Monday, November 28, 2011

Writers Tell Stories.

We told family stories

friend stories

sad stories

snow stories

happy stories

disgusting stories

barfing stories

boat stories

and scary stories

Writers need to talk before they can write well. We must fill our brains with words--from books, from others, and from our own voices--before we can write.

Spelling words for this coming week...

  • black
  • knew
  • bug
  • city
  • nice
  • too (they should know this kind of "too" means "also" rather than the number or "to")
  • sometimes
  • rain
  • thank
  • them

Wednesday, November 23, 2011

A Writing Celebration!

First, we read other people's books.

Then we commented on what they did well as writers.

We wrote things like "Your pictures have lots of details" and

"You wrote lots of words" and

"I liked your book because it was easy to read."

We did a lot of reading!

People wrote books about their lives and

fiction books about bunnies and

stories about holidays and

friends stories, just to name a few.

We are good writers, and we know what writers do!

We like to share that with everyone.

We love celebrating writing.




Then, after all the celebrating, we had snacks! (Punch and Christmas cakes)

Yummy!



Great job, writers!

Monday, November 21, 2011

American Thanksgiving

We have lots of friends all over the world. Would you like to know more about the holiday we'll be celebrating this Thursday? It's very important to us. Click HERE to watch a movie about Thanksgiving!

Friday, November 18, 2011

News for the week of November 14-18



This week we have:

  • worked hard to make sure ALL of our books have a beginning, middle and end, even if they're nonfiction. Thinking of an end for nonfiction is MUCH more of a challenge than making an end for a fiction story.
  • learned about tens and ones and arrays (groups of things lined up neatly). We are beginning to learn that multiplication is fast addition.
  • read some of our favorite books during reading time in the morning. Did you know we now are able to read for 32 minutes without stopping? We've learned we are able to read that long because we LOVE the books we choose!
  • started taking AR tests this week.
  • continued working on our books for our upcoming writing celebration.
  • watched short (as in less than four minutes) videos from National Geographic Kids about dung beetles (eww!), jungles, sea turtles, and lizards.
Things to remember for next week:
  • No spelling test. We are doing a writing celebration and many time-consuming one-on-one assessments for our district...and it's a short week.
  • No school November 24 and 25. Happy Thanksgiving!
  • Please be sure your child is wearing a coat to school. If you are in need to a better coat, please let me know ASAP. We have some available.
Happy weekend!

Thursday, November 17, 2011

Paying Taxes...What a Bummer.

Today during JA, some of us were chosen to work for the government as teachers, firefighters, police officers, etc.

The rest of us worked at Sweet O Donut Factory.

The donut workers were paid $5 for their hard work.


The donut workers were told by the tax collector that they had to give two of their dollars to her to pay taxes.

Some people even hid under the table so they wouldn't have to pay!

Then...the unthinkable happened! The tax collector gave the donut workers' dollars TO THE GOVERNMENT WORKERS!

They thought they were really something...until the tax collector came for their money too!

We decided we're just going to stay kids and play with stickers and never get mixed up in all this tax stuff.

A Giant Sock Monkey in Second Grade?!

Sock Monkey sat with Makensie this morning. 
During Community Circle, Sock Monkey said he wished we could have bananas for lunch.

Sock Monkey read with his owner, Kelsey, during independent reading time.

He even took an AR test with her. He didn't tell her any answers.

Then guess what happened? The kids went to lunch and this is how Mrs. Overman found poor little Sock Monkey.

She felt bad for him, so he sat on her lap while she worked during lunch.

Lucky for Sock Monkey, the kids came back and he got to do a Junior Achievement lesson with them. He was much happier after that.

Tuesday, November 15, 2011

The View From Here. Do You Do This Too?

Playing Dizzy Dizzy Dinosaur

Playing Chutes and Ladders

Playing Hi Ho Cherry O

Playing Tic Tac Toe 
Making a book

Playing There's a Moose in the House

Playing the computer

Cleaning the closet

Drawing on the easel

Wishing Dylan a happy birthday on our whiteboard