long vowels a and i in reading and phonics class
• revised a personal narrative using a checklist and continued our unit on cursive writing in language and spelling class
• worked with today's number (34) and deciphered data from a Venn Diagram in math class
• identified the various components that classify certain animals as mammals or birds (body covering, how they have their young, how they breathe, and where they live) in science class
• met with our K2 reading buddies during ECA

Tonight's Homework:

• Complete Social Studies Activity Book pg. 20.
• Read aloud for 15 minutes and have a parent sign your reading log. 
• Handwriting Connections pg. 86-87 (all of the students have started this.)