We have had 2 great science lessons this week. The students looked through their lunch boxes and made a tally chart of what they think could be recycled or reused. We discovered that most of us use a reusable lunch box and those that don’t, have a recyclable one.

The following day the children participated in a Nearpod quiz. Please ask your 2nd Grader about this.

We have been working on our State project this week. The children used iPads to display information to the class. We used Keynote and Haiku Deck and they really enjoyed the process. After the holidays are over the children will have an assignment that will need to be completed at home. Each child has chosen a state (other than California) and will eventually present their work to the whole class. I will post more details soon.

We are working on Place Value and Value in Math. The children are doing this in a variety of different ways and using many methods and tools to do this. We are also working on making the computation of math facts automatic. A great app for this is OPERATION MATH.

We had a lot of fun this afternoon using Nearpod for the first time. This is an amazing tool to use in the classroom and the students loved it. Please ask your 2nd Grader about it.

We have been really busy in the classroom this week. We have been working on number bonds, place value quite a bit and also woking on Marcy Cook’s ‘Find the X-Tile’ in math. Please ask your 2nd Grader about this.

We have been having a great time in Social Studies learning about the state of California and how to present information. This will help the students when they begin the U.S. State investigations very soon.

We started our first Science unit this week and we learned about the four ‘Rs’ Reduce, Reuse, Recycle and Respect.

Don’t forget it is an early dismissal tomorrow.

Mr.D

The first week of school went really well. I was impressed with how well the kids settled in after a long summer break. Naturally, as the week wore on, they began to run out of steam and so the break has come at the right time.

We have done a lot of community building exercises this week, using the TRIBES model as our guide. One of these such activities was when the children were put into pairs and had to produce a Venn Diagram about themselves. It was great to see the children working together looking for similarities and differences with their partners. We then had a great conversation, sharing about what we had all learned.

In Mathematics, we did a few preliminary exercises which allowed me to get a sense of the different levels of the group.

We also did an initial spelling assessment which will allow me to assign appropriate spelling words to the students.

We also began looking at map skills. The children created maps of their houses, remembering to include a title and a map key. We also began looking at the US states which is a large part of our initial Social Studies unit.

I’m looking forward to seeing everyone again tomorrow.

Mr.D

Thanks for a great evening. I had fun talking with you and meeting new faces. If you have any questions about something you heard or didn’t hear last night please feel free to email me.

The day has started off well. Everyone seems to be settling into the classroom well. We have done a few activities to set goals for the classroom and ourselves. I will post the results of these here later on. So far, so good!