Putting on our Geologist Hats

We have become geologists in Room 402!  We are studying how rocks look when wet and dry, how they feel, how they interact with each other, and how to sort them.  We spent most of our time sorting the rocks - first figuring out the "rule" for sorting them, and then doing so.  We sorted them by color, texture, weight, luster, and size.

To explore size, we used a new scientific tool - a screen.  We used three different sized screens to sort a pile of river rocks into different sizes:  pebbles, gravel, and sand.  We will soon be exploring rocks even larger and smaller than those rocks!

Updates and Announcements

Just a few announcements:

As we all know, it's been quite cold recently!  When we have indoor arrival and/or dismissal (cold weather or precipitation) please do not enter/exit through the lobby.  Please enter the building at the ramp (halfway between the front lobby doors and the school yard gate) and go through the cafeteria.  If it is before 8:30, your child can remain in the cafeteria until school starts.  Breakfast is also served until 8:30.  Dismissal should be the same - please enter the building through the cafeteria.  From the cafeteria, there are three different stairwells to use to get upstairs.

Secondly, a huge "thank you" to everyone who has helped chaperone the locker rooms during our weekly swimming lessons.  If you didn't sign up and still want to come, please meet us in the lobby at 11:20am on any upcoming Monday.

In case you didn't see it in James' emails, please note that next Wednesday we will be having a small music share based on the work the students have been doing with Nina from S'cool Sounds.  They'll be playing the recorder, drums, and shakers.  The share will be in the auditorium from 9:00am-9:30am and will be only for the first and second graders as well as their families.  They will definitely be seats for you!

Speaking of seats, on Monday morning we will be holding a special Town Meeting to honor Pete Seeger.  Please join us in the auditorium - and sit with us! - to sing some great songs together.  Hope to see you sitting and signing with us next week.

Finally, I'm sure you're being bombarded with emails from the PA about this event, but just another reminder about the EVCS Winter Jubilee next Friday.  Click the link to learn more about this great event that supports the wonderful drama, art, and project-based work our school values so much.

Thanks!

Funer Hardware

A phone call came in for 96 bricks - the warehouse
now knows that they need 9 rods of 10 bricks and
6 individual bricks in their box to ship out!

We hadn't heard from Princess Funer in quite some time, so it was great to get a message from her yesterday morning!  After the dreaded snuzzlewump destroyed the Land of Cm, the princess saw a need for a new hardware store to help supply the construction workers with their building materials so that the land could rebuild.  Funer Hardware opened last week and everyone was so grateful.  Of course, the calls started coming in for orders of pipes, bricks, and tools - too many calls for the princess to handle!  That's where we came in.

The princess set up an office space for us - with telephones, pencils, and recording cards.  We went to our offices and got our desks ready.  Then the phones began to ring!  All throughout our room we heard, "Hello, Funer Hardware, how can I help you?" and "Funer Hardware!  We have all your building supplies!  How can I direct your call?" as the phones rang.  All of the calls were orders for bricks.  We knew from the princess's message that the warehouse was organized with the bricks in flats of 100 bricks, rods of 10 bricks, or single bricks.  The warehouse needed the total number of bricks as well as how many flats, rods, and single bricks to pack up from the warehouse shelves.  We took over 200 orders for the hardware store yesterday!

Today we will continue taking orders - but with much larger numbers!  We are becoming experts in identifying how many 1s, 10s, and 100s are in numbers all the way up to 1,000!

A worker puts down his phone and
records an order

A basket of complete orders for the warehouse

Who is X?

Our notes from X

Today we suddenly heard loud banging at our door.  I peaked out in the hallway, but didn't see anyone.  At our doorstep was a black box marked "Top Secret" with a note on it.  The class agreed that we should open the note.  It said, "Dear time travelers, Here are some travel materials. Use them wisely. - X".  We had so many questions!  Who is X?  How does she or he know we're time travelers?  How will these materials help us?  We studied what was in the box and saw three materials - travel rods, time-connecting string, and time circles (like a clock!).  We figured that maybe by combining those three materials we could create a time traveling device.

Our time travel devices

We created personal time traveling devices using the materials.  Suddenly, though, a first grader walked into the room.  She had a note for us - from X! - that had accidentally been delivered to Room 401 instead of Room 402.  We rushed to the rug to read the note.  It said, "Connect behind you.  See the past.  Reach forward. Love. - X"  We thought for a while about what this note might mean.  We decided they must be directions for how to travel!  We stood in a circle.  We first held our time travel devices behind our back. ("Connect behind you.")  The we closed our eyes. ("See the past.")  Then we held our devices out in front of us. ("Reach forward.") Finally we pulled them close to our hearts. ("Love.")  We felt some shaking in our bodies!  Our knees were quaking!  Whoa!  We think we've figured it out.  Later this week we'll attempt to travel to the year 1514 to start learning about the past in Manhattan. 

Science and Social Studies

In both science and social studies we are starting two new units.

In science, we have become geologists!  We will be studying rocks, sand, silt, and clay before we study soil in the spring. We have begun a class rock collection.  If your child find rocks for our collection in the next few weeks, bring them in!  We have already begun sorting and studying the rocks that we have in our collection.

In social studies, we are starting a new dramatic unit to study the history of Manhattan.  Specifically, we will be learning about the Lenape tribes that lived on our island.  We received this mysterious map last week.

After reading and studying the map, we realized that we need to travel back in time to learn about Manhattan in 1514.  Then we will need to travel into the future to teach the people of 2514 about the great things from 1514 and from 2014 to help inform their choices.  We will be role playing, time-traveling, and learning all about our island.  Stay tuned!

Swimming

Today we began our swimming lessons!  I wanted to first say thank you to all of the parents who came and helped with the locker rooms!  We couldn't have done it without you!

Today we were introduced to our swimming instructors and were tested to see how we felt and acted in the water.  We blew bubbles, kicked our legs, floated on our backs, and moved our arms in the water before we were put into 4 groups.  Now that we have our groups, we'll be able to get right into the water and start swimming next time!

Parents, please send your child's swimming clothes in a separate bag from their book bag - this allows their wet clothes to be put into the bag after swimming without getting our papers and books soggy on the way home.  Please also remember that if you signed up for bringing home lunch on swimming days to bring one - the cafeteria is closed when we return from swimming, so only those students who requested school lunch a week in advance will receive one.  Thanks!

Chess

Today we began chess classes with Bradley!  We learned all about the board, how to name the squares, ranks, and files.  We then studied the pawn.  We learned that there are 8 pawns in the game of chess.  We learned how they can move and how they can both defend and capture other pieces.  We first played a class game against Bradley.  We quickly saw that keeping track of our defense and our offense was harder than we thought!  After that, we played a game on the chess board using only the pawns.  Our goal was to get a pawn from one side of the board to the other.  We had a great time!

Some of us are already skilled chess players, others of us have limited experience with the game, and even more of us have never played before.  By learning each piece one at a time, all of us are strengthening our chess skills to be strategic in our playing.  We will practice each Friday.  This afternoon, during choice time, some of us used what we learned to either keep playing with just pawns or to play full games of chess.  What fun!

Updates

Sorry for the silence on the blog!  We are back in the swing of things at second grade!  I wanted to make sure that everyone knew what is coming up:

- Half day next Friday!  Pick-up is at 11:30 on January 17th.
- Our schedule of prep classes has changed.  We now have:

• Art on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays
• Dance on Mondays and Wednesday

- Swimming lessons start on Monday!  We will be leaving at 11:10 this week and 11:20 the following Mondays to swim.  We will return around 1:45 to eat lunch in the classroom.  Please pack accordingly.

- We will be switching back to library on Fridays for the next 10 weeks to accomodate swimming on Mondays.

- We will begin chess class on Fridays as well!  Bradley will be teaching chess to us each week to learn this strategic game.

- In February we will be having our music share based on our recorder and percussion work with S'cool Sounds.  Stay tuned for the date and time!

- This Monday we have our next Town Meeting.  Join us in the auditorium from 8:30 until 9:10 on Monday morning.  

I think that's all for now.  Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns!

- Liz