Math Number Explosions, I am Collage covers and Printing Practice!

Reminder: Student Conferences are next week Thursday September 19th from 4:30-8:00 pm and on Friday September 20th from 8:00 am-12:00 pm. Please make sure to book in your conference. To book please log into My CBE/Power School and go to my School Conferences. 


Reminders:

Our first Scholastic Book orders came home today. If you are interested in purchasing some books for your child please do so online. If you are unable to place an online order you may still send in the order forms to me with Cheque only. I cannot take cash for book orders. 


Math

This week we in math we have been practicing breaking whole numbers up into their number bonds or parts.

We practiced doing this ourselves using blocks and number bond models:

Knowing our number bonds and how to break up numbers really helps us when we move onto addition. 

Today we practiced with some double-digit numbers. We were also challenged to explode out the sneaky 5's or 10's first as seeing these important numbers can help us add more efficiently!

https://www.abcya.com/games/fuzz_bugs_number_bonds

Collage Covers

Today we finished creating our all about me collage. We had to choose pictures from magazines that meant something to us or that we liked. We covered our paper with these pictures. We will  then brainstorm words that describe us to add to our collage: 

I AM:

Friendly
Patient
Funny
Athletic
Dancer
Sister
Brother
Daughter
Son
Happy


This will then be laminated and be the front cover to our Visual Sketch Books which we will use all year to document our learning journey in Grade 2! 

Printing Practice

This week we practiced printing two simple sentences on Grass, Ground and Sky paper to help us see where our letters should be sitting on the lines. 

We will contine practicing this method to ensure that our upper case and lower case letters are being formed correctly, used appropriatley and that we remember to use finger spaces between each word. 
This will not only make our printing neat and oraganized, but it will help us read our writing back when we are sharing and allow others to read our writing more easily. 

Read to Self, Accuracy Strategies, Writing practice, and Sketching like a Scientist!

Literacy

This week we have continued practicing Reading to Self independently in order to increase our reading stamina.

We are up to 10 minutes. Ask me what I am finding challenging about Read to Self and what I am enjoying the most?

We have been practicing improving our reading accuracy by using Stretch out the word and by Using the Pictures as clues when we get stuck:

Here are some suggestions for how you can practice this at home:

Writing

Today we wrote about our summer break. We answered the questions:

What did I do over the summer break?

Why did I like it?

What was my favorite part?

What is something I wish I had done over the break that I did not get to do?

Sketching Like a Scientist!

Today students brainstormed about the question What is a Scientist?

We then practised sketching like a scientist by examining, drawing, labeling, thinking, and wondering about an insect specimen!

Tomorrow we will do this again with many different bug/insect specimens.
Ask me how sketching like a scientist is different from just sketching a picture?

Stamina, Good Fit Books for me, Writing, Math Games and our Classroom Promise!

Reminders: Important forms came home today in my home communication folder. Please fill out and send back as quickly as possible. 

Volunteers:

I will be talking more about this at our upcoming Conferences but until then I could really use a volunteer for some prep work next week. If you have a valid security clearance and would like to come in please email me at imlagrana@cbe.ab.ca




Literacy

This week we have been talking about our reading stamina and how to increase and improve it by practicing reading EVERYDAY!

Did you know that to get better at reading we need to read lots!!

We also need to be able to choose our own books that are a perfect fit for us!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-Gj0-h5JV0


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rwtHGh0PVHo

We practiced chooseing a good fit book today and reading for 6 minutes. We will increase our stamina everyday until we are able to read for 20 minutes without talking, getting distracted, becoming bored or getting tired!

We also filled out our STAMINA graphs and will continue to do so all next week until we reach our goal!

Math Games and Ten Frames

Today we looked at ten frames and played a power of ten game. Ask me what my favorite part of the game was? 

Classroom Promise

Today we read the book "17 Things I'm Not Allowed to do Anymore". 

We begain brainstorming important rules for our classroom community.

Tomorrow we will decide which rules are the most important to us. We will write out a Classroom Promise and sign it as a way to remind ourselves and remember that we are all making these promises to each other. Ask me which Rule I think is the most important one?

STEM BINS!!

Today we got to try out our classroom STEM bins to create, build, design, and think about a specific challenge:

Ask me what materials I used and what I was trying to build? What was difficult? What did I enjoy? If I could do it again what would I change or add to my design?

Name Tags, Name Games, Routines and First Day Jitters!

We survived the first day of Grade 2! 

Today we made our own name tags to use for our coat hooks. We praticed using fancy letters, block letters, bubble letters or curly q letters. We also drew and designed our coat hooks to look nice since they will be laminated and up all year! 

We played some name games and talked about favorite summer memories in order to get to know each other better. Ask me some names of new classmates and maybe some friends from last year that are in my class?


Routines

Today I brought home my new Home Communication Folder (Bussing students did not-they will bring them tomorrow). This is a folder for sending important info and forms between home and school. Please ensure that your child brings it EVERYDAY even if there is nothing in it. It helps them remember the routine if they have to take it out of there backpack. It will not always come home if there are no new forms or communication peices but if it does please send it back! 



Today we Read the book "First Day Jitters" by Julie Danneberg:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G8M1h4vCSe8

We talked about feelings and all of the feelings we had about starting a new year and Grade at Royal Oak School. 

We did our first writing activity using these sentence starters and examples to get us thinking:

Welcome to Grade 2!

 August 30th, 2019

Dear Students, Parents and Guardians, Welcome to Grade Two!
My name is Mrs. Lagrana and I am excited to be teaching grade 2 this year at Royal Oak School. This is my 7th year teaching at Royal Oak School. Previously I taught Kindergarten at Hillhurst School.

I have three children (Danny (17), Izzy (14) and Ivy (5). I love walking by the river with my dog Oreo. I also enjoy scrapbooking, swimming, and travelling.
My favorite memory from this summer was camping at Writing on Stone provincial park. My family and I enjoyed many hikes in the hoodoos, visiting the interpretive center and floating down the Milk River. I love reading and learning and am excited to discover, explore, learn and create with you this year.

This year we will be using Blogger as a communication tool to let you know of important information, share classroom learning and stay connected. You can sign up to receive email notifications every time I post something new to the classroom blog. Please visit: Imlagrana.blogspot.com 

School begins on Tuesday September 3rd and the bell will go at 9:10 am. Please bring your child to the grade 2 doors (see map below). Grade 2 teachers will have class lists printed and mounted on the back wall of the school. Once you have found your child’s class have them line up and wait for the bell. Teachers will be outside at 8:50 A.M. saying hello and helping students to find their correct line ups.

Have an amazing last few days of your summer break. I can’t wait to meet your child on Tuesday!

Mrs. Lagrana 
imlagrana@cbe.ab.ca 

Symmetry, BBQ!

On Friday we talked about Symmetry and looked at symmetry in shapes, art and insects!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MW0kDNHS6lo

We did a practice drawing of an insect using a line of symmetry and trying to mirror the other side. We then drew a good copy on black paper.

Today we outlined or pencil drawing with white glue.

Tomorrow we will be using chalk pastels to add colour and a background affect to our art.

Tomorrow is the year end BBQ!

Wednesday is the last day of classes. Please remember if your child will not be here on Wednesday June 26th and you would like there report card please send in a large self addressed (and stamped) envelope and we will mail it out to you.