Halloween Parade!

Today our school was transformed by costume and decoration!! What a fabulous parade we had! We began by walking through the school, grade by grade, then filing outside, and finally parading into the Commons. The students had to guess the Faculty costume theme (Ice Cream Flavors) and then we finished with the "Monsters" song led by Mr. Bean. After the parade Second and Third Grades celebrated with their companion classes. Amazingly, all this happened by 9:30 AM! Please enjoy the photos, taken by our own Ean McGonigle.

This week students have been busy with Social Studies projects. The second grade continues to study Community. Last week the children had a wonderful field trip to Escobar's Farm and Corn Maze where they learned about rural community. After the visit, we learned about the letter writing process and worked on "thank you" letters for Farmer Escobar. In third grade, children worked on constructing salt dough maps of Mexico showing the topography of the country. In the weeks to come we will work on painting our maps, adding a map key, the oceans, and a compass rose.

Have a wonderful weekend, and a safe and festive Halloween!

Buddies

This week 3rd Graders partnered with 2nd Graders in our class and joined the 5th Grade for buddy time. Before buddying up, we had a class discussion about the article "Bullies Beware!" in the current issue of Time For Kids. As a group we talked about our experiences either being bullied or acting as a bully ourselves. We agreed that it is important to speak up if you see someone being bullied, even though it can be difficult to do so. Later, when we met with our 5th grade buddies, children discussed various bullying scenarios and how they might respond.

In reading groups this week 2nd Graders read Jamaica Tag Along by Juanita Havill. Students practiced making text-to-self connections, which is an important comprehension strategy. 3rd Graders read The Spooky Tail of Prewitt Peacock by Bill Peet and continued to practice the comprehension strategy of visualization.

Using the mentor text Miss Tizzy by Libba Moore Gray, students brainstormed friends in their lives that they could write about in their journals. Next week we will choose one of these friends to write a piece about.

Next week we are looking forward to meeting with you all during Parent-Teacher Conferences. We will spend about 25-30 minutes with parents and then invite your child to join us for about 10-15 minutes. We find this to be an empowering way to engage children in their own learning and involve them explicitly in the process of examining their learning journeys.

Please contact us if you have any questions!

Have a great weekend!

Lee and Megan

Social Studies

Second and Third Graders have been working in integrated groups with their companion classes on theme-based Social Studies projects. In Second Grade, students are involved in a year-long study of "Community." Currently we are learning about our classroom and school communities. Children are working on making a "bird's eye view" map of our classroom. Thus far, they have sketched maps and added key details. Soon children will use these sketches to complete maps on the computer, complete with compass roses that they have individually designed. In addition, students have chosen a member from the school community to interview about how they help Friends Academy.

The year-long theme in Third Grade is the study of "World Cultures." Children have been learning about world maps, continents, and oceans. To begin, each student was asked to complete a blank world map and fill in any continents that they knew. This proved to be quite difficult for many! Afterwards, students were given the opportunity to consult various maps and atlases to learn more. In small groups, children worked on creating collaborative world maps, labeling the continents, oceans, and adding a compass rose. Soon, we will begin to focus in on Mexico, its geography and placement. Students will have the opportunity to work in small groups to make flat maps of Mexico and then salt-dough maps to highlight the country's topography.

Writing

This week children worked hard to publish their first writing piece! Next week, we will have a chance to share our pieces with the group from our "Author's Chair."

Ask Us About . . .

*Our Constellation groups.

*Sharing during Meeting.

*Closed Syllables.

*What is means to "visualize."

*Number words.

Dates To Remember:

*No School: Monday, 10/12 (Columbus Day)

*Parent Conferences: 10/21 &10/23 (Please sign up if you have not done so already.)

Have a GREAT long weekend!!

Readers, writers, and mathematicians!

This week, 2nd and 3rd graders have been immersing themselves in independent reading activity. Books of all genres can be found tucked in bright red reading folders, cradled in hands as children get cozy on pillows, shared between friends, and held up at meeting time as suggestions for others to read. Children have learned how to find a "just right" book using our lettering system as well as some rules of thumb. If a book has five or more words that they cannot read and/or they have difficulty recalling what they just read, a book is likely too difficult for independent reading purposes. The process of picking a book can be truly empowering, as children assert their opinions and interests. Routinely, our class discusses what we are each reading independently--even the teachers! In addition, children have the opportunity to recommend a book that they have read to others.

In Writer's Workshop, children have been learning about the editing process. This week we edited our writing for for capitalization at the beginning of sentences, capitalization of proper nouns, and punctuation at the end of a sentence. Utilizing mentor text, we discussed how "sight" and "sound" words can add interest to our stories. Children reread their writing and added sight and sound words to their sentences. We all agreed it made them much more interesting to read and easier to visualize!

The concept of visualization is one that we are exploring in our reading groups as well. Children are noting how descriptive words and phrases in the text that we are reading can help us to create a mental image and visualize what is happening in the books we are reading. This exercise of "visualization" leads to greater comprehension.

In math we have been continuing to enjoy our cognitive activity "What's my rule?" and students have begun to lead this activity themselves. In addition we have been studying graphs and their usefulness in examining data. Next week we will do some surveys and graph our results.

Dates to Remember:

Tuesday, October 6th: Pizza Day!

Curriculum Overview Night

Wednesday, October 21st: Parent Conferences (after school)

Friday, October 23rd: Parent Conferences (No school for students)

Have a great weekend!

Joyful Learning

This week we have settled in to our routine and academic structures. Reading groups are in full swing, Orton-Gillingham is up and running, writing notebooks are filling with words and pictures, and students are actively involved in math problem solving and experimentation. Our classroom is abuzz with the joy of learning!

Circles of Learning

This week we engaged in a rich and empowering discussion about learning. In groups with our companion classes, students and teachers alike thought about learning as a circle, ever-expanding and constantly evolving. In the center of our learning circles are those things that we feel are strengths of ours. Usually these are skills that we have practiced for a long time, but they may be things that come easily to us because of own natural predispositions. On the edge of our learning circle are those things that are less easy for us, skills that require more work and attention. We call these things our growing edges. After discussing these circles of learning, each child and teacher created their own individual learning circle. Once everyone had completed this activity, we came together as a group to share our learning circles. The children's respect and care for each other was palpable as they responded and supported each individual and their brave statements. And thanks to all the parents who are openly engaging in this project by completing their own learning circle. Please return them and we will hang them along with ours!

Parents' Night

Thanks to all for your heartfelt participation during our Parents' Night this week! We so enjoyed getting the chance to share our classroom and program with you. We invite you to come to our October 6th Curriculum Overview night for more discussion. And don't forget to check out The Dunn Institute's Learning Difference Awareness Conference for fabulous offerings, www.dunninstitute.org.

Ask us About . . .

*Our Learning Circles.

*Making posters with our Buddies.

*Independent reading.

*Fact bracelets.

*Our reading books, "Shortcut", "The Man Who Walked Between Two Towers", "Sheila Rae the Brave" and "Poppleton".

WELCOME!

Welcome to our blog! We hope you find this an informative and fun way to learn about your children and their school lives. Here we will post words and pictures that give you a sense of our classroom curriculum and philosophy. In addition we will share important practical information about dates and events. It is our hope that you will interact with this site, adding comments and thoughts that you would like to share with our classroom community.

Off to a great start . . .

We have spent the first two weeks of school creating a caring community of learners, establishing rules and routines, and sharing our hopes and dreams for our year together. We have also established important connections with our companion classes, sharing lunches, recess, and Morning Meetings with them. Friends Academy and The Sally Borden School jointly embrace the philosophy of Responsive Classroom, a social curriculum that guides our interactions within the community. We feel that only when children and adults feel safe and connected are they open and ready for learning. To that end, we strive to take care of social needs throughout our day, and coach our children in communication skills that allow them to establish strong connections within our community. To learn more about the Responsive Classroom, please visit www.responsiveclassroom.org.

Academic Components . . .

Throughout the past two weeks, we have spent time getting to know your children as learners, as we will continue to do throughout the year! With the help of Jamie Ross-Cory, we have done some formal and informal assessments of student skills to get an understanding of where we are individually and collectively as learners. We have also slowly begun to introduce some curricular components. We have begun Writers' Workshop, focusing on using drawing as a method to get ideas for our writing. Using the inspiration of Donald Crews and his narrative Big Mama's, we have explored how drawing a picture before writing makes it easier to find the words we wish to choose. Each child drew and wrote about a place that is very special to him/her and had a chance to share this work with the class in a Sharing Circle. Today we went for a walk with clipboards and paper in search of inspiring images. Each child is collecting their work in a personal Writing Notebook. We have also begun Readers' Workshop and have been learning about our classroom Math materials and games. Next week we will start our Orton-Gillingham work in groups.

Ask us about . . .

*. . .our "Specials" and how they are going.

* . . .our Writer's Notebooks.

*. . .our 5th Grade and Kindergarten buddies.

*. . .what we do during Morning Meeting.

*. . .our routine for packing up at the end of the day.

Have a wonderful weekend!!

Mrs. MacGregor and Ms. O'Brien