More with Place Value and "Retelling"!!

In light of the weight of this week... I will say it's been a productive and pleasant day in 2W! Starting with Kelsey's math meeting! She lead calendar math, days in school, and ran one efficient meeting! Next, we reviewed what we learned about place value and what happens when you have 2 digits in a number. We remembered the "place" the digit's in determines it's value... what it's worth! Next, it was time to practice!! We built our numbers with base ten blocks while paying attention to how many "tens" and how many "ones".... and how many in all! And then... right there... in the middle of finishing math, and getting ready for snack, this gathering of second graders enjoyed their book about Doubles Riddles! Robert lead friends in a reading of doubles riddles, while paying attention to give props to each of the writers on each page! Great moment, and I loved it! Well done friends!! We sang a new song at morning meeting (Chicken Lips) and tried a new greeting... "slap it, shoot it... kaboot it" and it was great! As always, we payed close attention to greet each friend with care, but loved the new greeting! Next... Today's message was all about listening and retelling... important skills! Students tried to listen and understand today's message, and then, Jack and Caroline repeated today's message! Well done, and not easy! After quiet reading, we used our thinking and writing skills to retell our stories. After writing and retelling our stories, we got to shuck corn! That's right, today was another GREAT farm to table day at SES, and we helped shuck corn for tomorrows meal! Friends shucked... and peeled... and shucked some more!! Mr. Barshefsky helped with a lot of the shucking, along with Ms. Barrett, and we can't wait until lunch tomorrow! Helping prepare our meal made us feel important, useful, and excited for tomorrows feast! Fun Friday tomorrow friends. I must note how impressed I am with your students, in light of a difficult week. The children always bring joy and purpose to our work... thank you for all your care and support on behalf of our little school!

Place Value and Memories...

With each day, we endure and persevere through our loss. Our students have been spectacular this week, and today's Cafe Sun was another reminder of what makes our school so special! Today we started in math, as we always do, and wrote about our thinking about odd and even numbers... 14 specifically! We remembered the patterns with even and odd numbers used important vocabulary like "pairs" and "leftovers". Next it was on to place value, one of the most important concepts to learn using our base 10 system of numbers!! First, we remembered where the tens place and the ones place are. Then, we noticed what happens when you count beyond single digit numbers! Then we looked at numbers with the same digits, but in different places. Digits might be the same, but THEIR PLACE IN THE NUMBER determines their value... what they're worth! One excellent morning full of learning, then practice, and then critical thinking. We talked about how important it is to work... COUNT... using precision! Counting with precision insures a careful, thoughtful result! Very important! Kelsey also lead another great math meeting too! Well done Kelsey! In reading workshop we wrote about our reading using "retelling" strategies. Retelling a story is a skill we practice often, and using transition words to help us with our writing! Our spelling program is well on it's way, and today we practiced our short e vowel sound using antonyms (opposite words), context clues (to determine meaning or multiple meaning), and synonyms (words that have the same meaning)! Today was also our first Cafe Sun, and Stephanie, Giorgia, Kelsey, Ben, and Caroline lit up the dance floor with some sweet moves! Cha cha... sliding to the left.... hopping about... it was spectacular!! Sure brought a smile to this teachers face, and added some well needed levity and joy to a difficult week. Thank you Cafe Sun performers!! In the afternoon, we enjoyed more of our story about Nick Allen and his battle of wits with teacher Mrs. Granger! Reading Frindle is proving to be one of our favorite moments of each day! Thank you Andrew Clement! In writing workshop we prepared letter to Kai and Taro, Mr. Merritt's 2 sons. We were asked to think of memories of Mr. Merritt so we could share them in a letter with his boys (whoa.... heavy stuff...). Though not easy... we loved remembering how Mr. Merritt used to read the Pledge of Allegiance wayyyy too fast, how he wore a Dr. Suess outfit when it was 90 degrees, how he helped build our pavilion, and what a kind man and friend he was to so many families. Well done friends, well done!

Mr. B. and Mr. Ponti... and Dictionaries!!

Another difficult day... without a doubt... but made better with an assembly with our whole school community! Mr. Hines lead songs and memories... while remembering what's most important... Love! We had a chance to meet Mr. B. and Mr. Ponti (right hand corner of this picture) who will be leading our school and our community. We couldn't be in better hands... both gentlemen have worked in our district, have the experience in leadership, and deeply care about our school and your children! Welcome Mr. B. and Mr. Ponti! After the assembly we had our own morning meeting and tried a new greeting with rhythm sticks. After our greeting we read today's message, and wondered how we could make our new leaders feel welcome and more comfortable! That's when Chan-Hee suggested we write them a friendly letter... like we did for Lucas when he joined us last week! GREAT IDEA!! Next, it was on to reading workshop and quiet reading, writing about our thinking and reading, and some skills practice with reading related activities! Last thing we did was talk about syllables and short e vowel sound! We spent our word study time remembering what syllables are, and how to notice them in words. Then, we had to find where the short e sound was in words (challenging)! After that... it was all about dictionaries!!! And we loved it! We had an introduction to dictionaries, and all the amazing things inside of them! Guide words, maps, pictures, words... and then we looked up some of our spelling words! Paying close attention to spelling, and ABC order, we were able to find our spelling words in the dictionary! WE ended our day together with Kelsey's math meeting.... a little later than usual, and well done! Another great day friends.