**CONGRATULATIONS to our Spelling Bee Reps--Juancarlos and Jeremy!!!! Evelyn will serve as our alternate. These students will participate in the Irving School Spelling Bee for K-2 to be held Wednesday, April 15th beginning at 11:45 am in the Irving Auditorium. I was so proud that ALL of my students participated the our classroom "bee." It went 7 rounds before we were left with 3! It was a great show of interest, effort and courage! All are to be commended for their great show of sportsmanship and support of others!
**School Spirit Week was the BOMB! We had cozy pajamas, "twin" friends (and even Mr. Degman's twin--Tate!) lots of adorable stuffed animals and a great show of School Spirit on Friday with our school colors represented. Thanks Student Council for a great idea!
**Information/sign up for the Academic Fair and Egg Drop Contest is in your child's homework folder. I have given you a paper copy, but you can also sign up on line thru the Irving School website. I have talked to the students about ideas for Academic Fair projects and Egg Drop vehicles. Ms. Creehan will come in after break to show students some past projects and answer any questions they may have. I would love to see our class represented by some projects and vehicles!! What are YOU interested in??? Start with a question! Both the Academic Fair and Egg Drop Contest are Wednesday, April 22nd. Students will share their projects in the gym during the day. The Fair will be open to the public in the evening and students can return to chat about their projects. The Egg Drop Contest will begin at 12:45 out on the black top. The students name will be announced and the vehicle will be dropped by the student from the 3rd floor window! Come out and join us!
**Route to Reading Rotation 6 has concluded. You should have received notification of skill mastery. Route to Reading Rotation 7 (our final rotation for the year) will begin on Tuesday, April 7th. The students have worked super hard!
**In Friendship Club this week, Ms. Bell Bey did a great lesson on Brain/Body connection and the ability to control your own actions. Awesome!
**In Mr. Packer Problem Solving this week, Mr. Packer continued small group work on dots and position and direction following and I worked with a group on 2D and 3D shapes.
**Opera for the Young is coming to Irving School! On Monday, April 13th at 1:30 pm, the students will see a production of "Beauty and the Beast." It is an interactive production! Ms. Hiolski is already teaching classes the 4 songs that will be sung during the performance.
**Spring Break begins 3/28-4/5. Classes resume on Monday, April 6th. All students traveling near and far have their travel journals. Some students have requested a journal for home use. We can't wait to read about their adventures!
** Future Field Trip--Adler Planetarium on Monday, April 20th from 9-2 pm. Information and permission slips will be sent out after break. I will need 4 volunteers.
**YES! It's finally time!!! You can now begin to bring in your GIANT boxes, medium and small boxes, paper towel tubes, toilet paper tubes, cup tops, containers, fabric and any other COOL things you have been saving for our Space Station Projects. I showed the students some of the materials left by previous classes. We are getting excited! Our space station prep, design, construction and detailing will take place the week of April 27th-30th. We will need some hot glue volunteers during our detailing phase. Stay tuned!!
**Please have a safe and restful spring break! It is somewhat of a homework holiday....but......you can read your Busy Reader, work on your idea or begin your project for the Academic Fair or vehicle for the Egg Drop Contest, write and illustrate in your travel journal, log on to Lexia, BrainPop, play some of our old homework games, go outside and get some exercise, do some yoga poses, observe nature (spring is here,) spend some time with family and friends.
This week:
It was all about our wacky weather--boots again and having fun during Spirit Week. The students also worked on building 2D and 3D structures to add to our "Structure Museum." Our station day was truly special! We invited Mrs. Aguilar 2nd grade class to collaborate with us on activities. Mrs. Aguilar, an army sergeant in her nonteaching life, is being deployed to Germany for 4 weeks. We are so happy to have her at Irving! Station day activities included students each choosing a story and reading it with a buddy from Mrs. Aguilar's class. They then worked together to draw an event from their story and write a question about the story and doing "Egg Math" where they got a plastic egg with their buddy, opened it and created a story problem about what was inside. Safe travels Mrs. Aguilar!
Reading/ Language Arts: The students completed Unit 7 Weather in their Treasures Reading series. They reviewed all their sight words and letter sounds paying particular attention to short and long vowel sounds. Students began sharing their Weather Diary projects. Great work! We also tracked the weather of many of the students travel destinations on weatherunderground. I read the trade book, "Bear Snores On." Students made predictions about story content. While I read the story, the students listened for the order of events in the story. After a second reading and whole class discussion, the students formed teams an worked collaboratively to complete a story elements butterfly identifying the characters, setting and plot. Each group shared their work. Toward the end of the week, the students made choices on creating their own workstations. Their workstations included leveled readers, elbow chatting about asking and answering questions about their story, sentence building using nouns, verbs and adjectives, working with word families, putting mixed up sentences in the correct order, working with consonant blends and digraphs, responding in writing to squencing events and playing CVC and consonant blend games.
Math: Our story problem math journals are going well. The students are currently reading, creating the problem using ten frames, illustrating the problem and writing a number sentence. I am then choosing a student to record on the projected page. The students are continuing to explore and build 2D and 3D shapes to add to our "Structure Museum." They continue learning the vocabulary associated with flat and solid shapes--flat, solid, sides, vertex, vertices, corners and faces. Math workstations this week included counting on from a random number, working with a partner to create a story problem, working with the app Butterfly Math, time by the hour activities.
Writing: The students continue to work on lowercase letter formation. They used their stuffed animals for a writing prompt--describing them and telling why they were special. Students shared their writing with their table mates. Their peers critique their writing using the writer's checklist noting beginning with a capital letter, spacing between words in a sentence, placement of words on a given line and using punctuation.
Science: The weather did not cooperate in order for us to continue with our shadow experiments. We will finish them up after break. The students began an inquiry on the sun. What do you know about the sun? I recorded their responses. The students listened to informational stories about the sun. Many knew the sun was a star and was made up of burning hot gases. Some students were surprised to learn that the sun is a medium star. The students also began learning a song about the order of the planets. The students used the wind tunnels outside yesterday. Lots of fun and running around! Much more to come after break!
Technology: The students continued to use the iPads for whole group, small group and individual use. Vocabulary development apps have been the focus this week in reading. The apps Oz Phonics, Spelling Bug, I Write Words, Tic, Tac, Toe and Read on Sight were used. In math, the students continue to work on addition and subtraction processes with the apps Butterfly Math, Animal Math, Kids Math, Number Find and Sam Phibian. In science, students explored the apps NASA, weatherunderground, and Solar System.
Literature: "The Sun," "The Amazing Sun," "The Universe," "Aliens in Underpants Save the World," "Fly Guy Presents Space," "Sun, Earth and Moon," "Super Storms," "Morning, Noon and Night," "What Color is the Sky," "Moondance."
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