It's About Time!

Greetings Friends! Lots to catch up on in 2W! We've had a great week of math meetings lead by Marcus! Some equally great morning meetings lead by Abby and Deter, just to name a few! The new "presidential" work board is almost complete and catch up day is upon us! Students have worked independently on literacy jobs while readers meet in reading groups with teachers! Learning about Presidents Washington, Lincoln, and Obama while reading poems, working on puzzles and math jobs make good practice during a busy morning of reading groups! In math we've stretched our learning about measuring time to include time to the minute. Using our clocks to move the minute and hour hands on the clock help us recognize how important they both are, and what they represent when reading a clock! We'll continue to practice reading clocks, telling time, and thinking about how hands move on a clock! In writing we've continued our work on revising and editing our writing to make it better! Editing our writing is a very important skill to learn to make our stories ready for readers! We've also learned how to "show" instead of "tell" in our stories. While many stories will "tell" the reader what's happening, a truly wonderful story will "show" the reader what a story feels like, looks like, smells like. In spelling we've learned a lot about base words and have added endings to show plural, past tense and present tense (participle). Learning how words are structured help us see patterns in words and helps us become better spellers in our writing! The weather has been crazy, but we live in New England, so we adapted well like pros! Frigid, below zero temperatures to balmy rainy fog, to sunny skies followed by... snow? And that was just one day! Holy moly! No matter what the weather, the climate in 2W has been busy and full of fun and learning! Stay tuned!

Time Begins, and Writing and Revising!

Greetings Friends! Another bitter cold, chilly, frigid day today! That didn't stop recess, though! While we missed the great outdoors, there was plenty of puzzles, Uno, and snap cube creations for everyone!! We started with a brand new "presidential inspired" work board after quiet reading this morning! Poems, buddy reading, scholastic news, and classroom library jobs all inspired by Presidents Washington, Lincoln, and even Obama! In math we introduced a new unit telling time by reviewing parts of a clock and time to the hour and half hour. We will continue to stretch and practice what we learned in double digit addition and subtraction, but will also be learning about time and the importance behind knowing how to tell time. More to come! In writing workshop yesterday we worked on rereading, editing and revising! Today we continued our learning by examining some second grade writing written by real live 8 year old writers! We saw how they added detail to both text and illustrations with sensory words, dialogue, and subtle little "extra's" to their pictures! Next, we talked about how writers write about "what they know" and thought about our unique experiences. Living a writers life means taking those experiences and creating a story! Many writers went back to previous stories and added even MORE detail, action, characters and events to make their stories even better (well done Marcus)! Marcus shared his dragon story and showed everyone how your story can take an unexpected twist and send the reader into surprise!! We ended the day with PE with Ms. Gebo. Stay tuned for V.I.P. in 2W... a new way to highlight and learn even more about all our unique wonderful friends in 2W!!

2013!!! Blogging is BACK!!

Howdy Friends! Took a little blogging break... between holidays, oral surgery and blah blah blah... we're finally back! Let's get caught up on the learning and musings that make 2W!! First, we have a new fish! A real blue finned beta cutie we've decided to name Pebbles! There was voting and counting, and some very democratic fish naming protocol, and Pebbles it is (though Rocky was a close second)! We've been stretching our learning in place value and decomposing/expanding numbers into double digit addition and subtraction! YES indeed, we said double digit addition, with regrouping and carrying! Wow! Abby also lead a great math meeting and we've enjoyed many morning meetings lead by Alea, Madelene, and Trey, just to name a few! All full of music, games, messages, and greetings! We're learning about plurals and how to change a word to show "more than one" by adding s, or es. Of course, there's as many exceptions to the rule as there are actual plural nouns in the English language, or at least it feels like there are, but we're determined to know our plural nouns by the end of this week! In writing workshop we've practiced editing and revising our writing. Time and careful rereading go into crafting every piece of writing, and we are learning all the tricks of the trade!! In reading groups we've worked with a variety of genres to include historical fiction, folk and fairy tales, and nonfiction, research based reading (sharks, bats, marine mammals, just to name a few). As you can see, 2W is a busy, joyful place, and we can't wait to get our new year off and running! Stay tuned... our blog is back! Tomorrow is Thursday... PE (sneakers please) and library books!