Dear Moms and Dads,

Vernal, barbecue, flies, dandelions, and MUD are some of the words the children have found so far for the Spring Word Duel. We are busy filling up our fourth poster. Thank you for your help at home with the project. The children are so excited to see how many words we come up with. Stay tuned to hear about the duel with Ms. Hartshorn’s class on Friday from your child!

We have been viewing pictures of some of the creatures that live underground such as centipedes, mites, earthworms, scorpions, moles, and bacteria as we explore soil and its contents to prepare for our trip to Shelburne Farms on May 1^st. I have asked Mrs. Harvey to make a mural with the children tomorrow in studio art to show the different layers of the ground/dirt along with creatures that live below the ground.

Ms. Hartshorn reports the following for an update on math events for second graders: 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."

In first grade, the children have just finished up a unit on measurement. They explored measuring weight with balances, capacity with sand and cubes, and length with cubes, hands, feet, and inches. Currently we are starting a unit on fractions. The lesson began with the question: " Would you rather have a half of a candy bar or a whole of a candy bar?" Most children said a whole. A few said a half because candy is sweet and not good for their teeth or that they really didn’t care for chocolate. When I told them that they were really going to have the whole or the half of the candy bar, their eyes lighted up. Then I proceeded to pull out the candy bars I had. I had two different sized candy bars. I had the miniature candy bars and regular sized Hershey chocolate bars. The ones that said they wanted a whole got the whole miniature candy bar and the ones that said half got half of the larger Hershey’s bar. There certainly was a buzz about the room about this as they discovered that the half piece of the larger candy bar was much larger than the whole miniature candy bar. I emphasized the point of the lesson that a whole can be different sizes. So, size matters! In the end, they all had the same amount of chocolate so they were quite pleased.

We have also been folding paper into halves, thirds, and fourths. We have found that halves can be cut in different ways for some shapes. Identifying fraction notations has been introduced as we manipulate the paper fractions. We have pretended to make sandwiches as well with fraction bars and cut the bread into halves, thirds, and fourths.

I have read two wonderful books that supplement our study of fractions. One book is called Eating Fractions by Bruce McMillan and the other is titled When the Doorbell Rang by Pat Hutchins. You might want to ask your child how they can tell something is cut into halves (two pieces that are the same size).

The standardized testing seemed to go very well. The children seemed to take it very seriously and didn’t get upset if they encountered something they did not know. I think it was a positive experience for them. Thank you for your support at home with early bedtime and breakfast.

Our trip to the Moretown Library to see Mrs. Bentley and some of the new books she has for National Library Week went very well. I’ll add some photos at the end of this letter.

Paint, paint, and more paint! We are making paint papers to prepare for our BIG book-making project. The second graders did this project last year and are sharing the steps and their excitement with the first graders. When this project is finished your child will share a beautiful collage story with you. It will be a keepsake.

Here are some questions to ask your child this week:

How do you feel about the reading test you took?

What kinds of paint papers have you made?(daytime sky, twilight sky, plants, trees, ground, salt paint paper, and Plexiglas paint paper)

Did you like reciting your poem to Mrs. Allison at library time?

Did you get a book from the Moretown Library?(All kids signed one book out. I have a few in the return box in the classroom to take back to this library.)

What are some of the creatures that live underground?

DATES TO REMEMBER:

April 18^th: Fieldtrip permission and $5.00 admission fee due for Shelburne Farms. As always, if this is not possible for you, please let me know.

April 18^th: Parent Survey for our school is due. This can be done online at the following link: To reach the survey, please use the following link:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=egVd173c1EXRBDUKbuReTA_3d_3d