Reminders:
∑ Halloween Parade, Friday, October 31st. Parade begins at 12:40 p.m.
∑ Fall Auction, Saturday, November 3rd
∑ Veterans Day, Monday, November 12th, NO SCHOOL
∑ Thanksgiving Day Holiday, November 19th - 23rd, NO SCHOOL
Goodness, I can’t believe it’s Halloween this week. So much has happened since the start of school and still going!
Halloween Festivities
Children should not wear costumes to school in the morning. You are welcome to pick your child up at 11:45 am if you would like to dress them in their costumes at home, but plan on being back at school by 12:30 pm. Please let me know if you plan to do this. Students are welcome to bring their costumes to school and change during lunch. Please send them in a bag with their name on it.
Our class Halloween Party will follow the parade. Thank you to the parent volunteers for bringing our classroom treats! (Volunteers setting up our Halloween party may due so between 12:00 and 12:30 pm.) Students will be dismissed at 1:25 pm as normal.
As you know via email from Anna, our class has been asked to walk with the Wells Fargo stagecoach to the Montclair Parade at Montclair Park. If you plan to have your child participate in this event, please let Anna know. Meet at the old firehouse between 2:15 and 2:25 pm. Should be a fun event for the children!
Thanksgiving Feast
The Feast, our second grade living history day, is fast upon us; in fact it’s a week from this Thursday, November 8th! Thank you for helping your child to memorize their speech. We’ve been practicing at school too! The goal is no paper on the day.
Just a reminder, if your child needs a costume for the event, you need to send a note to school ASAP. There are still a few costumes available for loan. If you are participating in the event in the morning, we ask you come in costume. There are some adult ones available for you too. If you plan to come for the speeches, you can come as you are. More information to follow as well as the permission slip in the next week and a half. Lets keep positive thoughts for a sunny day!
Winter Festival Dance Program
Joaquin Miller second graders have been invited to participate in the annual Winter Festival Dance Program sponsored the Office of Parks and Recreation. We are one of 20 schools. The actual program will take place Sunday, December 9th at Laney College. Dance instruction will be provided at school for students to learn the simple dance movements. There is a mandatory dress rehearsal on Sunday, December 2nd. More information to follow as we meet with the dance instructor. Even if your child is unable to participate on the day, they will still participate in the dance instruction.
Classroom
Our class continues to work hard and exhibits great enthusiasm for learning. We try to visit the new front gardens on Mondays to do our journal writing, weather permitting. It is also a time for them to make observations of the plant they adopted for the year, watching for changes as the year progresses. We’ve been fortunate to observe the insects and birds that have taken up residence in our garden. We have a couple of hummingbirds that have visited every time we’ve been out there. We also watched a female spider spin her silk around a bee that got caught in her web!
We continue working on numbers to 1,000, including place value, expanded notation, comparing numbers greater and lesser than and interpreting graphs for information. Just a note, sometimes math workbook pages come home incomplete. These are often not completed in class, as much time is spent on hands on activities and worksheets that I have created. The pages can be completed at home for additional practice.
We continue our physical science unit of Balance and Motion. We are investigating rollers, using our prior lesson knowledge to build on new concepts. We’ve already learned about balance and the purpose of counterweights. Investigated things that spin and rotate, tops and zoomers. All this information is being used as we investigate things that roll.
Parent Teacher Conferences will begin mid to late November and continue into December. I will let you know when I post the sign-ups outside Room 6. Please don’t hesitate to send me a note if you have a question or concern regarding your child. I don’t check my school email very frequently, so it is not the best way to communicate with me, sorry!
Thank you for all the donations from our wish list and to the many parent volunteers. Also thanks for your continued support of your child in completing their homework. We’re off to a great year!