100 + Days of Second Grade – Part 1

I want to share with you all the wonderful things we have been experiencing together in our first one hundred days of second grade.  We ended October with our Halloween Party and school-wide Halloween Parade. Unfortunately it was so busy, I didn’t get any photos of the students in their Halloween costumes but here is a photo of the watching a Halloween DVD waiting for dismissal after the parade.

Zero the Hero even got into the Halloween spirit by bringing clementines with “Jack-o-lantern” faces as a reward for solving his math challenge.

On November 9th, we finally got to go on our field trip to the Boston Museum of Science.

We arrived just in time to see the live animal show.

The live animal wasn’t just any snake. It was a python!

After the show, we were able to go to the stage and touch real snake skin.

We got to see and learn about  dinosaurs and lots of other interesting things!

Mrs. Riordan and C8 students in front of a giant T-Rex model.

State Rep. Garry was one of our chaperones. Here she and some of the students standing in front of an actual stegosaur fossil.

Davian and Jacob explore electricity!

Some of our C8 girls learning that a seesaw is more than just playground fun…learning about force, motion and simple machines.

Investigating a model of a one room schoolhouse.

C8 students learn about heat and energy.

The students had fun climbing inside this model of the waterways and found a statue of a river otter!

Thank you to all our chaperones!

The students got to be paleontologists themselves back in the classroom. They were given dirt from a dig site, magnifying glasses and identification charts to help them find fossils.

Quinton using the chart to identify the fossil he found.

Jayden identifies his fossil as Gabriella looks on.

Here are some more photos of students searching for fossils. Thank you to Ms. Allore and Mr. Santee for supervising our paleontologists during this hands-on science exploration.

Boston Museum of Science Field Trip

After a long bus ride, we arrived just in time to attend a live animal show about how some animals mimic other animals. The live animals were a snake and an owl. Some of the students stayed after the show to see them up close and to ask questions.

Learning about how these two snakes look alike but are very different.

Another example of animal mimicry.

Then we went to the dinosaur exhibit and took some group photos!

Our class in front of an actual triceratops from Hell Creek, Montana. This is the same place that Mrs. Riordan, Mrs. Porcello and Mrs. Cooke went to DIG School to learn about paleontology and to dig for fossils.

How many students’ hands can fit in a T-Rex footprint?

Our class beneath the T-Rex!

Looking up at Mrs. Riordan taking the photo from above!

After breaking for lunch, we got to explore the museum to see many other exciting exhibits.

Maria balancing weights!

Checking out some info on this screen!

Learning the science of centrifugal force and having fun!

Swinging on the moon!

This playground gets the whole body involved while they are learning about science!

Science is AMAZING!

Arianna enjoying this hands on experience!

Miranda enjoyed balancing the weights too!

Thank you to Mrs. Anello, Mrs. Brandvold, Mrs. Cowan, Mrs. Horvath and Ms. Silva for being fantastic chaperones on this field trip! Special thanks to Mrs. Brandvold for taking many of these wonderful photos.

 

Important Information and Reminders!

This note was sent home today but in case it didn’t make it home, I am posting the information here as well.

Due to the recent school closures from the storm, the second grade team has decided to make the following changes :

The Unit 4 Fundations packet will be due on Thursday, November 9, 2017.

We are sending home the spelling words today but the spelling test on these words will also be on Thursday, November 9, 2017.

We would also like to remind you that the Halloween Party and Parade will now be held tomorrow, November 2, 2017.  If you signed up to send in treats for the Halloween Party, please send them in tomorrow.

Finishing up October in C-8

We wrapped up our dinosaur and fossil unit by writing nonfiction informational reports about a specific dinosaur. In order to do this, the students were paired up and assigned a dinosaur. They had to work together to research in our numerous dinosaur resources about their dinosaur and put this information on a graphic organizer. Then they had to work individually to write their rough draft. They met with Mrs. Riordan to edit and then they copied their final report. Finally they illustrated their reports. It was a challenging project for them but they worked certainly hard.IMG_2966 IMG_2965 IMG_2964 IMG_2960 IMG_2959 IMG_2958

But October wasn’t all work and no fun. We had a special visit from Ronald McDonald as part of our Community of Caring program.  

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Ronald taught the children important life lessons!

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Happy Halloween from C-8!

Finally, we finished October with Halloween. Our school was decorated like the movie the Wizard of Oz and our Principal, Ms. Smith along with most of the staff dressed up as the characters from the movie. It was an exciting day!

Two Special Visitors to Brookside!

This week has been an exciting week to be a second grader at Brookside! On Tuesday, October 7th, we had an in-school presentation by the Fossil Lady. She does an amazing presentation and she had the entire second grade spellbound!

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We’re wearing our pith helmets and we’re all ready to be junior paleontologists.

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She brought a giant book that taught the children about paleontology, dinosaurs, and fossils.

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She also brought “Oreo” a prehistoric mammal

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She chose Mary to hold a “dinosaur egg”.

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Then Mary got to put the egg in the nest in the book. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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I don’t which the children enjoyed more….Oreo or…….

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touching the coprolite….and finding out that it was dinosaur POOP!

Then the children got to go explore and examine three tables worth of fossils that the fossil lady brought with her.

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We loved our visit with the Fossil Lady!

Then on Thursday, October 9th, the entire school was very lucky to participate in a whole school assembly with Danielle Niles. Danielle Niles is the morning meteorologist for Channel 4 in Boston. She showed the students a video, taught them all kinds of things about meteorology and her job on television, and answered their questions. In the end, she videotaped the entire school sending out a message that will be broadcast on Friday morning.

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Danielle Niles explaining the water cycle and precipitation.

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She demonstrated how to make a tornado in a bottle and taught them about weather safety.

Thank you to the Brookside PTO for helping to make both of these enriching presentations possible!

 

 

Measuring a Brachiosaurus at Brookside! Part 2

Finally our Brachiosaurus was completely colored in and we decided to find out how our dinosaur compared to second graders!

DSC_0749We found out that our dinosaur was over 10 second graders tall!

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Then we measured how wide the brachiosaurus was and we discovered that it was more that 15 second graders long!

But we weren’t finished yet! We finished by finding out how many second graders it took to outline the entire perimeter of the dinosaur.

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It took a while to get our second graders in place around the perimeter.

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We started placing students around the front of the brachiosaurus.

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As you can see, we almost ran out of second graders!

DSC_0769 DSC_0770One  last look at our dinosaur friend before he became extinct with Saturday’s rain! In the end, it was a really enjoyable way to spend a beautiful autumn day learning together as an entire grade.

 

 

Thank you again to all the volunteers for making this hands-on learning project a reality. We couldn’t do it it without you!!

Measuring a Brachiosaurus at Brookside! Part 1

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Here is a photo of the grid used to create our Brachiosaurus.

It all started with a plan that the Brookside second grade teachers had to show the students just how ENORMOUS a dinosaur actually was.

Then our wonderful parent volunteers cheerfully helped mark out the grid lines on the parking lot and then drew the outline of the dinosaur.

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Many hands needed to create a dinosaur!

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We need lots of straight lines first.

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Thank you to all our wonderful volunteers, especially our C8 mothers, Mrs. Joyce, Mrs. Sirois and Mrs. Ware!

Then it was time to start coloring in the brachiosaurus with colored chalk. It sure takes a lot of second graders to color a huge dinosaur!

DSC_0746Here are some photos of the C8 students working side by side on a beautiful autumn day.

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Where In the World Are We?, Dinosaurs and Fossils, Doubles Game, and One Awesome Mathematician!

Before we get to the photos, I would like to first try to clear up some confusion about the Fundations packet that still exists. Last week, the students should have just completed Tuesday’s 4 dictated words, Wednesday’s 5 dictated words and Thursday’s sentence on the Week 1 writing grid that is in the back of the packet. If your child did not do them last week, please catch up on them this week. The Week 1 words and sentence are located on the back of the parent letter page on the front of the packet. This week, the children will be doing the Week 2 words and sentence on Tuesday through Thursday. The children should write them on the Week 2 writing grid.

The students were told not to do the remaining worksheets last week because they had not had the in-class lessons they needed to properly understand and complete these worksheets yet. They have now learned about marking the digraphs and open and closed syllables. Tonight’s homework is to complete page 8. Tomorrow, they will be asked to complete page 9 in addition to the 4 dictated words. Wednesday, they will complete page 10 in addition to the 5 dictated words. If your child started these worksheets last week, please have your child go over them and fix any mistakes. The entire completed packet should be ready to pass in on Friday morning.

I hope our C-8 families have a better understanding about the expectations for the at-home packet. Now for some fun photos!

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Where in the world are we? Sharing our flipbooks!

The C-8 students completed a Social Studies unit about communities recently.  After reading the book, Me on the Map, we created flipbooks that started with our school, Brookside, and went from its street to Dracut, to Massachusetts, to the United States of America, to North America and finally to our planet Earth. Hopefully this hands-on activity helped the children to have a better concept of their place in the world.

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Here’s a closeup of one of our flipbooks.

After finishing our Social Studies unit, we moved into our Science unit on . . . DINOSAURS and FOSSILS!

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Our friendly dinosaur!!

 

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We are enjoying learning so much about these interesting extinct creatures by reading these fiction books and non-fiction books.

Check out our new doubles math game!

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We are learning our doubles math facts with this doubles math game. The students pair up and chant the doubles while holding up fingers representing the partners.

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When they reach 5+5, they “high five” and when they finish with 10 +10, they do a “high ten!” Lots of smiles and giggles disguised the fact that they were learning their facts!

Speaking of math facts, I am proud to announce that we have our first student to complete the Addition level of  Xtramath. This means that he was able to complete each of his 100 addition facts in under 3 seconds! He also managed to do this in just 14 days of practice. I think this is a new record! Congratulations Nicholas! I hope he is the first of many C-8 students this year!

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Nicholas, Addition Mathematician Extraordinaire!!

P.S. In case you didn’t know, clicking on the photo makes it larger! Hope you enjoyed the photos!

Second Grade Creates a Dinosaur…or Two!

It was a beautiful autumn day for our second grade to go outside to the parking lot to bring two huge dinosaurs to life. It started with parent volunteers and teachers working together to draw the giant grid on the parking lot. Then the parents drew life-size outlines of a Brachiosaurus and a Tyrannosaurus Rex. After lunch, all the second grades went outside and worked hard to bring the outlines to life by coloring in the enormous prehistoric creatures with colored chalk.

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The second graders worked hard to color in the dinosaurs.

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Coloring the tail of the Brachiosaurus.

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Coloring a dinosaur can be HARD WORK!

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Wow…this is taking a long time.

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Still coloring!

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First the students looked at the Brachiosaurus and learned that it was the size of a FOUR STORY building!

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The students sat around the perimeter of the Brachiosaurus.

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OH NO!! The Tyrannosaurus Rex is eating one of the second graders!!

After the coloring was done, they proudly examined their work and realized just how large the dinosaurs were. This hands-on collaborative activity is a powerful way for the students to truly comprehend the enormous size of the prehistoric creatures that they have been studying.

Thank you to all the parent volunteers who helped make this activity so successful. Additional thanks to the teachers who parked in other locations so we would have the large area to make our dinosaur grid.