2Mu Busy Bee News
Week of February 11, 2019
Readers' Workshop~
- As Readers, we have started our next Lucy Calkins Unit ~ Bigger Books Mean Amping Up Reading Power. As we are reading our chapter books, we are working on reading with bigger scoops and using different voices for different characters.
- During Readers' Workshop, we read and discussed Tomie dePaola's Big Anthony ~ His Story and Strega Nona ~ Her Story. We compared and contrasted the two story characters. We also learned how reading with different voices for characters makes reading more interesting.
- We also reread Strega Nona and then illustrated different parts of the story!
- To help us learn about bigger scoops while reading, using intonation, and character voices, we read and discussed Mercy Watson to the Rescue written by Kate DiCamillo. We also read and discussed Tomie dePaola's The Popcorn Book.
- During FUNdations we learned about multi-syllabic words with different types of syllables. For example, cozy is a two syllable word and both syllables are open. While, the word remote has one open syllable and one v-e syllable.
Writers' Workshop~
- During Writers' Workshop we completed a writing assessment to 'show what we know.' We picked a topic from our authority list and wrote a nonfiction book about a topic of interest. We reviewed the elements of a nonfiction story: use expert words, twin sentences, add facts with some opinions, include a good hook and clever conclusion.
- We started our next writing unit called Opinion Writing. We will be writing our opinion about our favorite books. So far, we wrote our first letter to our 4L buddies telling them our opinion about our favorite book. Stay tuned as we learn and grow our opinion writing.
- To enhance our writing and grammar skills, we learned about adverbs. We learned that adverbs describe verbs and answer the question: how, when, where, and why an action occurs.
Mathematicians~
- As mathematicians, we learned how to use a difference diagram to solve math stories.
- We also learned how to collect data to create a pictograph, bar graph, and tally chart. We learned that creating and using charts and graphs to show data helps to answer questions more quickly. For example, we can use a pictograph or bar graph to tell who did has the most or the least. We can also compare two quantities more easily!
- On Valentine's Day we used Sweet Tart sweethearts to complete a math comparison and data collection chart. Then, we made graphs with the data to answer math questions.
- During Fun Friday Math Centers we played games: Heart Sums ~ finding two connecting addends with sums of 14, BEE on Time ~ Telling Time, and Coin Quest ~ Counting Coins. Be sure to check out our fun photos below!
Science~
- As geologists, we experimented with washing the three rocks we observed last week. We discovered that some of the rocks made bubbles when submerged in the water while others became shiny.
- We learned that the rocks came from volcanoes and they were called basalt, tuff, and scoria. Each rock was formed from a different layer. For example, the scoria is red because it is formed from hardened lava.
- We watched a video to learn more about volcanoes and how rocks are formed from them.
- Today, we learned about river rocks. We learned that we can describe and sort river rocks by their properties. Some of the rock properties include color, size, shape, and texture.
Other Activities~
- Michael Pagliaro was our Star Student of the week. We enjoyed learning more about Michael and playing the "All About Michael" Trivia game!
- We celebrated an Valentine's Day with an awesome party! We played Valentine's Day bingo, had a Heart race, and made delicious sundaes! Thank you to all our parent volunteers: Mrs. Barrett, Mrs. McGroarty, Mrs. Pagliaro, Mrs. Lugiano, Mrs. Kubikian, Mrs. Giorgio, and Mrs. Fitzgerald. Thank you also to all the parents for your party donations. We couldn't have had such a successful event without all of YOU!