Just wait till you hear about the fun we had THIS week! :)

It was election week in 2-2! After having our primaries, and then our National Convention followed by a LOT of campaigning by our two main candidates- Fair Francine and Tough Tom, it was time for the second graders in 2-2 to vote for the class president that they felt would do the best job. The 2nd graders registered to vote, and then approached the voting booth for their turn to cast their ballot!

 The children were proud to show that they had exercised their right to vote by decorating and wearing "I VOTED" buttons!

 You might have heard, Fair Francine won in a landslide! She received the majority of the votes in our class and became the "President-Elect" of our class. Both candidates ran a wonderful campaign!

 Here "Francine" waves to and thanks her voters!

 Tough Tom congratulates his opponent graciously (and unprompted! :)

 In other news, our Fairy Tales are finally complete! You might remember that the children have been working to write their own unique versions of Goldilocks and the 3 Bears. A few of the children were able to share their stories during class this week. They are all hanging in the hallway for you to view at conferences next week!

 Mrs. Mullan came in to teach a wonderful art appreciation lesson to the children about Japanese art. The children learned all about the abundantly beautiful cherry blossoms that come from Japan. They also learned how to write a Haiku poem! They practiced counting the syllables in words to make sure that their poem matched the 5-7-5 syllable rhythm!

 The children used the bottom of a water/soda bottle to make their own versions of the cherry blossoms that they learned about!

 Thank you for a wonderful lesson, Mrs. Mullan!

 It was Mr. Sanzone's last day visiting and helping our class. He read a Time for Kids news article, helped the kids take their spelling test, and he read them a story called "There was an Old Lady who Swallowed a Pie." It was fun having him visit the last few weeks!

 After the election, it was time for our Inauguration Day. Fair Francine repeated the inaugural oath of the President of the United States (with a few tweaks :) and vowed to uphold the law of the Constitution in our classroom! It's official!

 The children also learned about the first Thanksgiving this week. They read a passage and highlighted the important details that helped them answer the who, what, where, when, how, and why of the passage.

 They also identified the author's purpose of the passage- it was to inform us with the facts about the first Thanksgiving! We learned so much!

 Finally, the children had to form their own opinion about why they would or would not have liked to be aboard the Mayflower. They came up with really great, thoughtful reasons!

 You didn't think we were done yet, did you? A final activity of the week was to write a letter to the President of the United States. We wanted to let him know that we were learning about citizenship, the job of the president, and we wanted to ask a few questions! The letters turned out great!

 The children also had practice addressing an envelope- to the White House! They did a wonderful job of making their own lines and writing all of the information in the proper place - and so neatly!

 Mrs. Jo Jo came in to tell the kids Happy Thanksgiving...

 And they bombarded her with hugs!

Mr. Gries popped by with the same idea! He stole a little bit of Mrs. Jo-jo's "thunder," as one of the students put it! They are so funny!

I wish you have a wonderful, restful Thanksgiving with your families!

A short, but very full week!

Our 2nd grade musical took place this week!  On Wednesday, the children sang, played kazoos, told jokes and shined in the spotlight during their music show! It was a fun, playful, enjoyable "Tribute to Silliness!"

 While the children were hard at work at school, I was hard at work at a conference with Dryden's Leadership Team! We listened to a wonderful and very reputable speaker, Susan Hall. Our time spent at this conference deepened our understanding of the new Common Core Standards. It was a really terrific learning experience that helped our team better envision our future steps with the Common Core.

Back in the classroom, the children were beginning to get into the Thanksgiving spirit! The children made some colorful feathers to dress my turkey that explained why they are thankful!

 Our classroom campaign continues! Here you see our "Tough Tom" and "Fair Francine" candidates Alex and Kelly field questions from their voters. They restated what they would do if elected, and they had to think on their feet to explain some answers to the tough questions from their future constituents! They did a great job! The children completed a Venn Diagram showing the similarities and the differences in the points of the candidates. We are are learning that it is very important to be an informed voter that carefully processes the available information and asks questions before making a decision. We will be "registering" to vote next week, and then it will time for our big election!

In math this week,

the children practiced estimating the cost of a variety of items. Then they were asked to decide if they could purchase a combination of items for $1.00 using the estimating skills we practiced.  We noticed it is easy to add numbers that end in 0, and the children learned to round up those numbers that end with a five or higher, and round down if the number ends with a 4 or less. The children did a nice job during their first time working with this concept!                                                       

The children also practiced using a tape measure to measure lengths and distances to the nearest inch and centimeter. The children also practiced estimating two digit numbers. I am pleased to see how comfortable they have become when deciding if they should round up or round down. 

In reading,  the children read a realistic fiction piece called, “There’s Nothing Like Baseball.”  We practiced making inferences again to build our understanding of the story. We remembered that when we make an inference, we mix a little about what we read with a little about what we know to determine what the author is intending for us to understand.  Our new vocabulary words that popped up all week included:  imaginary, uniform, practices, starting, tryouts, and coach! 

In Grammar, we continued to work on apostrophes this week! The children reinforced what they learned last week: ‘s is added to a singular noun who “possesses” something, s’ is added to a plural noun who “possesses” something, and sometimes, the letter s is just used to make a noun plural, or more than one! It can be tricky to decide when to use that apostrophe!