Friday, November 18, 2022

 Hello Weckie Families!!

Today is going to be a short News Blog as things are SUPER busy on this end but I hated to miss a Friday post!! We are in full blown Turkey-Mode over here as we prepare for Thanksgiving! Look for some fun projects to come home with your Weckies next week and enjoy sharing them with your family over the holiday week! We have had some awesome discussions about allllllllll of the people, places and things we are thankful for this "thankful" time of year. We have created a class book the kids will be bringing home next week and a few turkeys projects along the way too!

Big things coming...

Conferences - Please check Skyward on Monday morning to sign up for Parent-Teacher Conferences! All conferences are going to be held remote on Zoom. Skyward says they are "in person" but they are in fact, on Zoom. You can sign up for conferences beginning on Monday, November 21st in the morning (I hear about 7am) on Skyward. 

Tuesday, November 29th is our Field Trip to the Outdoor Center - Wahoo!! If you have not yet turned in your field trip permission slip and $15 cash, please do so ASAP. We want to have all money turned in before Thanksgiving break so that the Monday we return, we can sort our payments for the buses and the Outdoor Center! For this field trip, your child will need to dress in FULL winter gear. Think: snow-pants, boots, good socks, winter coat, hat and gloves. Please make sure that everything is labeled. We spend a lot of time outside on the trip and we'll want to make sure everyone is bundled up. I am also looking for TWO volunteers to help with a surprise treat for our return! In the past we have had very HUNGRY kids returning to school and I thought it would be a fun surprise to have a snack waiting for us. I am looking for one parent to drop off 24 cookies and one parent to drop off 24 cold juice boxes that afternoon, just prior to our return. We are estimated to be back about 1:45 but our class will then go right to Music and PE. I know that a snack about 2:45pm would be just perfect!! Please let me know if you are able to help and I'll let you know which two parents I hear from first. Thank you, thank you!!

And a side note from Mrs. Weckstein:

A special heartfelt thank you to each of you for sharing your kid(s) with me!! I am LOVING this group and they have really come together well as a strong classroom family. We receive compliments from FAPES teachers and are often compared to the other classes as a very strong example of good leaders and behavior. THANK YOU!! I can for certain say I am so thankful for these 23 Weckies this holiday season. I wish you only a safe and healthy Thanksgiving holiday!

Friday, November 4th

 Hello Weckie Families!

Happy Friday! What a week it has been... Halloween followed by a sick kiddo at the Weckstein's has made for a tricky week for sure. A huge thank you to our guest teacher, Mrs. Jackie Valentine, for keeping things running smoothly in my absence Wednesday and Thursday!  A special thank you to everyone who sent in items for our Boo Bash Halloween Breakfast as well as to all who gave of their time to help work our party (Mrs. Thomas, Mrs. Anglin and Mrs. Vazquez)! We had a fantastic morning together! 

Readers' Workshop
In Readers' Workshop we wrapped up our "Readers Grow Like Beanstalks" unit! We had a couple ending mini-lessons including:

• I can identify how the author made the whole story click together.
• I can reteach about a story using the phrase: Somebody wanted ________, but_______ so_______. (For example: Adam Rubin's book, Those Darn Squirrels.. Mr. Fookwire wanted to paint illustrations of the birds, but the squirrels kept eating all of the birdseed in his feeders which made the birds fly away, so the squirrels ended up dressing up like birds to make Mr. Fookwire happy). 
• I can determine what the author wanted to teach me from the story.
• I can predict the author's lesson from my sneak preview of the book.

Then we did a culminating activity where we talked about all of the new reading strategies we have learned and talked about which strategies we would most often pick for tricky and challenging words.

This week we moved into our Non-Fiction Reading Unit! We have started by talking how readers of non-fiction grown knowledge. Mini-lessons have included:

• Non-Fiction readers notice and learn from details in their text.
• Non-Fiction readers can put the parts of the text together in their mind.
• Non-Fiction readers can ask questions about the text/topic they are reading.

It was a big shift this week to book shop for non-fiction books to add to our book bins but there was also a lot of excitement about reading books on new topics for our readers!

Writers' Workshop

We continue to work on writing small moment personal narratives in Workshop. Mini-lessons have included topics like:

• I can revisit my ending to make it strong.
• I can check my writing over to make sure SNAP words are spelled correctly.
• As a writer, I can work hard, practice and get stronger each time I write.
• I can use a checklist to set goals for my writing.
• I can revise my story to match my intent and meaning.

Next week we'll dig deeper into mentor texts where we can find author's craft that we can try in our own writing to make it even stronger!

Math Workshop

In Math we wrapped up Unit 2!! We spent time finishing up with addition strategies for the near doubles facts, the turn-around rule for addition (which we proved does not work for subtraction), learned to play new games including: Evens and Odds, Money Exchange Game, Fishing for 10s and a pumpkin dice game. This week we spent time reviewing important concepts like evens and odds as well as using our addition strategies to solve number stories. We also took our Unit 2 Assessment, Unit 2 Cumulative Assessment and worked through the Unit 2 Challenge! Look for all of this to come home later next week! At the front of their packet, look for their Self-Assessment page. The check marks done in pencil were filled in at the beginning of the unit and the check marks done in color were done at the completion of the unit. It's interesting to see what they think they have improved in with the different skills and their comfort level with each!

Science

You may have heard the exciting news... we are botanists!!! Our science kit has arrived and we have done our first planting of brassica seeds. Each child is growing their own plant as we observe and learn about plant parts. More to come on this...

Important Upcoming Dates:

November 8, 2022  - NO SCHOOL - ELECTION DAY

November 17, 2022 - Half Day of School (dismissal around 12:10pm)

November 24-25, 2022 - NO SCHOOL - THANKSGIVING HOLIDAY

November 29, 2022 - Field Trip - WL Outdoor Education Center (YAY!)

Friday, October 21, 2022

 Hello Weckie Parents!

We have been SO busy in 2nd Grade! It appears the cold weather season is upon us and I have a couple of suggestions to help out your Weckie at school this winter. On Thursdays, we go outside for Block Recess anywhere from 30 to 60 minutes (depending on weather). Then the kids are in for 40 minutes before they go to lunch, and then recess again. It would be super helpful for them to have an extra: pair of gloves, pair of socks and hat on these cold, wet days. You might want to just get in the habit of leaving these in their backpacks in a gallon Ziploc baggie. 

Thank you to EVERYONE who has signed up to help with our Halloween Party! We are good on three parent volunteers now and the sign-up genius looks pretty great too! It is linked here as a reminder for all who have volunteered to donate items. Anything that is NOT food, can be sent in ahead of time! Kids will be allowed to wear their costumes to school that day but all scary masks and weapons should remain at home. 

Boo Bash 2nd Grade Sign-Up

Readers' Workshop

We are approaching the end of our first unit, "Readers Grow Like Beanstalks" and I can confirm our readers are growing like beanstalks!! Mini-lessons have focused on:

• I can notice the beginnings and endings of new words.
• I can tackle tricky vowel team sounds in my reading.
• I can not only say the words, but I can figure out what they mean.
• I can check myself by fixing my mistakes when my reading does not make sense.
• I can notice how an author makes reader's react.
• I can notice when and how an author makes a powerful text.
• I can notice powerful author's craft and try it in my own writing. 

I am in the midst of doing reading assessments with many of our readers and hope to launch guided reading groups and small group instruction soon!

These are the mentor texts we have read, re-read and LOVED these last two weeks:

Anchor charts from our Unit of Study in Readers' Workshop.

Writers' Workshop

In Writers' Workshop we continue to focus on writing personal narratives in the form of a smalll moment (a time we did something). Mini-lessons have focused on:

• I can tell a meaningful story like a master author.
• I can use my partner to help make my beginning stronger.
• I can make a plan for my small moment.
• I can stretch out a tiny moment into one story.
• I can elaborate my writing with actions and feelings.
• I can magnify my small moment with details.
• I can fix my ending to make my story better.

Phonics/Word Study

We continue our work in word study with vowel teams and first grade SNAP words! We have spent time looking at different vowel teams and in particular lately, when the vowel plus 'y' makes a long vowel sound. Our word detectives have done a nice job finding examples of these words around our room and in books that we read!

Math Workshop

In Math Workshop we have been learning MANY different strategies for addition! I have attached a picture of the chart we have created and will continue to add onto during this second unit. We have spent time working with doubles. The hope is for all second graders to know their doubles facts up to 20 pretty routinely by the end of the year. We have worked with combinations of 10. We have learned to use a double tens frame when adding two numbers. And we have looked at the near doubles strategy for addition facts that are almost doubles facts! Lastly we have spent the last few days with the turn-around-rule, learning how it works great for addition and proving how it does not work for subtraction! We ended this week with math stations that reviewed new math games including: Doubles are no Trouble, Fishing for 10s and the Money Exchange Game. 

Social Studies

In Social Studies we are wrapping up our first unit about our local community! We have had great discussions about the people and places that make up our community. We have learned about human and natural features of a community. Then we took time to talk about needs and wants and how they can be met in our community. Last we learned about the three different types of communities as we read the story, The Little House (urban, suburban and rural). 

It's a Weckie World!

 Hello Weckie Parents... and happy Friday!!

We have had another stellar two weeks in second grade here in 202! The Weckies have been working hard and have also been playing hard too ;-). It has been so nice to enjoy the mild fall air lately that it was a bit harder to accept the chill in the air today! Please make sure to send your child with layers as the temperatures outside (and inside) seem to fluctuate lately!

We are beginning to put plans in place for our Halloween Party at the end of the month. With Halloween being on a Monday morning, we've decided to get creative and do a "Boo! Breakfast". We are going to work as a grade level to put together a Sign-Up Genius that will come out next week for parents to volunteer donations. Each class is going to have three parents come in as helpers to run the buffet and serve the food/drinks. If you are interested in volunteering IN PERSON for our Halloween Party, please email me by the end of the school day on Tuesday, October 11th. If we have more than three, I will put the names in a hat and we will draw them out of a hat. Remember, there will be many more parties this year. We are asking that ONLY those three parents come to the party to help with congestion in the building. While we still have limited parking options, it is going to be tight here on the 31st. We are also asking for each child to contribute $1 to the costs of the waffles and craft we will be making. Please send this in with your child in the next week. 

Word Study

In Phonics we have had two major focuses the last two weeks... one has been vowel teams the other has been SNAP words (high frequency words we want our kids to be able to read and spell, in a snap). We have been working on the vowel teams of: ea, ai, ou, ee and oo. We have found these teams in words around the room, words in books, words on charts, etc. We have also spent time using these vowel teams in our own writing! Coming home with your Weckie today is a BINGO board filled with 24 SNAP words from first grade. Please use this as a review with your child as we have a goal of being able to spell our SNAP words from 1st and 2nd this year. We will use these words in games and practice making them with: magnetic letters, chalk boards, magna-doodles, letter tiles and with whiteboards/markers. You can do the same at home too!

Readers' Workshop

In Readers' Workshop we have begun a look into different strategies we can use when trying to solve tricky words... the saying is: When Words Are Tricky, Roll Up Your Sleeves! We have talked about: checking the picture and thinking, "What would make sense?" and we have used what's happening in the story to help us figure out new words. We will add five more strategies and share this chart when it is complete in the coming weeks! ALL have finished their iReady Reading Diagnostics and information will be coming home early next week with their reading scores (as well as their math scores). I will reach out later next week if your child will be on an IRIP (individualized reading intervention plan) and communicate our goals for moving forward with their reading instruction! Using the iReady data, I have also placed the kids with just-right Readers' Workshop Partners. Continually practicing ways to read with our partners is a big goal in second grade. 

Writers' Workshop

In Writers' Workshop we have continued to work on our small moment personal narratives! These kids have SO many great experiences to write about and love writing time. It has been fun to have them share their writing and work with partners to improve and clarify their work for an audience.

Math Workshop

Unit 1 Math tests have come home this week and overall were REALLY good!! I can see a lot of skill growth and development from first grade and most have a really solid number sense (which is awesome). We will continue to work on patterns on number grid puzzles, odds/evens, skip counting and making combinations of 10 in the coming weeks. Remember, Homelinks are not mandatory, and are never 'late'! They are simply just a great refresher and second round of practice for skills covered in math that day in school. 

Social Studies

We have launched our first Social Studies Unit, Our Local Community, and the kids are LOVING talking about our community of White Lake. They appear to be White Lake experts!! We have brainstormed a list of places in our community, learned about community helpers that keep a community safe and productive and we have learned about human and natural features of a community. Today we did a brief introduction to the geography of a community and talked about how our one home is a part of a larger neighborhood, which is a part of a larger township, which is a part of a larger state, country and continent! 

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Important Upcoming Dates:

-October 12th 7pm Dublin PTA Meeting

-October 21st Dublin Spirit Wear Day

-October 28th Dublin Trunk or Treat @ Clifford Smart Middle School (they have a bigger parking lot ;-))

It's Feeling like Fall...

 And just like that, Fall is upon us!! We went from super warm weather to super cold weather pretty quickly! We typically have done snack outside but have moved inside towards the end of this week due to the cold temperatures! Please remember, the kids have recess minimally for 20 mins a day outside and need to be dressed appropriately. I would suggest sending layers at this point as the classrooms are still a bit warm and stuffy, but outside the air has been cool and crisp!

We have been super busy here in 2nd grade learning all sorts of things! We have reached that phase where the honeymoon is over and we have seen some concerning behaviors as well. Thank you for continuing to discuss being respectful at home with your Weckie as we are needing a lot of reminders in school lately!

Last week we wrote our Classroom Promise and we have been reciting it daily and referring to it daily as we all promised to make great choices. We incorporated our Classroom Promise into Constitution Day as a great way to review the importance of the Constitution and then create our own Classroom Promise. 

Readers' Workshop

In Readers' Workshop we have been continuing our unit of "Readers Grow Like Beanstalks". We have talked about deciding "how" to read, giving books a sneak peak, building our stamina, learning to book shop in our classroom library and how to take care of our books and we have been slowly learning to work with partners on our reading! We have been working through the iReady Reading Diagnostic and this will give me a better idea for placement into just-right book partners, guided reading groups and IRIPs for individuals who qualify for extra support. 

Writers' Workshop

We are in the midst of our launching unit in Writers' Workshop working on personal narratives and small moments! Writers' have been building their writing stamina while writing about a time they did something. We have been reviewing how all stories have: a beginning, middle and ending, a problem/solution, characters with names and characters who have thoughts and feelings. It has been fun to see what our writer's have created and shared.

Math Workshop

In Math we continue to work through Unit 1. We have been working with coins and coin values this week. ALL of our Weckies can use extra practice at home with coin value and counting combinations of coins. Please make sure you are reviewing this with them at home as that would be super helpful! We have spent time filling in number grid puzzles when numbers have been missing and talking about patterns on a number grid. Like if you need to subtract 10 you just go up one square and likewise if you need to add 10, you go down one square. We will wrap up Unit 1 next week and our first Math Homelinks will also begin to come home!

Have a fantastic weekend... and stay warm! ;-) Mrs. Weckstein

Off and Rolling in 202!

 

Hello Weckie Parents!

Happy Friday!! We are off and rolling in 202!! What a FANTASTIC two weeks of school we have had together. We have been learning about our classmates through games, sharing our favorite books, buddy activities and more! I love this time of year as you watch your classroom community come together, new friendships form and kids come out of their shells (for lack of better words)! I like to use this Friday News Blog to post updates about our learning 1-2x a month! I'd like to say I was really good at posting every other Friday, but sometimes life just happens (or teaching for that matter).  I'll try to email out to the whole when I do post here so you'll know that there is new information to read. I apologize for a lack of photos here or on our Twitter page (be sure to follow @WeAreTheWeckies as I eagerly await the list from the office about which faces are allowed on social media and which are not). Hopefully soon!

Readers' Workshop

We are slowly launching our Readers' Workshop and have spent time the last week:

-Learning to pick a comfy reading spot (Comfy Reading Spot homework due Monday)

-Learning what Readers' Workshop looks like vs. what Readers' Workshop sounds like

-How to ignore distractions and build our reading stamina (up to 20 minutes as a whole group as of today)

-How to talk to an audience about our favorite books, giving the title and showing why we picked this book as a favorite

Writers' Workshop

We are slowly launching our Writers' Workshop as well! We did an On-Demand Writing Assessment to start the unit using a narrative piece (tell me about a time you went...). Our Writers' had about 45 minutes to complete a piece and show all that they were capable of doing as a writer. We will look back at these pieces later in the year to see how your children have grown, and I will use these pieces now to guide my instruction moving forward!

Our first writing unit is a personal narrative unit and we spent time this week talking about big events (and comparing them to a big watermelon) and then all of the little events or small moments that happened in the big event (and comparing those to seeds, or ideas, for our small moments). My modeled example was about a family camping trip to Algonac State Park and each seed was about something that happened or we did in Algonac. Each seed representing something I could write a small moment story about for my audience.

Math Workshop

This week we took a beginning of the year Math Assessment so that I can gather more data about our kids as mathematicians and best guide my instruction. We then began the first couple of lessons from the Everyday Math program as we explored with number lines, filled in missing numbers on number lines, explored the different tools in our math tool kits and talked about all of the ways that numbers are important to us in every day life!

Curriculum Night

Curriculum Night is on Wednesday night at 6:30pm on Wednesday, September 14th!

Please let me know ahead of time if you will not be able to attend so I can send home information with your child on Wednesday! It really is an important time to attend (30 mins) so that we can discuss the details of the year, answer any questions and clarify anything academically we will be covering this year.  I hope to see you here!

Have a fantastic weekend! - Mrs. Weckstein

Welcome to 2nd Grade 2022-2023

Hello Weckie Families!!

If you are reading this blog post you have come to the right place! Let me be the first to welcome you to Second Grade at Dublin! I am so excited to be your/your child's teacher this year in our brand new school. We are so excited to welcome you in and show you our new learning space. You'll probably still see a lot of boxes, and that's okay. I can't wait to see what we can create and build with all of the empty boxes ;-). Sounds like a perfect Fun Friday activity. 

I hope you have had a great summer and have tried new things, read great books and gone on some cool adventures! We are going to learn so much this year, do so many cool things and have our best year yet! Buckle up and get ready... I am SO excited for our time together.

Your Partner in Learning, Mrs. Weckstein :-)

Here are a few pics from our summer... so you can get to know me (and my family).

Here's me with Liam (left), and then me with Ellery (right) and at the bottom, Mr. Weckstein!

Friday, April 8th

 

Hello Weckie Families!!

I hope that everyone had a restful and fun Spring Break! The Weckstein's took on Disney, which was anything but restful, but we sure did have a lot of fun! The kids were eager and excited to be back on Monday and the noise level was high most of the day... :-). It's hard to believe we are headed into the third and final trimester of the school year! Please make sure to check Skyward for your child's Trimester 2 report card. These take a lot of time and contain a lot of valuable information about your child that you can use at home to praise, motivate and challenge them to continue to be their best self! Please let me know if you have trouble and need guidance accessing your child's report card on Skyward. Our school office can help you!

Word Study

We have moved into an important area of word study, where we are learning to add endings -ed and -ing to words where you may or may not have to double the consonant before. Think of swim and how it becomes swimming, where you add an 'm' whereas in other words like jump, you only add the -ed or -ing ending. The English language can be tricky but we are learning little strategies for how to tell when to double the consonant, such as if the vowel before the consonant in short in sound. We also break words apart by syllable and this can help us to see where we'd need to double a consonant - think of run and if you added -ing, you would have running. If you broke it up by syllable you would have run/ning or the need for two n's. Next week we move onto to plurals and when to add the 's' or the 'es' ending onto words. 

Readers' Workshop

Our Workshop minilessons have been helping us to learn how to 'amp up our reading' when approaching longer or more challenging books! We have taken a look at different strategies to help ourselves as readers for: tackling tricky words, using post it notes at the end of chapters to record main ideas/events of the chapter, using pictures to help us to retell the story, learning to read the same books as a reading partner, learning to find ways to motivate partners to keep reading and we have even done some partner reading this week on Epic Books! Epic is like a digital library filled with hundreds of books, videos and magazine articles for kids. It is free for us to use during the day, 9-3. A few kids have mentioned trying to go on at home and it asks you to pay. This is not something you have to do at all. Totally up to you. I just suggest they take advantage when we can during the week instead and use the free account.

Writers' Workshop

In Writers' Workshop we have just launched our opinion letter writing unit! Our young writers' have learned the parts of a friendly letter earlier this week. They have spent time writing two practice friendly letters that included: the date, a greeting, an introduction, a body of the letter, a closing, a closing greeting and their name. As the week moved on, we transitioned to writing letters that feature facts and opinions about our favorite book or favorite book character. It has been fun to see which books the kids are picking to write about or who their favorite book characters are, and why! We will continue with this next week as we learn to tell more in our letters and continue to practice learning the format of a friendly letter.

Math Workshop

Unit 6 Math Assessments came home earlier this week. The Unit 6 Assessment addressed any new skills taught during the unit while the cumulative tackled skills we have been building upon all year. We all definitely need continued practice with partial sums and ballpark estimation. Continued practice here and at home will help make those two strategies more familiar and easier to use for our young mathematicians! I even find that having learned partial sums as an adult, that's my go-to method now for adding double or triple digit numbers! I hope that the kids will find in time too, how much easier this method can make things when you need to solve math mentally. This week we learned a new game called, "Hit the Target". Students worked in partnerships to solve for multiples of ten by adding and subtracting (using three steps) from a starting number to hit their target number. This was a fun challenge for many! We also spent time this week digging deeper with subtraction from double digit numbers. We practiced using number grids, open number lines and even base-10 blocks to help us solve these tricky problems.  Lastly we played a group game called "Basketball Addition" where Team 2 beat Team 1 by 6 points! It was an exciting game of addition for the whole class to participate in and enjoy while also doing math.

Please also make sure to pay attention to your child's home-links! Many are coming back without the directions being followed. These are meant to be something that you can complete with your child. Thank you!

Science

Science homework went out on Thursday this week in advance of our "wind" day next week! Next week we will continue our air and weather unit by "catching wind" outside! Each child was given a pinwheel template and a wind-snake to fully color and return to school. We will be laminating and piecing these two windcatchers together next week before we go outside and catch wind! Pics to come, I'm sure.

Important Upcoming Dates/Info...

• Please continue to pack appropriate weather gear for recess. The weather has been a bit unpredictable this week and we try to get the kids outside daily, so they may need rain coats and hats/gloves still as temperatures fluctuate. 
• Friday, April 15th- No school for Good Friday observance

Friday, March 4th

 Good Afternoon Weckie Families!

Happy Friday! What a week it has been... School-wide we kicked off March is Reading month with a building book competition, our annual "Battle of the Books" competition where we work as a classroom, than grade level and then entire school to pick our top favorite picture book for our building. We had a BLAST at the Outdoor Education Center on Thursday this week and then we wrapped up the week today with a building-wide "Fox in Sock - Crazy Socks Day" at Dublin! 

Please make sure you are following our class Twitter @WeAreTheWeckies for photos from our special day at the OEC!

Readers' Workshop

In Readers' Workshop we are wrapping up our non-fiction unit. We have been immersed in non-fiction books the last couple of weeks! We have compared two non-fiction books on the same topic to each other to find similarities and differences in information, we have looked for clues to solve tricky new vocabulary words that may emerge in non-fiction books and we have spent time practicing reading with fluency like experts on a topic would do! 

Writers' Workshop

Our experts are well on their way in writing expert books! We have spent the last month working on expert topic books where each child has been writing multiple books on topics that they consider themselves an expert on. Topics I have learned about in writing conferences have included: cooking, gymnastics, cheerleading, snowboarding, baking brownies, cheetahs, how to somersault, how to go camping, how to care for a pet turtle, a video game laboratory guide, cats, worms, wolves, plants, gaming systems, dinosaurs and I'm probably missing a few more topics! We have SO many great experts in our classroom!

Math Workshop

Before break we completed our Unit 5 diagnostic. Much of unit 5 in math was spent solving number stories and using different diagrams to help us prove our answers. The unit 5 tests will be coming home soon! Unit 6 opens up with a fun data day activity we did where we counted the number of pockets everyone was wearing, and created: a tally chart, a pictograph and a bar graph of our data. We then used our bodies to create a graph and found the median value (2 pockets). The remainder of our unit 6 work this week has focused more on number stories and using diagrams for subtraction to help us organize numbers and find the difference between two values.

Science

We are well on our way into our Air and Weather unit for Science! We had a blast exploring air the last two weeks with parachutes and with syringes and tubes! We found that while we cannot see air, the shape of an object can change when filled with air, we can feel air and sometimes we can even hear the movement of air as it hits objects! More to come for our curious scientists...

Important Dates Ahead...

Thursday, March 10th - 1/2 Day of School (Afternoon PD for teachers)

Friday, March 11th - Spring Picture Day

Wednesday, March 16th - Book Fair Family Night (times coming soon)

Thursday, March 17th- Wear Green for St. Patrick's Day/Dublin Spirit Wear Day

Thursday, March 24th - Special Class Lunch (more details to come soon)

Friday, March 25th- Read-In Pajama Day at Dublin (more details to come soon)

Friday, January 21st

 Happy Friday Weckie Families!!

Welcome back to the Blog... I honestly did not realize it had been so long! Time / Days are flying by over here!! It has been a great last couple of weeks as we have returned to school and gotten back into the routine of things after Winter Break!

Phonics:

In Phonics we wrapped up our unit of study with some time spent reviewing rhyming words. So often if we know one word (such as: night) we forget that we also know many other words (sight, light, fright, tight, etc.) that we come upon in books! We then moved into our new unit of phonics which aligns nicely with our non-fiction reading and non-fiction writing. We have spent the last few days learning to methodically break words apart (most often by syllable) to help us piece together the sounds within tricky or challenging words. 

Readers' Workshop:

In Readers' Workshop we began our look into non-fiction reading! Each week our readers "shop" for new books in our classroom library and the past couple of weeks they have been encouraged to find some fiction and some non-fiction books. We have spent time talking about being readers of non-fiction answering these questions:

• What non-fiction readers notice and learn (I see... I think... I learned...)?
• What is this book teaching me?
• What are the features of a non-fiction text?
• How is my non-fiction book set up? How does it  go?
• What have I learned that I can celebrate as a reader?
• What lingo can I anticipate seeing about the topic of my book?

This week we also began our iReady Reading Diagnostic! Everyone seemed pretty calm and I'm happy to report the website has not flagged anyone for rushing (a huge victory)! While we are hoping to see growth, please know that this diagnostic may actually be harder for many than the September version as the expectations rise on this latest diagnostic. I will be reaching out to parents in the coming weeks as the kids finish to let them know if their child has qualified for an Individualized Reading Intervention Plan (IRIP).

Writers' Workshop:

In Writers' Workshop we began 2022 with an "On-Demand" writing assessment. Our writers' were given time over two days to plan and then write their own non-fiction piece on a topic that they consider themselves an expert on! It was interesting for me to go back and read their work and learn all about: how to train a dog, how to make a quesadilla, how to make a grilled cheese, facts about cheetahs and more! Then I took some time to look at the non-fiction features our writers were using and compare those to the lessons ahead for new things we will teach them about writing non-fiction. The remainder of days have been spent with just having a free-write of sorts. Kids have been given ideas of topics to write about, while also enjoying that they could write on any subject/genre this week. Next week we launch our expert writing unit of non-fiction.

Math Workshop:

The last few weeks were spent wrapping up Unit 4 which took a lot of time to look at place value using ones, tens and hundreds as well as short form for base-ten blocks. We learned how to write expanded notation for numbers (i.e. 512 = 500 + 10 + 2) and we reviewed strategies for solving addition facts. We have also learned a new game this week called "Beat the Calculator" which helps with addition fact fluency.

Money, money, money... MONEY!!! Here it comes!! We are moving into a big unit in math all about coins! Please continue to review coins at home with your children. By the end of the unit we will be making change with coins from $1, and many still need help simply recognizing coins and knowing their value. 

Social Studies:

We are deep into our geography unit in social studies! We have learned about the features of maps and spent a day looking at all sorts of road maps from our county, state and country! We spent time then creating our own classroom maps complete with map keys and a compass rose. Then we moved onto talking all about how goods and services can move in and out of a community through transportation. We made a giant list of transportation on land, air and water. Lastly we will be talking about the different land-forms that help to shape the land we live on in our community and around our country!

Upcoming Important Dates...

We have A LOT of important dates coming up. Info will come home accordingly closer to each date but I wanted to make you aware of what's coming ahead (so many fun things)!

-Tuesday, January 25th: Half-day of school: Dismissal begins around noon (ish)

-Wednesday, February 2nd: Global Day of Play - more to come soon :-)

-Wednesday, February 9th: Student Count Day (rumored to maybe be a PJ day, no promises yet), Valentine's Day boxes and Valentine's Day cards can start being brought in to school

-Friday, February 11th: Hundreds Day Celebration in 2nd Grade (start to think about your 100s day outfit... I expect to see lots of elderly folks here that day ;-)... Nana Weckstein can't wait to see their outfits)

-Monday, February 14th: Valentine's Day Celebration in 204 (thank you for volunteering to donate all of the ice cream sundae goodies). Feel free to send anything in ahead of time!

-Monday February 21-Friday February 25th - No School - February Break

-Thursday, March 3rd: Second Grade Field Trip - Walled Lake Outdoor Center