Sept. 28

Last week certainly went by quickly! In fact, last MONTH went by quickly. Here we are about to step into October already.

This week's Language Arts will center around the story "Mrs. Brown Went to Town", and we'll be practicing the phonics skills using CVCe. This means consonant-vowel-consonant-final e. Words like this will be words such as NAME, LIKE, etc. We have enjoyed the funny stories in this theme!

In Religion this week we have two special days: October 1 is the Feast of St. Therese of the Child Jesus, and October 2 is the Feast of Guardian Angels. Many laypeople probably don't take notice of these days unless they are a Holy Day, but I like to include them for my kids. We'll also be starting to learn about the Rosary. October is the Month of the Rosary. I found out that most of my kids didn't know the Hail Mary, so this will be a good thing to learn.

I now have four people who've sent in their donations for the soldiers. Thank you! I especially liked seeing the hunting and fishing magazines. I hadn't thought of those. I added some items on the easel in the North Entrance, but I'll add them here, too.

• POWDERED DRINK MIXES (single serving ones) like Crystal Light
• COMBOS AND OTHER PRETZEL, CRACKER TYPE GOODIES
• MICROWAVE POPCORN
• EASY MAC ( a favorite for some!)
• PADS OF PAPER
• PENS AND PENCILS

These are all pretty inexpensive items, so I hope we get more donations. They'd also be easy to ship. I sent two packages of my own using the flat rate boxes from the post office. Postage is around $11.oo or $12. oo for each these boxes which can hold up to 20 pounds.

You might want to ask at work if your co-workers would like to be included. One parent said her fellow employees wanted to do this and are collecting from them. I thought that was a great idea!

Mr. Bell came into our room on Wednesday to help the kids get started on writing. He showed them how to plan for a beginning, middle, and end of stories by using drawings on their planning sheets. He was going to come in on Friday but we had too many kids absent so I asked him to come back on Wednesday. It's great that he's willing to do this, isn't it? :-) This week we will begin planning for our October books.

Have a great week!

September 19

I just wanted to update you on today. First grade shared the Safe and Sacred video with us. It was very well done. The video was cartoon characters and had rhyming verses in it. It was divided into sections: 1. My Body Belongs to Me 2. Good Adults-Bad Adults 3. Good touches- Bad Touches 4. What Can I Do? 5. Who Can Help Me? 6. Let's Talk About It.

Basically it helped kids to know that they shouldn't talk to strangers, shouldn't get in a car with strangers, don't let a stranger know if you are alone at home whether it is someone on the phone or at the door ( I doubt anyone here would allow a 2nd grader to stay home alone!) and they have a right to say no to anyone who touches them in a way that makes them feel uncomfortable, sad, mad, or scared. Then they are to TELL a trusted adult. The kids were given good information about who they could go to - parents, grandparents, aunt, uncle, older siblings, teachers, priest, minister, doctor, etc. It also pointed out that kids need to memorize their home phone ( with area code), as well as their address, parents' work phone numbers, and the town's emergency number. I believe it's very much like the information we as parents, grandparents, & teachers have already taught our children. It's just a good reminder.



Next week we will be reading the story "Julius" so look for the spelling list under that story in the student handbook. This theme is Silly Stories, and we've already had some chuckles about the stories we've read so far!

We'll be continuing our subtraction in Math, and we'll have a test on Chapter 2 on Friday if we get everything done up until then. Some days we just don't get as much done as we'd planned.



Today the kids drew and colored on paper that we'll wrap boxes in to collect our donations towards the Support Our Soldiers project. We hope to be able to put some out for others to donate to this project. By the way, if anyone wants to help with postage, we'd like that too. Thanks for the donations we have received so far! I plan on getting a box of my own ready this weekend - including homemade cookies which my nephew said the guys would really like!



If there is anything in particular you'd like me to include in these posts, just let me know.



Have a good weekend!

Addition to Sept. 18th post

There are two things I forgot to mention on the first post.

Several children are finishing their breakfasts and then say they are still hungry at milk break time. If your child is one of these, please send a snack in for your child. I do ask that you NOT send in sweet snacks such as fruit roll-ups, gummy snacks, breakfast/snack bars as many of these are just full of sugar if you read the ingredients. You may want to send fresh fruits and vegetables, maybe whole grain crackers, low-fat string cheese, etc. Please do not send soft drinks or tea.

Please feel free to start sending in items for our "Support Our Troops" service project. I have one donation so far. We can collect all year, but I'd like to get at least one package going if possible. If you have any relatives or friends who'd like to donate, we'd certainly welcome that also!

September 18

I have a reminder for you. Some of the students have still not handed in the Parent/Student Handbook sheet and the Safe and Sacred Sheets. Please send them in SOON so the office has those. Thanks!



We had our first Chapter Test in Math yesterday. It was basic addition, and everyone did well. One of the things I've mentioned to the kids today is that they need to CHECK their work BEFORE they hand it in. As you will see on some of the tests and other work, kids sometimes skip an answer.



There will be a Spelling Test tomorrow. The words in the Student Handbook that I gave you are the ones for the Reading-Writing Workshop. These are a little confusing because the company intended for the lists to be torn out, so they go from RIGHT to LEFT in the handbook. (Last week's words were from Dragon Gets By.)



Tomorrow we will see a video on the Safe and Sacred material. We will view this with the first grade as the video is in high demand and needs to be returned. When we get videos through the Diocesan Media Center, they are approved by the diocese so you won't need to worry that it isn't age-appropriate. If you have any questions, please feel free to contact me.



In Social Studies we learned what a community is, a citizen, rules, and responsibilities. They had good answers to the questions.



Thank you to Mrs. Rueckert for reading two books to my class this morning! The kids were very interested and quiet! She read two books about "Jesus", and the kids asked for more books about Jesus. Hooray!



Have a good evening!

September 15

We had another busy day, but it was a beautiful day! We're going to enjoy these nice days while we can!

This week we are working on Reading-Writing Workshop. We will use the 5 steps of the Writing Process. These steps are: Prewriting, First or Rough Draft(sloppy copy), Revising, Proofreading ( or editing), and finally, publishing. This writing is to write a story. We will go through each step of the process. We will be using this process when we write. Since it is already the middle of September, I think we'll write a short story. Next, we will begin working on our October books. Each day we will be writing - most days it will be in a journal.



Just to clear things up for you when work comes home: I let the kids know if they should put papers in the Keep at Home or Return to School pockets of their homework folder. When it comes to the Reading/English/Spelling sheets, I have them all stapled together. If some of the sheets are blank, there should be a note on the page such as Did Together, Did Orally, or Skip as we may just not have time to do all of these or these may not be items that will be on the tests at the end of the themes.

I am needing to use the yellow discipline slips less often. Hooray! That's our goal! I am going to be using Positive Behavior cards in addition to the Caught being good, etc. For these cards, I will punch them and when the card is full they'll get a treat/award. Hopefully, the kids will work at getting the positive awards and not the yellow slips! :-)

Thank you to the Rasmussens for cutting our carpet squares for our lockers. Thanks to Brad Lundmark for donating the carpet mats. Thanks to Mrs. Rueckert for agreeing to be our Room Parent, volunteering to read to the kids, and for offering to do the book orders.

Here is our second grade liturgy schedule for this year:
October 22
January 14
March 11
May 13.
There will also be the All-School Sunday liturgies. There will be the usual 4 P.M. Christmas Eve liturgy, the Catholic Schools' Week Sunday liturgy on Feb. 1st, and April 26 at 11:00.
This year we will have the opportunity to attend Mass with the Bishop in Superior. This will be Jan. 21st ( pray for good weather!)

If anyone would be interested in coming in to do an Art project anytime this year, feel free to let me know. We'd welcome it!

Have a good evening!

SEPTEMBER 9TH

First of all, I'd like to thank the parents who took the time to come to Parent Night last night! It shows how important your children are to you, and I appreciate it - especially since the Packer-Viking game was on earlier than planned.

This week we are focusing on the short a and short i sounds in words. Your child should have taken home their story "Len and Linda's Picnic" which they are to read to you, but it does not have to come back to school. The high-frequency words this week are: kitchen, bought, front, kitchen, roll, and until.

Today we worked on order and zero properties in Math. We also counted on by finding the larger number and then counting on from it to add numbers. This is like 9 + 2. Nine is the larger number, and then we count on two to get 11.

We also did some map work in Social Studies. We learned there are 7 continents, 4 oceans, that the colors on a map stand for certain types of land, and blue is for water.

In Religion, we talked about God's gifts of creation. Students are to choose one photo from the book and write two sentences telling how people use these gifts. This is the first time they've written in their journals. Mr. Bell wants us to do daily writing. We also do Daily Language Practice which is one sentence on the board for the kids to write correctly. For next month I hope to get going on their October books!

Have a good evening!

FIRST DAY1

Our first day is over, and we made it through the heat. I am looking forward to cooler weather IF the meteorologists are right :-). We had a very good day! The breakfast/getting ready for class will take some getting used to, but we will work it out. We will still have the milk break, and I am sure you are getting or will get the letter about the cost.

Tomorrow is our first school year liturgy. We are looking forward to singing and praying together as a school family.

Thank you to the Home School Association for the wonderful apples for snack today!!

Students were given a "take home folder" which is to be returned each morning. There is a "return to school" side and a "keep at home" side. They also have their reading bag and calendar. Please sign this and return each day. Thanks!

Have a good evening!