Ms. Hartshorn’s Classroom News
April 10, 2008
Dear Families,
"This is an enjoyable group with whom to work. Everyone did well with no major melt-downs." This was a quote on the sub plans left by your child’s substitute teacher, the one and only Mr. Alligator. I was away at an education conference on Monday and Tuesday with Mrs. Orr. We both came back with some amazing ideas and materials to use with your children. We even got to meet Jane Yolen, author of Owl Moon. She and her daughter Heidi Stemple teamed up for a keynote presentation one morning. Your children seemed to all enjoy Mr. Alligator very much. I am happy to be back with your children this week, and eager to delve into some new ideas I brought back.
In reading, several children are working with non-fiction text. They are reading to compare and contrast while they use monitoring and clarifying strategies. We’re calling these strategies, "Fix-up" strategies. They include, rereading a portion of the text, and stopping to ask questions such as, "What do I know now that I’ve read this paragraph?" "What don’t I understand?" "Was there a word or phrase that was confusing to me?" Other Fix-Up strategies include continuing to read on to see if the meaning of a word becomes clearer, looking at the pictures for clues, etc. All of these strategies are used by readers when an unknown word shows up, or something doesn’t seem to make sense to the reader. Many children without these strategies will continue to read on, thinking they understand, and avoid taking the time to analyze or take stock of what the text is teaching. As children move on through school, reading becomes more centered around non-fiction, especially in science and social studies, so these type of self-monitoring strategies are essential for further reading comprehension development.
In the second grade math group, we’ve been working with multiplication by building arrays. We’ve learned that an array is actually a rectangle and some rectangles are special ones called squares. Learning that 6 x 6 actually builds a square so 6 "squared" is 6X6 and creates a square with an area of 36 has been quite fun to prove and show with other numbers. We’ve also done quite a bit of work with fractions and division using several games, paper folding and question-posing to help develop concept understanding, which is different from always expecting the "right" number answer to be determined. We’ve talked about when a half is really a half, and not just one piece of something. We’ve looked at how two ¼’s equals a ½ , and we’ve played several games that have helped us begin to see that division and fractions are the same, and that division and multiplication have a relationship of being opposite operations. We’ve also taken the time to look at some very large numbers---in the millions using some number cards that are designed to help show "expanded" notation. One particular lesson involved talking about "standard" notation of numbers and "expanded" notation, so 132 is the standard form, and 100+30+2 is the expanded notation. I began with an example that if I ate 17 banana splits one afternoon, I would need to "EXPAND" my pants because my body would have spread out, BUT I would still be Ms. H. Using the colored number cards I was able to expand the number 132 = 100+30+2. Both ways represent the same number...the same quantity. Likewise, I had to explain that putting the number back into standard form would be like me having to run on the treadmill to get my body back to it’s standard, original, smaller form. One girl left math class that day exclaiming, "I tried not to think of you in a bikini after eating the 17 banana splits. I’m trying to get that out of my head."
Our Learning Buddies helped us build wheels with axles that could be powered with the tension of wound rubber bands. Oh what fun!
More ramp and roller coaster building with some new ideas and techniques:
Reminder: The playground is still very muddy and quite wet, so we are asking all children to wear their snowpants or mud pants AND boots for recess and the time outside at the end of the day. Children who don’t have both of these will be asked to stand on the concrete area by the doorway or play inside the playhouse. The playground is so wet and muddy that without these precautions your child would be soaked and soiled thoroughly, making the rest of the afternoon in school quite uncomfortable.
Marian Moore, a dental hygienist visited our classroom last Friday and provided a dental care lesson. She checked each child’s mouth at a private, individual time if your child was in school that day. If she found a problem, she sent home a note and emailed you. She is a wonderful resource if you need help finding a dentist, or are having a difficult time paying for one. She can be reached through our school nurse, Karyn Kaminski, and would love to help anyone who needs assistance in providing dental care for their children.
Dates to Remember:
April 14th and 15th: Gates McGinitie Test beginning at 8:15. Please make sure your child has a good breakfast and plenty of rest. You also might re-emphasize that all we want him/her to do is try his/her best and that there may be things on the test he/she doesn’t know and that is okay.
April 14th: We will walk over to the Moretown Library for National Library Week activities with Mrs. Bentley in the afternoon.
April 14th: School Assembly at 2:15
April 21st-April 25th: School Vacation
May 1st: Four Winds Lesson: Plant and Animal Defenses—We will probably be going outside, so please send your child to school with appropriate outdoor wear, INCLUDING comfortable shoes for walking in the woods and fields.
May 7th: I will be giving all my second graders the Vermont Developmental Reading Assessment. You’ll receive more information about this assessment in the future.
May 15th: Spring concert with Mr. Close
I hope you are able to enjoy what seems to finally be spring in the hills of Vermont.
Be well~
Brenda