Family Newsletter

 Dear Families,

Here is our week in review:

Social-Emotional Learning:

• This week, the students continued to practice and model positive self-talk as a powerful strategy to stay calm and focused on school work.  The students created smaller speech bubbles and thinking bubbles which will be taped to their desks.  The speech bubbles reflected a positive statement that resonated with the particular student, such as “I can try again”, or “I am strong”.  The thinking bubbles reflected similar statements, but the students had the choice to draw a picture of something that calm them and make them happy.  Some of these thinking bubbles contained pictures of outdoor spaces and puppies.  They did an outstanding job reflecting individual needs and goals.

• The students in our class not only filled our classroom buzzy jar again for being safe, kind and responsible, they also helped fill the school-wide Hive!  For our classroom celebration, we celebrated with “Choose your own adventure”.  The students had multiple choices to choose from, such as accessing platforms online, playing games, or drawing.  For our school-wide celebration, the students were encouraged to wear their favorite colors to school.  We certainly had a range of colors represented!  What fun!

Reading:

• This week, the students continued to work hard in our guided reading groups, applying various reading strategies to build a stronger repertoire for improved reading accuracy and fluency.  They are hard-working and absorb instruction.  I hope you are noticing their enthusiasm for literature at home too.  If you want to continue this work over vacation, please consider giving your child access to Lexia and read the many library books your child took home this week!

• We finished our chapter book too.  This week, we read the first book in the series about the Kingdom of Wrenly, written by Jordan Quinn.  This series is about a prince and his friend, who live in a magical kingdom and go on adventures.  The books are filled with maps and sketches, which support the story.  They are also filled with new interesting words.  We started charting these words to make sure the students fully understand their meaning.  We call them “juicy words”.  Ask your child to explain. More on this in the weeks to come.

Writing:

• The students finished their personal narratives this week.  Their writing pieces reflect a story that is true, is about them and have a clear beginning, middle and end.  The students also learned to make their writing more interesting by adding words to describe people, places and events.  They learned to anchor this writing around our senses.  Lastly, in this writing unit, the students learned to add dialogue and lots of detail to their accompanying pictures.  They met with their editing partners to check on all of these components as well as their grammar, making revisions and editing when necessary.  When we come back from our Thanksgiving break, the students will have the opportunity to write another personal narrative and choose one story to publish.

Math:

• Second grade mathematicians continued to build a deeper and more flexible understanding of number paths/number lines and how to add two 2-digit numbers together.  

• Second grade mathematicians also practiced telling time to the nearest five minutes, using our Number Corner Calendar as a guide and playing various games to support this understanding.

• The students also participated in a November Math Assessment, which reflected our current learning standards and progress.

Technology:

• The students continued to work on our digital google classroom, reflecting their understanding of what it means to be a digital citizen, showing kindness and respect while making safe choices.

• Your child brought home usernames and passwords for accessing Typing Club at home today.  Thank you for your patience as the school navigated technical difficulties.  Have fun typing at home!

News and Reminders:

• ABS Bee Shirt  order forms are inside your child’s Home Folder this week.  Please consider supporting our school and order some school shirts!

I hope you will enjoy a restful and joyous holiday break with your family and friends next week.  I am going to see my sister who lives in London, England, and I am very excited to see her again.  Talk to you soon.

Warm Regards,

Maria

Family Newsletter

 Dear Families,

Here is our week in review:

Social-Emotional Learning:

• We enjoyed going outside with our reading buddies in Mr. Deyo’s class.  The students brought books to a special place called “Tree Island” next to our school where they read books and played together.  Here are some pictures:

• The students continued to practice mindfulness with positive self-talk this week.  Your child has another HomeLink from Second Step inside the Home Folder this week.  While we encourage families to complete this assignment at home, it is completely voluntary.  Thank you.

Reading:

• We finished reading the first book in the series called Mouse Scouts.  As you may recall, the students had requested that we create our own woodland habitats to reflect the setting in the book.  Thank you for donating the materials we needed for this project!  We had more than enough.  In fact, we received so many pine cones, sticks, rocks and pieces of bark that we decided to save them for another project.  Thank you.  Here are some pictures from our classroom when the students created their habitats.  I hope they shared them with you at home.

            

Writing:

• The students continued to add more pages to their personal narratives this week.  They created interesting starting sentences to set the stage and added details about who was there, what they did and where the story took place.  They also worked in small groups with me and Ms. Bassett to add adjectives to make their writing more detailed.  They did a great job!  Ask your child to explain how we used our senses to help us frame this type of writing.

• This week, the students also shared their writing with their peers in class.  They learned different techniques from each other and were encouraged to try new approaches.  For example, they learned that writers sometimes embed questions into their writing to engage the reader.  What a great idea!

• Lastly, the students created detailed pictures to match their words.  They also added labels as a way to add even more clarity.

Math:

• Second grade mathematicians continued to build a deeper understanding of number paths and number lines this week.  They were encouraged to show their thinking in different ways.  They were also encouraged to anchor their calculations to friendlier numbers to simplify their solutions.  They were solving equations that involved adding two 2-digit numbers together, such as 34+29.  Some students feel most comfortable adding the tens together first and then the ones.  They add the two groups together at the end.  We call this strategy partial sums.  There are many other strategies to use as well, but counting all, or counting on will not provide efficient and accurate strategies in second grade math.  We have practiced looking at the addends and thinking about what we already know about these numbers.  Hence, 29 will help us because it is just one away from 30.  Adding 30 to 34 is efficient and fast.  Mathematicians choosing this strategy will simply subtract one at the very end.  Ask your child how they would solve the following equations: 57+19, 38+65 and 29+47.

• Second grade mathematicians also continued to build a deeper understanding of telling time to the nearest five minutes.  Since second graders are expected to understand digital and analog clocks, we strongly encourage parents to engage in this conversation at home.  It can be difficult for young learners to see the difference between the long hand and the short hand, thus leading to misconceptions about what time it is.

• Second grade mathematicians also used Dreambox, our online math platform.  Thank you for supporting this at home too.

Science:

This week, Harmony House started our new science unit.  We launched into earth landform changes by having a pretend flight over the Grand Canyon. Next week, we will start our science workshop rotations.

News and Reminders:

• There is no school 11/21-11/25 (Thanksgiving Break)

Have a great weekend,

Maria

Family Newsletter

 Dear Families,

Here is our week in review:

Social-Emotional Learning:

• This week, the students continued to learn and practice positive self-talk as a calming strategy.  They learned how to use short, targeted statements along with different yoga moves.  For example, the statement “I am kind” was matched up with a yoga pose of a tree, stretching the arms up high to “spread” kindness around our classroom and the world.  The statement “I am strong” was matched up with a yoga pose called the warrior pose.  We practiced whispering positive self-talk and breathing techniques as a class and with partners.  You can find some flower breathing techniques in your child’s backpack today if you want to learn more or try this at home too.

• We had another restorative circle with Ms. Nicole. This week we explored the different strong emotions we all experience.  The students shared what makes them  feel happy and what makes them feel angry.  Thank you Ms. Nicole for joining our class again.

• The students at ABS filled the Hive again for being safe, kind and responsible.  This time, we celebrated with a stuffed animal day.  The students had so much fun learning with their stuffed animals.  Some students even chose their stuffed animals as their partners in math and reading!

Reading:

• This week, we continued to read independently, with partners and in small groups.  The students are gaining more independence navigating our different stations every day.  I am so proud of them all.  They work hard!  This week, we added two new stations to our trick word practice.  The first station includes Fundations magnetic letter tiles and the other station is a writing station with special markers used on large easel paper.

• We are in the midst of reading the series “Mouse Scouts” by Sarah Dillard.  This series is about some adorable mice who have different adventures together while also giving the reader lots of follow-up activities and ideas for how we can all help keep our communities and the environment clean.  The students made a strong connection to the extension activities in these books and asked if we could build our own representation of the setting, or our own little woodland habitats for fanciful characters.  As a result, we need your help!  If you choose to, please gather a small amount of the following items that we would need by Tuesday the latest next week: pinecones, acorns, pine needles/branches, small sticks, small rocks, bark and any other woodland materials that are small enough to fit inside a small grocery bag (for carrying purposes).  Please have your child bring these materials into our classroom by Monday or Tuesday next week.  Thank you.

• 

Writing:

• The students on Harmony continued Fundations classes this week, learning about decoding/sounding out and how tapping can be used to help them spell words.  They are encouraged to transfer this knowledge to their writing classes in order to represent blends, vowels and digraphs in their own best spelling.

• We started our small moment writing unit as well.  Small moment writing is a personal narrative and it is a sequential story; a story with a clear beginning, middle and end.  It is a story about something that has already happened. Since this type of story is about the writer, the writer will use the following words a lot: me, I, mine, my, etc (throughout this unit, the students will be encouraged to learn how to spell these high frequency words as well).  This week, the students planned their stories using a graphic organizer, which will provide an overarching structure and guide their writing in the weeks to come.  Stay tuned for more as this writing unit progresses in the weeks to come.

Math:

• November’s calendar in math reflects clocks and telling time.  Throughout this month, the students will review telling time to the hour and half-hour.  They will also learn how to tell time to the nearest five minutes with an understanding of the different hands and the difference between am and pm time.

• The month of November will also introduce the students to number lines and how number lines can be used to add and subtract.  This is a new skill and expectation, specific to second grade.  This week, we learned from Ms. Schaw.  She joined our class to teach us about number paths, a tool that helps young mathematicians visualize the number sequence before using a number line.  The students did an outstanding job decomposing their numbers as the equations got more challenging.

Technology:

• The students continued to learn more about our google classroom and how to be a digital citizen online while creating a digital project on Book Creator.

News and Reminders:

• There is no school 11/21-11/25 (Thanksgiving Break)

• A note from our school counselor, Ms. Heather:

Lake Champlain Waldorf School presents Mindful Parenting at the Holidays. Friday, November 4, 6:30-8:00. This is a free event and registration is required. Here is a small blurb about it:

Re-imagine the holidays as an experiment in mindful parenting with this Friday evening presentation followed by a Workshop on Saturday. Take away simple tools to make small, doable changes to your family life and practical ideas to make the upcoming holidays more peaceful and joyful.

Pre-Register at: Mindful Parenting

Have a great weekend,

Maria

Family Newsletter

 Dear Families,

Here is our week in review:

Social-Emotional Learning:

• This week, the students learned more about active listening skills and how to focus their attention more efficiently.  We played a game called “Sentence Switcheroo” and read a Scholastic magazine about different communities to practice these skills.  Ask your child to explain.

• The students also earned a huge classroom celebration for filling the classroom buzzy jar multiple times (with me and a Guest Teacher).  This time, we invited  Mr. Deyo’s Kindergarten class to a Reading Restaurant.  The students decorated the classroom to look like a real restaurant, complete with menus, pretend food, a play sink and cash register.  They “seated” their reading buddies at our decorated tables and served them books.  Pictures will be shared shortly.

• We had another Restorative Circle with Ms. Nicole this week too.  This time, we talked about the importance of including everyone at school and shared our feelings and thoughts around being excluded.  

Reading:

• This week, we continued reading different books in series.  Early in the week, we took a short break from longer chapter books to learn more about traditional picture books that also offer multiple books about the same characters.  We read about Angelina (by Katharine Holabird) and Library Mouse (by Daniel Kirk).  

We ended the week by starting our new chapter book “Greetings from Somewhere: The     Mystery of the Gold Coin” by Harper Paris.

Writing:

• This week, the students continued revising their writing pieces both independently and with their editing partners.  They completed a piece about their favorite chapter books from our read alouds.  They were encouraged to give three reasons why they chose this particular book.  They did an outstanding job justifying their pick!

• The students also continued practicing their spelling of trick words.  Trick words are more challenging words since they do not follow the more common “sounding out” rules of most words used in second grade writing.  If you want to support this learning at home, here is a link to the second grade list.based upon the Fundations program and here is a link to the second 100 high frequency words based upon the Frye list that our school uses. The students are encouraged to write these words in many different ways so they can memorize them.  We use various tools in the classroom and sometimes they spell these words in bubble letters, sideways, in cursive etc. Here  is a choice board with options for home.  Please note this additional reading/writing is not homework nor is it required.  I simply included it as options for home learning.  All materials are inside your child’s Home Folder today. Thank you.  Please let me know if you have any questions.

Math:

• We continued to learn more about part-part-total diagrams as we decomposed numbers this week.  The numbers we’re tackling are getting increasingly more complex, but the students are doing a terrific job using their strategies to justify their thinking.  This week, we learned about “shifting”, a strategy that will help all mathematicians solve math problems of different kinds.  Shifting is when larger groups, such as groups of tens, are moved around to find the most efficient solutions, or strategy when solving complex problems.  For example, when decomposing 48, we can easily see 40+8, but knowing that groups of tens can be moved around easily is a powerful strategy, so shifting allows me to also quickly find 30+18, 20+28, etc

• We continued to practice telling time to the hour and half hour using am and pm

• We worked in small groups to count beans into groups of ten, which we also added together as a class.

• Ms. Bassett led the students in a “Number Talk” activity, a time when the students share their mathematical thinking about a math problem using mental math.  They did an excellent job!

Technology:

• This week, the students got on Typing Club.  We have new accounts this year.  When the students receive home access, I will share this information with you.  For now, they only have access at school. Thank you.

News and Reminders:

• Please see the enclosed informational letter about the upcoming Book Fair at ABS inside your child’s Home Folder.

• If you encounter technical problems trying to set up Dreambox, Lexia or Typing Club at home, please use the IT Help Desk link on the school portal for assistance.  Thank you. I also linked it here for your convenience.

Have a great weekend,

Maria