Week of March 14th

I hope everyone has had an opportunity to experience working on www.pearsonsuccessnet.com in conjunction with Reading Street. There are some really cool games to help your child "think quickly". Please let me know what you think. Last week we took our test on fractions, and the students did surprisingly well! We are jumping into measurement head first this week and have measured with tape measures and rulers! This Friday our class is wearing pajamas and watching a movie due to filling our marble jar! They are very excited about it! Yesterday we started working on our books to be published. Oh, did I forget to tell you? Your children are becoming authors and illustrators! Each child will write and illustrate his/her very own hardback book. Second grade applied for a grant to help with the cost, so the cost to each student will be minimal. We will celebrate together with "Author's Night" later in the spring after the books are printed and mailed back to us. We will let you know when the final plans for this become available. Don't forget to mark your calendars for Literacy Night next Thursday night, March 24th! Each child will receive a free book, snacks, and will get to see a fabulous show by Madcap Puppets! I'm looking forward to seeing everyone there! Ms. Varney

February 25, 2011

Hello to all! All the teachers had an exciting day of learning! I will be sending home parent letters from Reading Street, which explain how your children can log into Reading Street at home. This is all new to me, too, so luckily, there is an "800" number at the bottom of the letter which may help you if you need assistance. Happy Reading! Please let me know how you are doing with this! Have a great weekend!

Ms. Varney

February 17, 2011

I sent home a spelling list for next week today. Since we will only be in school for three days, I thought some of you might want to get a head start on the words. If your child was sick today and did not receive a list, here are the words: cook, stood, full, wood, July, shook, push, pull, brook, book, hood, and put. Enjoy your four day weekend!

Ms. Varney

Week of February 14, 2011

We had a great afternoon yesterday! The students had such fun exchanging valentines with each other! They were thanking their friends, and that was very exciting to see! Thanks goes out to Maddy's mom for putting together our treat bags! We celebrated the 100th Day of School today by making a booklet in our homeroom class, and in our skill group, we tried our hands at writing poetry. We added lines to a poem about the 100th day. We started taking the math test on Unit 7 today, and we will still be working on it tomorrow. We just moved our desks in our classroom, and we are doing well with the new configuration. In Reading Street, we will be talking about adjectives the next couple of weeks, and we will be starting fractions in Unit 8 of Everyday Math. I hope everyone enjoys the extended weekend coming up and stays safe and well. Remember, there is no school this Friday, February 18th, and next Monday, February 21st. We will return on Tuesday, February 22nd. See you then!

Ms. Varney

Week of February 7, 2011

With all the predictions of snow for the past weekend, we lucked out again! We even saw the sun! This week is a review week for Reading Street Unit 3. We are reviewing long e vowel patterns, long o vowel patterns, compound words, long i vowel patterns, and comparative endings -er and -est. We are also working on Author's Purpose (to inform or entertain), drawing conclusions, comparing and contrasting, fact and opinion, inferring, plural nouns, and past, present, and future verb usage. Your children are recognizing our "Amazing Words" in the texts we are reading, and that is very exciting! They are making connections with texts they have read previously, and that is equally exciting! Since this is a review in spelling, I am sending a list of high frequency words. The words are: pretty, won, parents, school, only, been, buy, half, many, their, hour, and money. In math we will be working on doubling numbers, halving numbers, measuring lengths using inches and centimeters, graphing, and finding the median (the middle value) of a list of numbers. If they can remember to put the numbers in order from smallest to largest first, that is the trick! The "crossing out" then is a piece of cake! So long for now! I'll talk to you soon. I'm looking forward to conferences again on Wednesday! Ms. Varney

Two Snow Days in One Week

So we had two unexpected vacation days in one week. Since we missed our spelling test on Friday, we will review on Monday and take the test on Tuesday. If you have a chance to visit the building, please check the wall outside our classroom to see our "snow people". They are awaiting visitors.