The LAST week before spring break

I have lots of information to share for the upcoming week and into the last 9 weeks of school:
Riley Caring and Sharing week is this week! Students may dress and participate with a .50 donation each day.
Monday 3/18-wear Bulldog gear and do your Bulldog best
Tuesday 3/19-Sports Day-wear your favorite team apparel
Wednesday 3/20-Pajama Day (make sure you have appropriate shoes for recess)
Thursday 3/21-Hat Day
Friday 3/22-Decades Day-dress up in clothes from your favorite decade!

Poptabs-2nd grade is doing very well-we have a full tub but we can continue to collect them through Wednesday soo.... bring them all in. WE WANT A PIZZA PARTY:)

Flat Stanley Projects: We hope to have them back when we return from spring break. I've showed students some examples of them coming back on poster board with labels telling what is going on in the picture, in a construction paper book format, or maybe even a power point presentation (there's also scrapbook format or photo albums too). Students will begin presenting them to us the week we return. I can't wait to see the adventures! This project will take us into a study of regions during Social Studies time.
AND to continue with regions, if you are heading anywhere for spring break, we would love to have a postcard with the city and state that you visited. We'll be mapping the information we get back!

Spelling-as we head into the final grading period of second grade (sniffle, sniffle) we will no longer be sending home spelling homework. I'm sure this is a relief for many of you as spring sports will be getting under way very soon. As you are very familiar with the types of activities on the tic-tac-toe and menus, you are welcome to continue doing them at home as a way to study and practice spelling words, plus Spelling City still has all the remaining lists too. We will be incorporating spelling work into our morning work block but please know that your child may still need some additional time at home to practice his/her words, especially if you begin to see your child's spelling grade slip. I will be grading the spelling work your child does in class to have grades in the gradebook other than just the weekly test.

MONDAY-Field trip

So your child should be getting home soon as it is Friday, 4:01pm. I realized as they were lined up at the door that we didn't write "field trip" for Monday in assignment notebooks. I reminded them before the bell rang, but let's face it...it is Friday and they were ready to go:)
I have many green Dog Dash shirts here and I told the students which ones I had, I'm hoping those that have theirs at home will find it so they can all be the "green team' on Monday. No big deal if they can't though!

Have a great weekend!
Mary

Week of Feb. 25th

Next week will look different in terms of reading and spelling. We'll be reading a novel called Flat Stanley to kick start the Flat Stanley project you heard about last week. We'll also be creating our flat people in class and we'll write a letter to the people you've provided the address for. We'll be working with dictionaries to look up some of the vocabulary words from the novel so you may see that come home if students don't finish in class.

In spelling, there will be no list going home and therfore no homework for spelling!

In math, we'll be taking the unit 8 math test on Tuesday so watch for the review to come home Monday night. Wednesday we'll begin unit 9.

FRACTIONS

Just a quick note to say, "Don't fret". Your child has been introduced to a lot of higher level thinking when it comes to fractions; equivalent fractions, parts of a whole, parts of a set, etc.  Most of this is an introduction and they will not need to master all the above mentioned skills. What they will need to be able to do is write the fraction for the shaded parts of a whole which is where I see the students excelling.  I've been a little stressed after the last couple of math lessons so I thought if I'm stressed you may be too:)
The unit 8 test is next week!

Parent Chaperones for CLC field trip

Here is the list of parent chaperones:
Kim Berry
Kathy Collins
Shelley Harrington
Nada Jimenez
Stephanie Jones
Autumn Smith
Jeff Williams
Kyle Zurcher
Nicole Zurcher
Anastasia Gresh?

There is NO charge for parents and plenty of space on the bus. We are so glad you could join us!! I'll check with the teachers who went last year about information you may need and send it home if necessary:)

News you can USE

Flat Stanley letters went home last night, hopefully you all got it from your child. The due date is Feb. 19th. Our class will be reading the novel in class so you'll be hearing more about that soon!

Today, I'll send home the Microbauts field trip permission slip. It won't be due back until Feb. 25th with our trip being on Monday, March 11th. I have 3 parents signed up to go at this point but we could use several more.

**ALERT-there have been a couple of identified cases of lice in our classroom. Please check you child; especially if they are scratching their heads a lot. You may also want to remind them of hugging, sharing hats, etc.

Coming Soon

It seems/feels like we have a lot going on in the next few weeks:)

• 5th grade wants to remind us all that their shoe collection starts on Monday. Send in those gently used shoes for a great cause!
• Book orders are due Monday, Feb. 11th if you'd like to place an order.
• Valentines: if your child is going to pass out Valentines they may bring them in anyday starting on Monday.  If you need another list of students just let me know. Our class party is next Thursday as well! (We are already sooooo excited)
• Hopefully your child filled you in on the "no bookmark" being sent home the last two weeks. It was already noted on the reading log anyway so we decided there was no need to send home that additional piece of paper:) Just fill in the reading log after reading the story and your're done.
• FIELD TRIP-I posted this a couple of months ago but we'll be going to the Challenger Learning Center on Monday, March 11. This is a trip that I need many volunteers for. Please let me know if you are available to attend with us from 9:15-11:15. We would probably leave the school around 9:00 and return around 11:30ish.