Something New & Engaging Everyday!
Week #35 May 20-24, 2019

What a week of special events!  We enjoyed fun, interesting work together each day this week.  This is a long entry with many photos to showcase our experiences.

On Monday, Hanna from The Flynn Theater visited each 2nd grade classroom to explore movement in a program called "Words Come Alive".  Using a familiar text, The Tiny Seed, we spent an hour learning and practicing various exercises to represent this story.  This culminated in us acting out the story collaboratively.

Thank you to Eric von Wettberg who visited on Tuesday to share his expertise related to our plant unit.  He worked with all 60 2nd graders at once--wow!  We learned about:  the importance and beauty of plants, how plants get what they need from the environment, and how amazing, nutritious and common legumes are--yum!

 Wednesday brought us our final Hands-on-Nature session of the year with Anna Clark, Erin Sutherland and Victoria Zaluski.  We learned about rotting logs as their own habitat including the insects that live there, and the time and weather needed to create them.  We worked in groups to explore rotting logs to find organisms and also enjoyed a puppet show.  Thank you to our Hands-on-Nature Moms for bringing us 4 wonderful sessions this year!

 We had a fantastic trip on Thursday to the UVM Horticulture Farm to see pollination in action!  We worked with the expertise of UVM scientists, professors, researchers and graduate students to learn about flower and pollinator specialization.  Thank you to Dr. Alison Brody and her team for hosting this free field experience for all of 2nd grade!

We conducted our own inquiry in the classroom.  Using models of different types of bird beaks, we tested which beak types would be the best pollinators, food collectors and seed spreaders.  We worked in partners to predict, collect and analyze our data.

Please send in your clean, white (or very light colored t-shirt) by Wednesday, May 29.  We will use this on Friday, May 31 with our butterfly expert from the Vermont Entomological Society.

Next week is SPIRIT WEEK at RMCS.
Tuesday:  Sports Day
Wednesday:  Neon Day
Thursday:  Throwback Thursday
Friday:  Comfy Clothes Day

Other things to ask your child about this week:
*Talent shares about drawing
*Writing and solving math problems
*Guidance lesson about gender with Mrs. Wheeler and Mrs. Rice
*FHTMS Jazz Band assembly
*Our final week of word study groups

Enjoy the holiday weekend!
Mrs. Hock

Pizza and Pollinators!
Week #34 May 13-17, 2019

Thank you to everyone who enriched our learning this week.  Peers, family, friends and community members all shared their talents to support our work.  It made this a fabulous week with all of our engaging experiences.

My son, Eddie, and Folino's started our week on Monday.  We learned about The 52 Kids Foundation, math used at restaurants, and enjoyed wood-fired pizza.  Eddie volunteered for 3 weeks with The 52 Kids Foundation in Uganda, and since Folino's sponsors this organization, he shared his experience to give us some context.  
At Folino's we solved math problems related to ingredients, purchasing/production/cost, seating, cooking time, oven temperature and consumption.

Jen, the bee keeper spoke to all of 2nd grade this week about her work to help the honey bee collapse.  She explained about the different types of honey bees and their role in the hive as social animals.  We learned amazing bits of information about their physical features and their important role as pollinators.  We enjoyed a sample of her own honey, and she also gave us each a package of seeds to grow flowers to attract honey bees.

Information about next week's field trip to the UVM Horticultural Farm Thursday, May 23.

• We will be outside 10:00-12:00; please dress accordingly.
• We will be served snack options.  Please let me know if you do not want your child to eat any of the 3 options.  The 3 options are:  Nabisco Honey Grahams, Fig Newtons and apples from Champlain Orchard.
• We will return to RMCS in time to eat lunch at school.

Other things to ask your child about this week:
*measuring the heights of Kindergarten and 3rd grade peers
*seed dispersal by wind, water, animal and propulsion
*pole bean germination
*writing paragraphs
*Talent Shares:  baking, baseball, soccer and geodes

Have a wonderful weekend!
Mrs. Hock

Enjoying Each Other and Our Work
Week #33 May 6-10, 2019

We are a talented bunch!  We enjoyed our first week of Talent Share for this month.  We saw demonstrations and learned beginning steps for how to: play the ukulele, Irish dance, play safely in hockey, speak and read Hebrew and write fantasy stories.  The talented presenters this week were confident and clear, and their peers were great students and supporters of their work!

We continue to enjoy our plant unit.  We simulated pollination by acting out the role of pollinators and flowers in this amazing process.  Your child can explain the model and we had amazing discoveries related to how difficult it is to be a flower and produce a seed, as well as being a bee gathering enough nectar to make honey.  See pictures below for this activity that we were able to conduct outside.

We enjoyed a week of problem solving.  Yes, it's true.  We all engaged in a variety of multi-step tasks operating with 3-digit numbers or with money.  Students focused in particular on communicating their thinking and using accurate symbolic notation to represent their strategies.

I enjoy my job immensely.  Thank you for your support and for all the kind words you shared during Teacher Appreciation Week.  Friday's PTO sponsored lunch was a lovely treat at the end of the week before our in-service meetings.  I appreciate your children, working with each of you, and having this amazing opportunity to teach. 

Other things to ask your child about this week:
*Pole bean observations
*Writing paragraphs about our plants and art in the hallway
*Mystery Doug
*Designing a plate of food thanks to pollinators

I wish you a wonderful weekend, and a Mother's Day full of fun and relaxation!
Mrs. Hock

A Growing Place
Week #32 April 29-May 3, 2019

A lot of growing is happening in 2nd grade--from our plants to our knowledge of 3 digit numbers!

Check out the pictures below to see images of our flowering plants in our grow lab from this first week in May.  We are very excited to see the changes in these plants and look forward to welcoming pollinators and supporting their revival in our community.

We dissected astromeria flowers as part of our unit to build the pollinator garden.  After learning about the parts of the flower, each student carefully dissected their own flower, glued & labeled the parts in their science notebooks, and described the process of pollination.  We sound like quite the experts using the terms petal, sepal, pistil, stamen, pollen, and ovary!

To learn more specifically about germination, we designed an investigation using pole beans to consider what seed/plants need.  Ask your child about L.A.W.N.S.  We are trying to control the light, water, air and space for our investigation.

For math, we spent the week solidifying our knowledge of 3-digit numbers before completing an assessment to show our growth with these skills and concepts.  Our focus for the next few weeks will be on strategies for adding and subtracting multi-digit numbers.

Other things to ask your child about this week:
*PE Dance Assembly
*Subjects, predicates, pronouns, compound sentences and punctuation
*Final guidance lesson for the year and saying good-bye to Ms. Bedell
*Practice writing summaries of stories
*Board game time

Have a wonderful week!
Thank you for all you do,
Mrs. Hock