Happy April

Art:
Ceramic Plate painting.  Thank you to Shuko for teaching us how to do this!

 Oil Pastel Cupcakes showing value:

Field Trips:
Thank you to everyone who has turned in field trip forms and money.
Remember to turn in your paperwork and money this week.  Our first field trip will be on that Monday we return from vacation, April 15th.    Thank you so much to our chaperones!  Right now we have 8 chaperones for the Burke Museum and 9 chaperones for the Pacific Science Center!  This will make for nice small groups.   .

March Madness Reading:
This fun event ended today!  Students were so excited to Tally their points.  The winning team is:  Best of the Best with 180 points this week.
We will be tallying up the total points for each team and announcing on Friday during the celebration.  

Monthly Assessments:
Students are bringing these home today.  You will find a math test, math quick check, reading comprehension assessment (This one was tough!  Students read a non-fiction piece about Oil and how it is a messy resource and then answered some tricky questions), a phonics assessment, and their monthly math facts timed test.    Students are getting much faster with their math facts!   We are so impressed.  It is still very important to keep practicing at least once a week.  These facts come in handy for double digit addition and subtraction.

Community Reports:
We are working with our 4th grade big buddies this week to fix and fancy up our community powerpoints.  After students have finished with revising and editing, they will get to share them with the class.   We are also working on posting them to our class Haiku website so that you can see them all from home as well.

Math:
Today, we reviewed double digit subtraction and tonight's homework is the practice test.  Students will take the unit test on Tuesday.

Spring Break:
Fitness Fun Forms went home today.   Forms are due back 4/19/13.    The class with the most forms turned in gets an extra 30 minutes of play with Mr. Sandbo!    

Have a wonderful week.

Weekly News

Our Super Fantastic Class

Flat Stanley:

We addressed our envelopes, popped Flat Stanley inside, and mailed them off!   Now we are anxiously awaiting his return.

March Madness:
Scores are in!   It will be Best of Best against Ice Dragons in the final competition.  All other teams are still earning points and every student who has read or 10 hours this month (20 points) will be invited to the celebration next Friday, April 5th.    Keep reading!!

Field Trips:
We are still awaiting the final word from the Science Center.  We will be sending home permission slips this week.

Supplies:
Students are starting to use up their watercolor paints.  Since we still have 3 months of 2nd grade, this might be a great time to buy your student a new watercolor paint set for class.     Black sharpies are also drying out at this time of year.    It would be great if you could send your child a new sharpie as well.

Thank you!

Weekly Update

 

 

Science:  
We have been studying balance in Science. The students have used counter-weights to make stable systems. You may have seen the mobile they made with straws, paper clips and rubber bands! In the next few weeks we will create experiments that teach us about motion and gravity.

 

Art: 

Students learned about line and created a composition using a photograph of themselves.

 

 

Math: 
We are beginning Topic 9:  Subtracting Two Digit Numbers.  By the end of this topic, your child wil be able to define and use the vocablulary of subtraction (difference, regroup, digit, tens, ones, and subtract).  They will be able to subtract a two digit number from another two digit number using regrouping when necessary. 

Math Games:   Last week, Layton's mom came in to help play math games with the class.   Students have learned how to play a variety of math games that reinforce math skills we are learning in 2nd grade.

 

Social Studies/Flat Stanley:  
 Remember that the address of the lucky recipient who is getting your child's Flat Stanley is due by this Wednesday!   Turning it in early is great too.   We will be working on writing a friendly letter to this person so we can send Flat Stanley out next week!
We have filled our room with Flat Stanley chapter books and many students are reading them during silent reading time each morning.

March Madness: 
Wow!   We have so many great readers!   Our brackets keep advancing.  If your child's team was knocked out of the Final 4 (which is really a final 5 since we had a tie!), they should still be reading and bringing in their points.   Prizes will be given to teams with the most total points, even if the team was knocked out of the brackets.

Read Alouds: 
You may have heard your 2nd grader tell you about our "Story Create" time.   Every day, Mrs. Fornia and I have been reading aloud while the class gets to choose to draw, paint, or work with clay silently.   The amazing creations made during this time are astounding us.   We have some students who have been working on the same incredible piece and keep adding so many details each day to their artworks!
Mrs. Fornia and I like to read chapter books that are in a series or that are by an author who has written several books.  We are hopefully inspiring your child to read more books either in that series or from that author.  Currently, we are reading "The World According to Humphrey" by Betty G. Birney.   The class is loving this story of a class hamster.  There are many more books in this series that your child can read on his or her own.   As a recap... we have already finished reading "Matilda" by Roald Dahl,  "Ramona Quimby, Age 8" by Beverly Cleary,  and "SuperFudge" by Judy Blume.

Field Trips:
We have two terrific trips planned for April.
Monday, 4/15 - Burke Museum for the plastics exhibit  (Noah's grandmother works at this museum!)
Monday, 4/29 - Science Center insect and butterfly exhibit.
Permission slips and more information will be coming home soon.  We will definitely be needing parent chaperones for these fun trips, so we hope many of you can join us.

 

 

Flat Stanley and March Madness Update

Hi Parents,
Today we read about Flat Stanley and created our own Flat Stanleys that we are giong to send off to visit a community in the Unites States (or farther!).   Your child is bringing home a letter about this project with the due dates attached.

March 20th:   Please bring to class the address of the person will be getting your Flat Stanley and 2 stamps.
March 22nd:  We wll mail out Flat Stanley from school.
April 22nd:  Flat Stanley needs to be sent back to school.
April 22nd-may 8th  Students work on their Flat Stanley poster reports in class.

March Madness:
Wow!  We have lots of great readers in this room!  We tallied results for teams (made up of students from all classes) and then moved students up a bracket.   If a team was knocked out of a bracket, they can still compete for most points overall.... so it isn't over for them.  We have lots of exciting reading still left to do.  Keep those minutes coming in!  Here are some pictures taken AFTER teams moved up a bracket. 

We had a wonderful clay lesson last Wednesday with Shuko.  Students created textured plates.  We will be painting them next Wednesday.

Music News:
The night concert for grades one and two on Thursday, April 4^th at 7 pm.   The theme is under the sea

Spelling:
This week's spelling list is all about adverbs.  A few students took a pre-test of the words.  If they passed most of the words, those students are taking home a challenge vocabulary list.   If your child is not bringing home a challenge list and you are interested in having them work on those words as extra credit, let me know and I'll send the list home.  They will still take the regular test.

This Friday is a teacher work day.   Mrs. Fornia and I will be learning about creating Proficiency Scales (Grading guides) for unit planning and we will be getting some technology training as well.  Since there is no school for students on Friday this week, Mrs. Fornia will be teaching class this Wednesday.

March (Reading) Madness!

Dear Parents,
Wow!  Our March Madness Reading program has started with a bang!  
As of today, our top three groups are.....Best of the Best has 22 pts, Reading Machines with 19 pts, and Reading Stars with 16!  We won't be taking our official tally until next Monday, but we can tell how excited our class is to read, read, read!

Congratulations to Faith, who came in 2nd in the All-2nd-Grade Spelling Bee!!    Way to go!
We are back to our regular spelling lists and systems. This week, there is no challenge list. Look for the challenge list next week.

Last week, we studied the artwork of Dr. Seuss (in celebration of his birthday!) and created our own 3D Seuss-like sculpture inspired by the place we are researching in our community. The sculptures turned out really nicely. Mrs. Frazier even came in and watched us at work. She complimented the class on their problem solving skills and how well they all work together to help each other out.

We had a fun assembly today all about inventions.   We learned about the toys of giants and the big ideas of science:  force, energy, properties, systems, motion, technology, investigations, and .... fun!
This ties perfectly with our science unit about balance and motion!


Are you interested in helping out at Sandburg in a more official position?  The PTA Nominating Committee is seeking volunteers to fill the positions on our PTSA Board. We are looking for parents who want to support our school by leading an outstanding PTA.   I know we have several wonderful parents who would be great at one of the board position.  Please contact Jenny Lara-West  jennywest93@hotmail.com , if interested.

Congratulations to our class spelling bee finalists:   Zoe, Faith, Oliver, and Emie.
Our two runners up are Luke and Grant!   Congratulations actually go to everyone.  We noticed how hard everyone was studying for this fun event.   Our All-Second Grade Bee is this Thursday at 2:30 in the Commons.

This Thursday is a big day!   In addition to the 2nd Grade Bee....we have our Book Rodeo during the day and or school-wide evening Math Night.  We hope everyone is able to attend math night, it looks to be a very fun and educational event.

In Science, we are beginning balance and motion this week. This week we will use counter balances to help balance  objects.

Today, we started working on how to better add details to our writing.  Writing without details leaves too many unanswered questions and makes writing fuzzy.   They worked with a partner to ask each other questions about a time they made a big mess.   Here are some pictures of our writing pairs.

The Sandburg PTA Skate Party is tomorrow, Feb. 26  from 6-8pm at Skate King.

Permission slip with parent/guardian signature is required to participate. Bring signed permission slips to SKATE KING not to school.  Permission slips will come home in your child's mail before the event, extras can be found in the office.

 General Information

Tickets will be available at the door $6.00 per skater.

• Roller blade rentals available from Skate King for an additional fee per skater.
• Payment can be made by cash or check only. Checks are to be made payable to Carl Sandburg PTSA.
• Sorry, no debit/credit cards accepted.
• Adults not skating get in free.
• Skate rentals are included in this price; no discounts for providing your own skates.
• Skate King coupons may not be used.
• No outside food 

Skate King will have the snack bar open to buy drinks and snacks.Mrs. Fornia and I will be sending home all the assessments for the month of February on Monday, March.  4th.    In that packet, you will find math quick checks, math tests, writing assessments, and a reading comprehension assessment for this month.  We also included our Winter and Spring Writing Grading Rubric and the Math Basic Facts Levels that go with our weekly timed math tests.

Welcome Back

Dear Parents,
We had a wonderful in class field trip from Nature Vision (our second visit).  This time, we learned all about the water cycle.  Ask your child to perform the water cycle boogie for you!

Community Research:
We began our powerpoint projects today!  Students learned so many great things about their location.  We will continue to work on these in class and then students will get a chance to share their presentations with the class.  You are welcome to send in photographs.... please email them straight to your child.  We are teaching them how to open picture attachments and save them to their files.

Math:
As your students practices their math facts every Wednesday (either with flash cards, one of our computer choices, or just orally with you), you should start adding in subtraction problems.   We are doing so well with our addition facts!   Now, we would like to focus on getting faster and stronger with subtraction facts.   We are sending home some subtraction worksheets this week as math homework as well.

Spelling Bee:
Our class bee is THIS  FRIDAY.   The top 4 spellers from our room will go against the top 4 spellers from the other 2nd grade rooms on Thursday, Feb. 28th.

Your second grader is bringing home a flyer for Sandburg Family Math Night.  There will also be a seminar for parents entitled, "Encouraging Math Confidence Through Games"  We hope you can all make it to this fun night.