Reminders:
The weather is turning! Please send your child with an extra layer and double check that they have an extra set of season/size appropriate clothing.
Please ensure your child has a water bottle at school daily. If you do not have a water bottle, please let us know and we can support your child to get one.
If your child will be absent for any reason, or if your dismissal plans change, please make sure to include Cindy LaWare (claware@cvsdvt.org) and your child’s teacher in your communication.
Writing: We have reached the third, and final, bend in our narrative writing unit. In this bend, second grade authors will focus on increasing independence and devoting careful attention to revision and editing, aiming to make their writing as clear and as powerful as it can be. Second graders are working hard on their author's craft to make their stories come alive!
Reading: Second grade readers have certainly been growing like beanstalks this year! During our reading time we have been looking and listening for the author's purpose. We know author’s write with intentions, so we pay attention! We noticed that authors will often use their stories to teach something to the reader. We looked closely at our reading and worked hard to discover what the author was trying to teach us. We also celebrated the end of our Reading Growth Spurts Unit through sharing what we learned from the stories we’ve been reading and giving examples of the strategies we’ve used to help us read.
Science: Our scientists have been busy the last two weeks! We have been observing the world changing around us as we’ve entered the fall season. We noticed as the weather got colder the leaves on the trees also began to change colors. Second grade scientists wondered, could this be related? Thus we began our investigation: Why do leaves change color in the fall? As scientists, we recorded our ideas using a KWL (Know, Wonder, Learned) chart and went out to observe the changing leaves outside. Through close observation we noticed the different parts of a leaf as well as many different colors. We discovered that leaves create and store energy for the trees to survive. The green color in leaves is a teeny-tiny substance called Chlorophyll. In the fall, trees begin to store energy in their trunk and branches through absorbing the Chlorophyll from the leaves. After the Chlorophyll is stored, the colors that are left behind in the leaves include reds, oranges, yellows, and browns!
SEL/Theme: This week we continued our journey on ‘Skills for Learning’ using our Second Step curriculum with a lesson on using self-talk. Self-talk is talking to yourself in a quiet voice or in your head.
Second graders learned that using self-talk can help them stay focused, stay on task, and ignore distractions. Self-talk can also help students manage their emotions so that they can make better decisions in stressful situations. Self-talk is just one of the skills for learning that we have been practicing this school year. Some of the other skills we’ve been learning and practicing are focusing attention, listening and mindfulness.
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