November 3, 2006

It was Levi’s birthday. He turned seven. Sydney was nice enough to share the cupcakes that her dad made for the Halloween party. The cupcakes were tender, peanut-buttery, and delicious. They had little chopped pieces of Butterfinger in them.

We got a new student six days ago. His name is Chris. He’s one of the coolest kids ever. He’s really funny. He’s really nice. He’s awesome.

Today we had an assembly that was called Mad Science. They did funny jokes. The guy put a flash paper on his hand and burned it. The paper burned, but his hand did not. It burned really fast. They held up a roll of toilet paper on a plunger stick. They used a leaf blower to make it all blow off the roll. It went onto a student and onto Mr. Stocker. The made scientist had a garbage can. It had a big rubber piece on one end, and a hole in the other end. He filled it with smoke. Then when he hit the rubber side, we could see the air and smoke come out the other side. It was so cool and really neat!

November 2, 2006

A Fun Day at Halloween We went to the bathrooms and put on our costumes. We came back to the carpet and counted off by sixes. That made six groups. Each group started at a different table. We ate lots of stuff. We painted pumpkins. We made our own cupcakes. We made Halloween mobiles. We made wind socks. We also played Hangman. We had a Halloween party. Happy Halloween!

Monday, October 23, 2006

We had science today; we worked with partners. We could use these tracks that are long, white, shaped like an arch or a semi-circle, and made out of foam. You can bend them and they won’t break. You could make a loop. You take a sphere (we used small marbles) and send it down the tube and it will roll. You can use tape on the end to make the marble stop. We could make the marble loop-de-loop, or twist, or slide. We could put the track against the table and send the marble down. You could even roll the marble up the track.

Newsletter 4

2006-2007…Room 302—Newsletter 4…http://room302.blogspot.com

October 19, 2006

Dear Families,

The year seems to be going by so very quickly. We’re already planning the Halloween celebration, and I’m already thinking about that first round of report cards. I hope the school days are going well for your child. Here is the latest:

Substitute

I missed some work time the week before last, and I didn’t like it. I enjoy being here teaching your children. Judy was out of town, so I was a full time dad, and a part time teacher. Luckily, we were able to get two fantastic people to fill in.

Reading

I have started to do Developmental Reading Assessments with the students. This is where I sit down with the students, one at a time, and really try to figure out just what skills and strategies they use when they read. Knowing what they already do helps me figure out the next thing I can teach them. The other good thing about this is that it requires the rest of the class to read quietly by themselves, which is another useful skill.

Writing

During writing, we split into groups. The groups sit at a different table every day, and one day a week they do guided writing--we call it “special project”. Our first special project was making birthday cards for people. This was a chance to talk about purpose for writing, audience for the writing, and all the things that should happen when writing a card, including greeting, message, closing, decorations, and overall personalization of the card. I’d expect that you’d see some evidence of this when the children are making cards (birthday, thank-you, etc.) for people at home.

Math

Sometimes our afternoons are so full, that we move right into science. We usually do math first, so does that mean we skip math on those days? You can perhaps guess where I’m going with this: I’m concerned that students will think that we’re doing math only during “math” time and nowhere else. I used part of our time together the other day to point out all the ways we use math when we’re doing science. Math is simply a form of communication (like writing) that we use to communicate understanding about the world. When we want to be precise, we use numbers to quantify; but we can do math without numbers: He is heavier, she is taller, mine is longer, yours is higher are all examples of math without numbers. Any sort of pattern is math without numbers. Numbers could be used to quantify all these examples if they were real, but often we don’t need the numbers. I think it’s helpful for students to look beyond numbers when thinking about math. I think it can provide a different filter for their thinking, and I think it could help them avoid the perspective of “I’m not good in math.” If you think of it (next time you hear “I want more.” or “Can I stay up later?” or something similar) you could point out the many ways they use math every day.

Science

We began this science unit with the “balance” in Balance and Motion. Now we’re experimenting with motion. We’ve done a lot of work with spinning. Ask your child about the tops, zoomers, twirlers, wheels and axels they made.

Halloween Party

We’ll have an afternoon celebration on October 31, starting about 1:30. I’ll be sending a separate note with details about how you can contribute.

Chapter Book

We finished My Father’s Dragon by Ruth Stiles Gannet. Actually, the sub finished it while I was gone. L If your child is interested, there are two more books in that series: Elmer and the Dragon, and Dragons of Blueland. Our latest one is Bunnicula by Deborah and James Howe.

Field Trip

We’re signed up to go to the Seattle Children’s Theater to see The Sorcerer's Apprentice by OyamO. We’re going with the other second grade class, leaving right away in the morning and returning to school about 2:00. I think we’re about full on the chaperone list, but if you still want to go, I can put you on a waiting list, in case we end up with extra room. I tried to email confirmation to those who already contacted me, but I was out part of the time and may have missed you, so if you wrote and I didn’t write back, please let me know. I’ll be sending permission slips for the kids soon.

Class Video

From time to time I video tape things that are happening at school. Then the students take turns taking the tape home to share. The tape should return to school the next day so the next person gets a chance; please help your child remember.

Email List

I’m hearing every now and then that people aren’t seeing this newsletter—the hard copy is not always making it home. If you’re one of those people, then you aren’t reading this. If you do happen to see the newsletter sometimes, and would like to get every copy via email, please make sure I have your email address. I currently have 12 families on the list.

Volunteers

We’re quite fortunate to have a number of parents helping out in the classroom this year. I know that not everyone can (I wish I could for my boys) but if you can and want to, there is still plenty of opportunity. Please let me know. We’d love to have you.

Calendar

Friday, October 27—early release, 12:15	Tuesday, October 31—Halloween party, 1:30
Friday, November 3—Science Fair, 6:30-8:30

Sincerely,

Jeff

Friday, October 20, 2006

In library today we learned about leaves. The leaves go on a tree. The tree sends the sap to the leaves so they can grow. If it’s cold the sap goes slower and slower. And then the leaves change colors, and then they fall off.

We also learned that people make syrup out of Sugar Maple tree sap. They drill a hole in the tree, and they put a thing like a faucet in there. They leave it there for awhile. They put a big bucket under it and turn the handle. The sap comes out of the faucet and into the bucket. Then they give the sap to a company and the company makes syrup. Then they sell it in stores.

Thursday, October 12, 2006

In science, we made Twirly Birds. The Twirly Birds can spin in the air when you throw, or toss, or drop them. The Twirly Birds were made out of paper—they weren’t real birds. We folded the paper on the dotted lines and cut on the solid lines. Some people colored them paper to make designs. Taylor T. made a design that hypnotized us. Instead of using straws for weights like on the spinners, we used paper clips. It was really fun and exciting.

In math, the first graders tried to make 12 for their Daily Equation.

Wednesday, October 11, 2006

We had a fire drill, an earthquake drill, and a lockdown. Every time we were waiting for one of them to start, we pretended to work at our tables. It was exciting. When we did the earthquake drill we had to hide under the tables. If you don’t have tables in your house, hide inside a doorway. If you’re in your room, you could hide under your bed.

Tuesday, October 10, 2006

We had a fire truck outside in the field. The fire fighters had stickers and magnets for us. The fire truck had headphones hanging down from the ceiling. Noah got to put them on and heard what the people were saying. Some kids heard that somebody was sick, and the firefighters had to go back and help the sick people. We hope the sick people got better.

Thursday, October 05, 2006

We made zoomers. We used plastic disks with holes in the middle. We put string through two of the holes and tied it to make a loop with the disk in the middle. We wound the string, then pulled it out gently and pushed it in to hear it make a whooshing sound. We had Mrs. Couch as a teacher this morning. Most of us gave her a hug.

Wednesday, October 04, 2006

We had a substitute teacher. She was so nice. She helped us with math. We had library and checked out books. We also had much and physical education.