Weekly Update for May 8th-12th

Hi Families,
It was lovely to see many of you for Open House on Thursday. Thank you for coming and touring our classroom and school.

We had a busy week of activities. The Understanding Disabilities program instructor taught students about hearing and vision loss, and we welcomed special guest Greg Kapamajian, who shared about growing up with a hearing disability. 

In other exciting news, our caterpillars are getting ready to morph into pupae, the third stage of their life cycles before turning into adult butterflies. We transferred them to my terrarium, and they are happily chowing down on the thistle plants I put inside.

​Important Upcoming Dates

• Thursday, May 18th: Barrows Fun Run for grades 3-5
• Thursday, May 25th: 2nd Grade Field Trip to Fenway Park in Boston. Our class is allowed 1 additional chaperone. Please email me if you are interested, and I will draw a name from a hat next week.

---

Community Building
We had an All School Assembly on Thursday to learn about and celebrate Asian and Pacific Islander month. We also did a little Mother’s Day project on Friday, and students enjoyed the laid back atmosphere to chat and bond.

Literacy 
We continued our informational unit on Insects this week. Highlights:

• Read aloud 2 informational texts about insects: “Life Cycles of Insects,” and “Social Insects: Bees and Wasps.”
• Learned and practiced new insect vocabulary words, such as “metamorphosis,” “molt,” “nymph,” and “pupa;”
• Practiced taking notes on our insect readings using symbols, drawings, words, and phrases;
• Practiced fluency with a decodable story and answered questions about it in writing, using evidence from the text.

Writing
We used our writing time to deepen our understanding of insects. Highlights:

• Expanded simple sentences about insects using the “sentence expansion” technique.
• Wrote letters to our moms. Enjoy!

Phonics
We wrapped up Unit 13 of Fundations on the “long o” sound spellings, “oa,” “oe,” and “ow.” Highlights:

• Continued practicing reading and spelling single-syllable and multisyllabic words with “oa,” “oe,” “ow,” and “o-e” such as “charcoal,” “flown,” and “tiptoe;” and “explode;”
• Learned new trick words and compared their sounds to their unexpected spellings: beautiful, tomorrow, and lose.
• Did activities to practices mapping the different spellings of the “long o” sound in our brains;
• Took our Unit 13 Phonics Test.

For at-home Phonics information and practice:

• Next:  Fundations Home Support Packet for Unit 14
• Review: Fundations Home Support Packet for Unit 13

Math
We continued our work in Unit 6 on Geometry, Time, and Money. We began the final section (D) on Money. Highlights:

• Identified pennies, nickels, and dimes and learned their values;
• Used skip counting and counting on by 5 and 10 to find the value of a set of coins;
• Identified quarters and found the value of a set of coins that included quarters;
• Found combinations of coins that have a value of 100 cents;
• Learned that 100 cents is 1 dollar and found the value of coins that exceeded $1.

For at-home Math information and practice:

• Please practice telling time on an analog clock at home with your child as often as possible. This seems to be a challenging skill for many of them.
• Also practice finding the value of a set of coins at home.
• Current: Illustrative Math Family Support Materials for Unit 6
• Review:  Illustrative Math Family Support Materials for Unit 5

Science
We continued our unit on Organisms and Their Habitats. Highlights:

• Learned about the parts of a seed and what a seed needs to grow;
• Learned how plants require certain things to grow (soil, water, sunlight) by observing our classroom sprouts and watching a video;
• Learned about biodiversity in ecosystems by watching a Bill Nye the Science Guy episode and discussing it.

​​Thank you for taking the time to read the entire update! Please reach out with any questions, or to connect to discuss your child’s progress. Have a great weekend!

​
​Below, students counting coins in math, observing our caterpillars, combining with the entire grade 2 for our special guest, and working on their Mother's Day projects.