Creating Our Class Rules

A couple weeks into the school year we began talking about what our hopes and dreams might be for the new school year.  Some of us were looking forward to reading more books, others were excited to write poetry and nonfiction books, and many students were excited to perform science experiments.  Some second graders were hoping to make more friends or learn how to share and collaborate with others.  We brainstormed and charted a list, coming back to it every so often to revise our goals for the year.  After about a week, students drew pictures of their own Hope & Dream and wrote a few sentences about it.  We shared our Hopes & Dreams with one another and displayed them on our bookshelf.  We discussed how this will be one of several goals we create throughout the school year, and that we will be revisiting our initial Hope & Dream to see if we've reached our goal and/or if we need to revise it.

Our Hopes & Dreams framed & displayed on our Library shelf.  The other side showcases their writing.

Once we each came up with a Hope & Dream, we began to discuss what class rules we will need to fulfill our goals.  We brainstormed as a class and came up with a long list of rules, ranging from "Do your work" to "Don't hurt other kids' feelings."  After a few days of brainstorming, we went over our list and thought about how to frame our rules in the positive.  "Don't hurt other kids' feelings" became "Be kind to each other."  We noticed that each rule could fit under the following categories: "Self", "Others", and "Environment."  After organizing our rules into each of these categories, we thought of how we could condense the rules under each heading into just one rule (it's easier to remember just a few rather than 20!).  We came up with the following three:  Take care of everyone, Take care of yourself, and Use materials nicely and safely.

Our 3 Class Rules, with student illustrations of what it looks like to be following each of these rules

Since formulating our rules, we've been constantly referring to them, pointing out when we see students following them and also forgetting about and breaking them.  Louise and Caroline find opportunities to model the rules for students and often ask kids to model doing the same.  We take the time to reflect throughout the day as to whether we are following the rules as a class, what we're doing well and what we need to work on.  We continue to remind them that together as a class we've created these rules in order to fulfill our Hopes and Dreams and need to take them seriously.

Please ask your child about our class rules... perhaps he or she can explain them to you and reflect on whether they see students following the rules during the school day.

Happy long weekend:)

How Full is your Bucket?

Yesterday we re-read one of our start of year books, How Full is you Bucket? during our read aloud time. Our focus was to think of ways that we can be bucket-fillers each day. 

For those of you who have not read this book, it is about a little boy, Felix, whose grandfather tells him everyone has invisible buckets. When we are happy our bucket is full. The story takes Felix through a day at school. It starts out rough, people are mean to him, he spills cereal on the floor, his sister knocks over his blocks. His bucket is almost empty. Suddenly, Felix's teacher compliments him for a well written story and his friends clap and celebrate him when he reads it aloud. Felix's bucket starts to fill up. The more nice gestures Felix makes, the more full his bucket becomes, meanwhile he fills the bucket of those he is being kind towards. 

After our read aloud, we wrote a response that answered the question: What are some ways you can fill someone else's bucket? Afterwards we shared our reading responses with one another. The students seemed excited and proud to offer their thoughtful suggestions.

To build onto this sentiment, we created an 'Acts of Kindness' chart that children can add to throughout the day. When a student sees another student being kind to someone, they can write the act of kindness on a post-it note and place it on the chart. As these notes go up we celebrate the kind gestures.

Classifying Objects and Materials

From many conversations with our students, we are hearing that science experiments are high up on their 'excited-about-second-grade' lists! So, last week we had our first glimpse into what it looks like to be a scientist - an introduction to the scientific method. 

Our objective for the lesson was for our scientists to learn about the characteristics of common materials and the vocabulary for describing and comparing materials. Together in our mini-lesson, we came up with descriptive words to describe the objects the teacher showed the class. The initial vocabulary list we came up with included: rough, smooth, hard, soft, round, gooey, wet, wooden, plastic, metal, shiny, dull, fluffy, edges, sides and more. 
Now it was their turn. Eagerly, our students went into their groups where they recorded, using drawings and labels, the characteristics they noticed by looking at and feeling their objects. As the exploring continued we added to our vocabulary list! Caroline and Louise circled from group to group asking the students to explain why they put the object in their chosen category.

This was a fun introduction to what scientist do. We are looking forward to many more explorations!

Sorting objects into categories (rough, smooth, dull or shiny).

Drawing objects from the tray and choosing words from
our vocabulary list to describe it.

Scientists busy at work!

A Message from Stephanie our Music Teacher

Dear Families,

Our second and third grade students are very excited to share a short song to celebrate the start of the school year during this Monday's School Wide Morning Meeting.  Our SWMM on Monday 9/29 starts at 8:50am.  We would love for you to attend!  The 2nd and 3rd graders will be sitting on stage for the entire meeting, so you will not be able to sit with your child during next week's meeting.  We hope to see you there!

Thank you,

Stephanie Nantell

Music Teacher

Writer's Notebooks

Hello families!

We hope you had a nice weekend with your children and got to enjoy the beautiful weather this weekend.

We will be introducing our writer's notebook this week. One of the first things we do is decorate the cover, both front and back. Please help your child find pictures, photos (printed on paper to make it easier to stick on the notebook), magazine art, etc. that reflect what they like to do and/or people, places, interests that are special to them. We will decorate them this week.

When you go through the pictures, magazines, etc. with your child, a suggestion is to discuss the photo, or special memory attached to it. This will help get their creative juices flowing! Inside this notebook will be the beginnings of great ideas and drafts that will develop into wonderful writing pieces!

This is also a perfect way for us to get to know each child a little more. For apprehensive writers, it helps us know what writing topics will spark interests - a great aide in the writing process! 

Enjoy the rest of your Sunday evening. We are looking forward to another great week!

Louise & Caroline

Our first week was a success!

Hello families!

We are happy to announce that we had a very successful first week in second grade! Our first week focused mostly on learning new routines, community building and cultivating new friendships. This is so important to help us create a caring and safe environment for our kids to learn and thrive in. For us it looked like team building activities such as organized group games, learning new songs, movement breaks, empowering students to demonstrate effective ways to perform classroom routines as well as model ways to use shared materials. Here at EVCS, we are implementing the Responsive Classroom First Six Weeks of School. Some pictures below illustrate the new rules and routines the children have been practicing this week. We are sure if you ask your children to describe some of the images, you'll be impressed by how well they can explain them to you! We even received a huge compliment from our District 1 Superintendent, Daniella Phillips on how well our second graders were transitioning from our classroom to the school yard! She happened to be watching close by. Way to go, second grade!

Here are some of the well-loved read aloud books we read and discussed as a class together this week:
First Day Jitters
Will I Have a Friend?
Wemberly Worried
How Full is Your Bucket? 
Dog Days of School

Members of our Second Grade Class

These are our expectations when we are meeting
at the rug area. (We are getting really good
at these! When our classmates take turns speaking,
 we are working to face the speaker and listen carefully.)

When we arrive in the morning, we put our
backpack in the closet, take out our lunchbox
and water bottle and place in the lunch bins,
then put our homework folder in the basket.

Before home time, we pack our folder, lunchbox
 and water bottle in our backpack and
sit on the rug for Closing Circle. 

This chart helps us remember
who our line partners are.

Families, meet 'Timmy Tip Toe'. He comes out to remind us
that we need to be quiet in the hallways so we do not
disturb other classes learning. When we do a good job,
we get a THUMBS UP!

This chart allows us to know where our classmates are
at all times. Whenever we leave the room, we put our
velcro name square beside the specific location card.

We have also been busy creating some artwork. Stay tuned for these beautiful illustrations! Tomorrow is Friday already...what a fun week we've had!

Supply List

Louise and Caroline’s Second Grade Supply List 2014-2015

Please also remember our Sponsor-A-Classroom fund that allows for greater project work, field trips, and demonstrations throughout the school year.

Please put your child’s name on the following, as these are not communal:

• 4 marble covered composition notebooks (no spiral notebooks, please!)
• 1 pocket folder (no file folders, please!) of any color/design your child would like
• 1 reusable water bottle 

Please do not put your child’s name on these supplies, as these are communal:

• 1 package of Elmer’s glue sticks
• 1 package of Crayola crayons
• 1 package of Crayola markers (thin or thick)
• 1 package of Crayola colored pencils
• 3 packages of square Post-it notes
• 1 box facial tissues

Optional (but very helpful to our class!):

• Colored tissue paper
• Expo dry erase markers
• Clorox/Lysol cleaning wipes
• Quart-sized or gallon-sized Ziploc bags
• Paper towels
• Small envelopes

Welcome second grader and family!

Dear Second Grader and Family,

Welcome to second grade!  We are looking forward to a wonderful school year together.   We are thrilled that you will be part of our 2^nd grade community this year!  This year, you will have two teachers – Caroline Bequillard and Louise Thornhill.  In addition, Melissa Gonzalez will be working as a paraprofessional in our classroom. Louise is new this year to EVCS and is excited to meet each of her students. Second grade is her favorite grade to teach! Louise had a wonderful summer so far, spending time at the beach, going for runs in Central Park and even got the opportunity to swim with dolphins in Mexico! Louise moved to New York City six years ago from Ireland, so she is really looking forward to exploring the fun and interesting facts about our city together. Caroline is very excited to be teaching second grade at EVCS for her eighth year of teaching. She spent the summer traveling, reading some great books, going to yoga classes, and riding her bike around New York City.  Caroline is eager to get to know those students she has never taught and to see the familiar faces of students she taught last year in first grade.   

As second graders, we will be exploring the community of New York City, both past and present.  We will study the government in our city, discover the role of citizens in the democratic process, and expand our thinking about the needs of a community.  We will also extend your work from first grade in math, continuing to explore addition and subtraction as well as measurement and data collection.  In science we will learn about plants; sand, soil and silt (the materials that make the Earth); and balance and motion.  Together, we’ll read lots of great books, do plenty of writing, get our hands messy, and explore through field trips, projects, drama, and teamwork.  It will be an incredible year together!

Parents, as your child grows, your role continues to be critical in your child’s learning.  We look forward to getting to know each of you as we work together to make this year a success.  At EVCS, we ask one or two parents from each class to take on the role of Class Parent.  Class Parents help communicate important messages and announcements, help with projects and field trips, and assist in the fundraising for trips and materials.  Please let us know if you are interested in being a Class Parent.  Much of our exciting work depends on having extra hands and resources in the classroom.

Please review the attached supply list.  Please note, that for many items on the list, we pool the classroom supplies – for example, all of the crayons go into a bin to be shared.  It helps to have uniform supplies (i.e. suggested sizes and brands), so that children will not feel attached to items you contribute to the class.  And just as a reminder, the first day of school is Thursday, September 4^th. The school day will begin at 8:30 and end at 2:50.  Pick up and drop-off will be in the school yard, unless it is raining. If you have any questions, please feel free to email us at CarolineAndLouise.EVCS@gmail.com.  Check in at our class blog often throughout the summer and school year too; it’s located at http://2ndgradeevcs.blogspot.com and will be full of great updates throughout the year.

Until then, we wish you a relaxing and enjoyable summer!  See you soon!

Sincerely,

Louise and Caroline