Grade 2 with Mrs. Burstein at SES: March 2014

Sunday, March 23, 2014

I CAN . . . critique the reasoning of others.

One of the Standards of Mathematical Practice that we are focusing on in Second Grade is:

I can critique the reasoning of others.

For second graders, this means that students can explain their own mathematical thinking and can ask questions about a classmate's mathematical thinking. For example, if Aleks tells Chris that he used regrouping to determine that 34+5=39, then Chris might ask, "Can you show me how you used regrouping?" Aleks would then expalin his work to Chris and hopefully discover that while he did find the correct sum, he did not actually use regrouping to reach his answer.

On Friday, we practiced this strategy of "critiquing the reasoning of others" by working in small groups on a single story problem.

Each student independently solve the problem, then shared his or her work with groupmates. After discussing their work, the group chose one or two of the best examples for the 3 components of the story problem:

Show your work
Check your work
Explain your work

Here are some photos that highlight this excellent collaboration:

Wednesday, March 19, 2014

Happy Birthday to Kaisaic!

Wow! Another March birthday! We are getting lots of singing practice with Happy Birthday!

Kaisac is our latest birthday kid.

Check him out:

Sunday, March 16, 2014

Non-Fiction Projects

On Friday, each of our collaborative groups presented their Non-Fiction Projects to the class. We enjoyed:

an Informational Text: Animals of Nature by Evan, Iris, Julia, Theo
a Poster and Poem: Hibernation by Aleks, Chris, Cole and Tyler
a Poster and Glossary: Tarantulas by Hunter, Kasiac, Kateri and Wyatt
an Informational Text: Deep in the Ocean by River, Samara and Sarafina.

These projects were rich with information and featured plenty of meaningful text features such as Text Boxes, Captions, Diagrams, Labels, Bold Print and Glossaries. Second graders have developed a solid understanding of how to read Non-Fiction, how to study Non-Fiction and how to create Non-Fiction. Wow!

Animals of Nature

Hibernation

Tarantulas

Deep in the Ocean

Good-Bye to our good friend, Evan.

On Friday, we said good-bye to our good friend, Evan. Evan and his family are moving to California and Evan will begin his first day at his new school on Monday, the 17th. Each 2B classmate created a colorful picture and a thoughtful letter for Evan that we compiled into a Good-Bye Book. We all shared our favorite 2B memories with Evan and we've made plans to stay in touch via blogging and Skype. In Evan's honor, we worked especially hard on a fabulous Number of the Day web at our Math Meeting on Friday. Check this out:

The Number of the Day was 117.

Evan at Morning Meeting on Friday.

Happy Birthday to Cole!

Another second grader celebrated a March birthday this week! On Thursday, we all sang "Happy Birthday" to Cole. You'll see that he's holding up 8 fingers to let us know how old he is now.

Wednesday, March 12, 2014

Happy Birthday, Dr. Seuss!

On Friday, March 7, we celebrated Dr. Seuss's Birthday with lots of engaging projects. We enjoyed a wonderful read-aloud of Green Eggs and Ham by an Amherst College student named Jimmy. We were also busy in the library with all kinds of Seuss fun. Check out these photos:

I CAN use non-fiction to teach

Second graders have been very busy collaborating on research projects during Reading Workshop. In small groups, they are researching topics, consulting non-fiction texts, and creating a teaching tool to present to their classmates. Some groups are developing posters while others are writing books. Whatever the format, these teaching tools are loaded with non-fiction text features including:

Headings
Captions
Diagrams
Text boxes
Table of Contents
Glossary
Charts

Each group is carefully monitoring its progress using a Readers' Checklist. This checklist guides the children to distribute tasks equally, to include "expert words" in their project, to use plenty of non-fiction text features and to pay careful attention to overall organization and mechanics.

Here is the checklist belonging to Chris, Cole, Aleks and Tyler. They are working on a poster about hibernation.

Julia, Theo, Evan and Iris are writing an Informational Text: Animals of Nature.

Wyatt, Hunter, Kaisac and Kateri are creating a poster about Tarantulas.

Samara, Sarafina and River are working on an Informational Text about ocean animals.

Monday, March 3, 2014

Happy Birthday to Sarafina!

We were especially lucky to celebrate two special events today: Wonka Day and Sarafina's birthday! Happy Birthday, Sarafina! (Also known as Verucca Salt!)

Wild, Wacky and Wonderful Wonka Day!

What a blast we had celebrating Wonka Day today! Our classroom was filled with the most adorable gathering of Charlie Buckets, Violet Beauregards, Verucca Salts, Willy Wonkas, Oompa Loompas, Mike Teavee, a Wonka Bar and a Chocolate River. While we were simply enjoying taking on our new roles as characters in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, we were also engaged in some great learning as well! We collected and graphed data from the Chocolate River, wrote Charlie and the Chocolate Factory Story Problems, solved a Wonka crossword puzzle, created character riddles and went on a fabulous scavenger hunt for a Golden Ticket.

Here we are in action: