Friday, March 28, 2014

Poetry Alive

Today Poetry Alive came and visited our campus. They were amazing. Check out their website here.


Mrs. Harris was a great actress.


He called our very own Olivia to be the sun.

Thursday, March 27, 2014

Weather Man

Jim Spencer came to second grade at Spicewood to talk about his job as a weather man!
I was totally star struck because I watch him all the time on KXAN.
Shamelessly I asked him for a selfie. 


You can visit his website here.


Second grade team! 

It was such a great lesson. He talked about how he's always been interested in weather and he knew when he was a kid that he wanted to be a weatherman.
He also talked about severe weather safety and how we don't have many tornadoes but we do have to be careful about flash floods.
We even got to meet KXAN's mascot, Kaxan.

Is this not the cutest dog?



Kaxan\'s become quite the mascot for KXAN, even making an appearance on the news! Nicole had a photo shoot with the [little] big superstar not too long ago.

Wednesday, March 26, 2014

Geoboards

For geometry today we used geoboards to make different 2D shapes.

The words I'm expecting my children to know:
polygon, quadrilateral, pentagon, octagon, vertex, shape, closed figure, solid, circle, triangle, rectangle, square, rhombus, hexagon, cylinder, cone, sphere, cube, rectangular prism, triangular prism, side, edge, face, square corners, point, sort, attribute.




Also, parents please take a few minutes to fill out the Spicewood survey




Tuesday, March 25, 2014

Jazzy sentences

Today we took boring old sentences:
The boy ran. 
The teacher laughed.
The man jumped.
The lady sang.
The fish swam.
The food was hot.
and turned them into exciting sentences!!!

Squeaky the famous boy ran so fast he caught on fire, and he ran slow and froze the right speed.
The short fat famous teacher laughed loudly.
The man jumped because he had bouncy shoes. 
The famous French dwarf lady sang extremely loudly, "La!" to the earth.
The golden big fish swam gracefully deep.
The food was so hot it caught my mouth on fire. 

I modeled it with the kiddos first using the sentence, "The dog barked." That became "The famous big brown dog barked, "Ruff. Ruff," loudly at me. 
Then I had the kids get into groups of 2 or 3 and circle write.
This means one person started and added one thing to the old sentence, then the next student added to that... and so on. 








Monday, March 24, 2014

Fairy Tales

I am so very excited about reading this week!
We are starting our new unit on fairy tales!

The TEKS for second grade are:
Students are expected to:(A)  identify moral lessons as themes in well-known fables, legends, myths, or stories; and(B)  compare different versions of the same story in traditional and contemporary folktales with respect to their characters, settings, and plot.

This means that we'll be keeping track of characters, settings, and plots and reading several different versions of the same story.
This week we're reading different versions of Little Red Riding Hood and Cinderella.





Coincidentally the Texas School for the Deaf is performing their annual play next weekend and it happens to be Cinderella.
I wish I could take all of my kiddos on a field trip to go see it but since I can't.... I'm posting the information here in hopes that their parents will take them!
I will be going and I'd love to see some of my students there!

Cinderella 2014

Cinderella Play

Friday, April 4, 2014
And Saturday, April 5, 2014
At 7 p.m.
Texas School for the Deaf
R.L. Davis Auditorium
Austin, Texas
Student $5; Adult $8; (children under 5—free)

Friday, March 21, 2014

SkyDiving

I went skydiving yesterday. 
Yup...... SKYDIVING. One of the PYP learner profile words is "risk taker," and when I stepped out of the plane... I felt like a risk taker in the truest form. 


I promised my kiddos I would take a video so when he asked me who I wanted to say hi to... obviously my students were the first thing that popped into my mind.

The whole adventure was fabulous. I would totally recommend it for any of you parents who are dare devils. Here's the website if you're interested. 


That's me! This is also a great example of GRAVITY! 
We finished our map!!



Wednesday, March 19, 2014

Geometry Game

Today my kiddos made cubes. Each side of the cube has a different type of polygon drawn/labeled.
I let them color them in, cut and fold/tape their papers into a cube.

Then they got out white boards and got into partners. One partner rolls the dice and then says the name of the polygon. The other person has to draw that polygon. This way they're getting practice saying the names of the polygons, as well as practicing drawing them and keeping track of the number of vertices and edges.

You can get this activity from my geometry pack.

Before

After



Tuesday, March 18, 2014

Waivers

I just got this email...

Dear Round Rock ISD Employee,

The Texas Education Agency has approved Round Rock ISD's attendance waivers for January 28 and February 7. The district submitted a low-attendance waiver for January 28 since 10,000 students were in attendance. The district also submitted a waiver for February 7, 2014.  With the approval of both waivers, students will not be required to attend school on April 18 or June 2, 2014

 Wohoo! 

I am so glad my little ones and I will not be sitting in my classroom in the first week of June. I still have staff development but at least I can have my room packed up at the end of May. 

This song seems appropriate for the way I feel about that email....

P.S. Is anyone else obsessed with Frozen? 

Geometry

To introduce the new geometry unit I had my kiddos do two activities. We built robots out of geo-shapes. We also organized shapes into as many different categories as possible. 
The words we talked about today were edge (another word for edge), vertex (another word for corner), and quadrilateral (4 sided figure). We talked about how quadrilaterals can look very different from each other!

Also, some great books for geometry are: 
(Click on the link to go to the youtube video reading)

Another good book is Shape Up.





Walking around to look at other robots. 

Sorted by color

Sorted by size

Sorted by number of edges


Sunday, March 16, 2014

Spring Break Writing

I don't know how the kiddos feel but I personally am bursting to share all my spring break adventures. There were several times on my trip that I thought to myself, "Oh, I can't wait to share this with my students!" #teacherlife

This desire to tell stories gives me a great opportunity to remind my kiddos about watermelon seed writing.

In second grade we talk a lot about ZOOMING in to one small moment and telling lots of good details about that small moment. At the beginning of the year we used the "watermelon seed" analogy. Click here to get my watermelon freebie.

Watermelon Writing

 So my whole trip to Florida would be the watermelon, one whole day might be a slice of that watermelon, but I want to pick just one seed. The seed I am picking is the morning we went to the Everglades and I got to hold a baby alligator.

If I tried to write about the whole watermelon, my story might sound more like a list.....

On my spring break vacation I did a lot of stuff. I flew on an airplane to Florida. I went to the Everglades and saw alligators. I held a baby alligator. I ate a huge coconut milkshake. I went to lots of restaurants. I went to the beach. I got sunburned. I went parasailing. I went shopping. I read books. I watched movies. I bakeD cookies. I met new people. I made new friends. I played with Sadie Lady.

If I chose just one seed, I can add lots of details about one small moment.

I have always been intrigued by alligators. They always look like they're smiling but they're also intimidating with their big snapping teeth! When I had the opportunity to go see alligators up close in Florida, I knew I couldn't resist! My two friends and I piled into the car and drove the 45 minutes to the Everglades. Once we arrived my heart started pounding. I was about to see real life alligators in their natural habitat! I've seen alligators on TV, and at the zoo but I couldn't wait to see what they were like in their marsh homes.
My friends and I got on the boat that would take us around the marsh. The boat was loud as it drove us around so whenever we saw an alligator, we just had to stand up and point. The wind whipped in our faces but we didn't care. After about half an hour of looking at alligators, the boat's captain stopped. He gave an interesting lecture about the history of the everglades and some fun facts about alligators. I was listening, but I also couldn't wait to get back on land. I heard someone say that there was a baby alligator we could hold. I tried to pay attention as the man in the ranger outfit talked about the difference between swamps and marshes, but I kept imagining myself playing with a baby alligator! Finally the boat turned around and we headed back.
My friend Vanessa snapped lots of pictures of the alligators but I didn't want to waste time getting out my phone. I wanted to spot all the hiding places of the alligators. There were some swimming in the water, and some sunbathing.
As soon as we got to land I went to the captain and asked about holding a baby alligator. He smiled and lead my friends and I to a grassy area with trees. He told us to wait there and be ready to pay three dollars each. We all looked at each other. Three dollars? That was it!? I would pay a lot more to hold an alligator! As we waited I felt like a kid waiting for my first roller coaster ride.
Finally, after what seemed like hours, the man came back with the cutest little alligator I have ever seen. The little alligator seemed just as excited as I was. The way he was wiggling made me think of the way my puppy Sadie looks when I'm holding a treat.
I told Jacklyn and Vanessa that they could go first. I wanted to make sure they didn't get eaten before I held Snappy. The captain explained how to hold him under the neck and under the tail. He said to hold Snappy away from our bodies so he couldn't bite us.
When it was my turn I held out my hands and the captain gently placed Snappy into them. Snappy felt light, cool, and rubbery! I expected his belly to feel rough, but it was smooth. He felt like a wet beach ball.
Vanessa snapped a picture, and then I had to give Snappy back.
It was absolutely worth the three dollars and I will always remember my first time holding an alligator. I hope to someday hold another one!
See the alligator swimming behind me??

Snappy!!!

Friday, March 7, 2014

Enrichment Day














Also, reminder that the second grade performance is next Tuesday in the cafeteria at 6:30pm! Your kiddo should be there at 6:15.

Thursday, March 6, 2014

Dr. Seuss

March 2nd is Dr. Seuss's birthday.
He would be ONE HUNDRED YEARS OLD! Of course we have to celebrate it!
Here are some links to some of Dr. Seuss's best books made into videos:

The Lorax

Sam I Am

Cat in the Hat

Horton Hears A Who

Halloween is a Grinch Night

Here is an eight minute biography about him...

Here's Dr. Seuss's official website. 

StarWars Dr.Seuss









In the afternoon I let the kiddos get onto Seussville.