1) I love deer hunting.
2) I love dancing.
3) My favorite food is pizza.
These clues had the class guessing a few dads and one mom. This student was very excited to see her dad walk in as our mystery, and she assured the class that he doesn't dance in a tutu! The class enjoyed the humorous book that dad and daughter had previously picked out, "Walter the Farting Dog" by William Kotzwinkle and Glenn Murray. Thanks for taking time out of your day to spend in 2nd grade!
1) We have brown hair.
2) We like to play basketball.
3) We had Mrs. Howard in 2nd grade.
These clues left the students with many guesses. When Ruby and Karli walked in, there were many students who recognized these 5th grade girls! Our mystery readers have been waiting for this opportunity since 1st quarter. 4th quarter has finally arrived and these two were ready! They shared the Froggy book with us, "Froggy Gets Dressed," by Jonathon London. Thank you girls! Great to see you back in 2nd grade!
1) I am a teacher.
2) I am a grandma.
3) I love to read and eat chocolate.
The class was pretty certain who this mystery reader would be, but there were a few other guesses as well! This student's grandma fit all the clues as she is a beloved English teacher at our school, and the students couldn't have been more excited to hear her story and enjoy the delicious treat she brought them. In the last few weeks we have been reading fairy tales from different points of view, so her book choice of "The True Story of the Three Little Pigs," was perfect! Thank you for taking time out of your busy school day to share a story with us, Mrs. Knutson!
1. I have been a mystery reader before.
2. I've spent a good amount of time at the school.
3. I love to watch football.
The class was so excited to have our first mystery reader today! They were definitely puzzled by the clues, but ultimately thought it might be one of our student's moms. They had no idea that Mason has been our first mystery reader since he was in third grade! The students found Mason's reading of "I Will Surprise My Friend" by Mo Willems very entertaining! Thanks for taking some time out of your spring break to spend in 2nd grade!
We've started our engineering unit in 2nd grade. We learned that engineers design and build things to solve problems. They use creative and innovative ideas. We've also learned that there are many types of engineers. Some may create new things, some take things apart to see how they work, and others study why things don't work.
Our first task was to make a spaghetti tower using 30 noodles and 30 marshmallows. The students were placed in groups of 3, and they had three science class periods to work. The goal was to build the tallest standing structure. Once the students got their supplies they got right to work with enthusiasm.
Groups soon found that this was more challenging than they anticipated. Spaghetti noodles are not strong building supplies and marshmallows are gooey. The groups worked together to design and redesign. This can definitely lead to frustration, and how the groups handle this frustration can definitely impact their outcome. On day 2 each group received 20 more noodles and 20 more marshmallows to help build on or fix up the tower.
Each group received 10 more noodles and 10 more marshmallows on the third day. These extra supplies were a welcome addition because many groups found that their snapped noodles were no longer helpful to their ideas moving forward. Each group pulled together and used excellent team work! They listened to each other's ideas and were patient throughout the process. We measured the towers on the third day. Each group ended with a standing structure. This is a fun project with so many great lessons!
For our most recent opinion writing piece, the students completed these beautiful projects detailing what they most liked about themselves. Of course the best parts of them are things we can't see and photograph- their kind hearts, willingness to help others, smart brains, and so much more. For this project, they needed to choose a part of them that we could see and photograph.
This was a step by step process. The students brainstormed their ideas in a bubble map. They began their writing with a topic sentence and then put their brainstormed ideas into complete sentences. The writing was completed with a conclusion sentence. We added a black and white photo to go with our writing. These opinion pieces range from humorous to heartfelt! I love seeing them up in the hallway with visitors stopping by to read them!
We finished up I Love to Read Month with a cozy read in and a guest author visit. We cozied up to our virtual fire place and enjoyed a s'mores snack as we read our books.
On our final Friday, along with Books for Breakfast, we gathered in the library to hear the story of "Annie's 4th of July" written by Jeanne Svobodny.
Leading up to Valentine's Day, the class made these cute love bees! We have great artists in our 2nd grade!
They enjoyed handing out their cards and talking with friends.
On our first Friday of I Love to Read Month, Ms. Graves' 4th grade class visited our classroom to do buddy reading. It's always fun to share a book with an older friend!
The class was thrilled when our items arrived last week! For items that we need, the class ordered new pencils, glue sticks, and individual pencil sharpeners. Items they wanted were a few new books for our classroom library, journals and blank books for writing, sticky notes, and a new cushion for reading. The students are writing up a storm in their journals and blank books. I've seen the class writing about their friends, favorite sports, family, and fiction stories in the white blank books. We also delivered our donations. The class had voted on two places: the Preston Food Shelf and the Chatfield Nursing Home. We typed up a letter describing the purpose of our donation and signed it. The Preston Food Shelf donation was sent in the mail, and one of our sweet 2nd graders has an aunt that works at the Chatfield Nursing Home so he was able to deliver it in person! Thank you again for all of your support in this project for the students. So many great lessons for these kids in this economics unit!
This sweet 2nd grader was busy in the kitchen this weekend! Her family made Hazel's Good Old Fashioned Pancakes and added blueberries. They look delicious! Then she made Oaklynn's Monster Toast. What a fun recipe! Thank you so much for sharing your pictures with us!
The students were so excited to get started with science now that it is 3rd quarter! We kicked off science with learning about the scientific method. We learned that scientists often start with a question, make a hypothesis, carry out an experiment, and analyze the results.
Our question was: How can we make gummy bears grow? The students made a hypothesis given 5 options. We soaked the gummy bears in plain water, sugar water, vinegar water, and lemon water. There was also the option that the type of water wouldn't make a difference. The class was pretty split across the board on their predictions.
We measured and weighed the gummy bears before and after soaking over night. Our result was that the vinegar water grew the gummy bear the most! The class discussed other liquids they might try if they were to do this experiment on their own. They brainstormed ideas of 4 different sodas or 4 different juices for example.
This sweet 2nd grader tried Mrs. Howard's recipe from the cookbook, and it was a hit with the whole family! I loved that she even got involved with the cooking by cutting the peppers! Thank you so much for sharing, and I'm glad you enjoyed the recipe! It's perfect for these cold days!
We have been learning about adjectives all year long. We know that an adjective describes a noun. We've been using adjectives to describe different characters we've met in the stories we've read. Recently we used adjectives to describe ourselves. We started the lesson by brainstorming adjectives about one of our sweet girls and then stuck them right to her!
When we returned back from holiday break we took care of paying back the school for the printing supplies for our cookbook project. We asked Mr. Semmen to come to our classroom so we could share with him about our cookbook sales and pay back $61.60. The school generously donated back $40 of that! That now left the students with $300 to spend on what they need, want, and to help someone!
We had a fantastic 2 weeks of selling cookbooks for our economics project. Our final numbers are in. We sold a total of 140 cookbooks and made $321! This was possible due to many generous donations! Our first step is to pay back the school for the printing supplies. We have to pay back 44 cents for each cookbook sold. This equals out to $61.60. After paying back the school, we are left with $259.40. With that money, the class will make decisions about what they need in our class, what they want, and who they'd like to donate money to in order to help someone in need. Thank you to all of our customers and those who donated. It's great to see former students come back each year to buy a cookbook because they remember selling cookbooks in 2nd grade. We will keep you updated on our purchases!
