Weekly News 1-9-26

 Weekly News for 2-P 1-9-26

     *Thanks for sending coats, mittens, hats and boots, plus indoor shoes daily!

*We could use donations of cleaning wipes so I can wash our desks and high touch surfaces daily during the germy winter months! 

*In math we continued working through Unit 6. We practiced using number lines for subtraction and other strategies to subtract with 2 digit numbers. Since we have built such strong place value skills, this is going smoothly! At the end of the week we learned how to subtract with regrouping, using base 10 blocks to “trade” or regroup. 

*In science this week we kicked off our force and motion unit, building background knowledge about the definition of force, push, pull and friction. In our first investigation we applied our learning around pushes and pulls — In the activity, Hopper Popper, students make a folded piece of cardboard jump high in the air, propelled by the pulling force of a rubber band. We discussed the forces involved in making this “Hopper Popper” jump.

*In reading workshop we are working on nonfiction text features such as bold words, the table of contents, the glossary and index and captions. We are learning how we can gain information from these parts of a text.

 

*In writing workshop we revised our invention reports to combine sentences and include signal words. Then we began the editing process and published our writing. 

*Our focus was on c, k and ck patterns in spelling this week. During our phonics time we practiced  -ew spelling patterns and reviewed all of the vowel teams we have been learning. 

*We kicked off the next Go2 Science Mission this week: Mission Penguins. We met Dr. Steinfurth who is sending Beth and Curtis to search for Galapagos penguins on a few of the Galapagos Islands. We know penguins exist on some of the islands, but are there undiscovered penguin colonies on other Galapagos Islands? Throughout the next 6 weeks we will get to explore the Galapagos Islands to answer this question. The kids are excited for another adventure with Beth and Curtis!

Getting ready to do our force/motion experiment!

About to watch the HOPPER POPPER fly!

Teamwork!

We recorded the height that our hopper poppers got for four trials!

But first we perfected our technique!

Here is how we kept track!

Sorry it's sideways - learning about penguins to help us understand our new Go2 Science mission

As we build background knowledge about force/motion we are keeping track of important vocabulary.

Reindeer Training Camp in PE.....keep scrolling for more pics underneath

 Mr. Hutchings makes this so much fun!

Weekly News 12-19-25

 Weekly News for 2-P 12-19-25

  

  School resumes on Monday, January 5, 2026! Happy Holidays to you all!

          *In math we kicked off unit 6 with practicing strategies for subtraction, specifically counting up or counting back for efficiency. We also learned to make a 10 for easy subtraction. Then we delved into 2 digit subtraction practice and used base 10 blocks for this work. Students carried over much of their thinking from our addition unit. After break we will hit subtraction with regrouping!

*In writing workshop we revised, edited and published our invention reports. We learned to write paragraphs for this piece and did a separate paragraph for the beginning, middle and end. We continue to work on crafting clear sentences and are all striving toward increased independence with capitalization and punctuation.

*We completed our Wabanaki unit this week and learned about Abenaki color and family words. We loved the book “The First Blades of Sweetgrass,” written by two Maine authors! 

*Our spelling work was long 0 patterns.  Our phonics work centered on the short and long sounds made by -oo or -u. 

*We had a school-wide holiday sing-along Wednesday afternoon and Friday was filled with fun in our classroom community. We engineered the tallest snowmen we could (out of toothpicks and marshmallows), drew a holiday snow globe, ate popcorn and fruit,  listened to some holiday music, did holiday fun packets and more. What a great group of kids - we have a blast together - and I’m so grateful for their joy every day. 

Snowman Challenge

Addition Bingo - holiday addition

Holiday Phonics Game

Working hard on an Art Kid Hub Directed Draw!

Holiday Puzzle Packet

An amazing indoor recess creation!

These guys love the matchbox cars and ranps

Weekly News

 Weekly News for 2-P 12-12-25   

 *Thanks for sending coats, mittens, and hats daily. Also, please send indoor shoes daily or send a pair to leave in the locker.

* We could use donations of cleaning wipes.

         

*This week in social studies work we continued our Wabanaki unit learning about the Penobscot and Passamoquoddy culture and language. We loved hearing Passamoquoddy wind songs.

 

*We finished unit 5 of Reveal Math. This week we worked hard on adding multiple addends with various strategies, including adjusting one addend to friendly numbers for easier adding, adding the tens and then the ones, or decomposing one addend so we can add mentally. We did a lot of review work to refine our skills and completed the unit 5 test.

*We published and shared our science articles on Tuesday and then we began a new writing cycle with more explanatory writing. We are working on invention reports. After examining a model of this writing and the rubric that laid out our expectations, we used Pebble Go to find an interesting invention and did our own research. Students took notes on a graphic organizer. Next week we will draft our report. 

*Our grammar work was focused on using object pronouns when writing (her, him, they, us, them). Our spelling pattern this week was long i patterns. In phonics work we focused on long i patterns and then vowel team review. We are learning lots of patterns at a time now, so extra practice is helpful for us to master these as spellers.

*During reading workshop we focused on reading books about inventions and identifying facts from these narrative nonfiction texts. These books helped us prepare for our individual writing research projects on inventions. We delved into some big questions such as,  “How did this invention make life better or change the world?”

UFLI Story Leader

Playing Sentence Scramble

Groups had to work together to put a scrambled sentence into the correct order!

Writers shared their science articles on Tuesday.

We liked hearing our classmates' articles.

A surprise visitor read us a Hanukkah story on Wednesday, Mrs. Singer!

We liked meeting Mrs. Pols's mother, who taught third grade at WCS for 20 years. She taught two of the parents in the current second grade class!