Happy (snowy) March!!

Hello!  The students have been busy working in our classroom!

They completed a biography unit recently and the work went home on Friday.  They had fun at the end of the unit creating a fictional pirate biography.  It tied in perfectly with their pirate music concert.  Speaking of music concerts, the students did so well during the rehearsals and performance.  (Pirate) Hats off to them!

Last week in language arts we shared and discussed folk tales, and next week we will move on to fables.  We continue to write in our journals and write in our language lessons. The students are enjoying their introduction to cursive.  (We just learn the lower case alphabet in second grade.)

We are starting subtraction in math!  This is a concept that we will stick with for a while.  We will also continue to improve on our addition skills.  Students still need to practice their addition and subtraction facts to 20 for our timed tests.  Of course, it will also help them to be able to do the harder addition and subtraction!

CogAT testing starts on March 5th and continues on the 6th and 7th.  We start our test in the computer lab at 9:00 each day.  I shared practice questions from all the tests with the students on Thursday and Friday.  They are ready to go!

I took pictures when we were working on our portfolios.  Unfortunately, technology got the best of me this time and the pictures didn't work out.  Think of a happy hum of activity and children looking over and sharing their work.  These portfolios will be a main component of our student-led conferences.  You received a note home about your conference time.  If you are unable to make it, please let me know so that we can reschedule.  Student-led conferences are an awesome celebration and learning experience for the kids!

Finally, I sent a note home about Leaders are Readers Day.  We are looking forward to parents and other leaders to come visit our classroom in April.  Please fill out the form in the next week if you or another leader are able to attend.  We are looking forward to an interesting and exciting day!