Week of Dec 8-12

Good day all.  I hope everyone is feeling better than I am.  It is a sick time for me and stayed away from the kids today and should be back to work tomorrow.  Just a quick reminder that tomorrow is popcorn day.  We will also be having our Christmas party on Friday, December 19th.  I will send out info for who I have to bring something for our last day of school in 2014.  We will begin our party around 11:30 so the children have lots of time to eat and visit before the movie in the afternoon.

Christmas Concert Info:

All grade 2 students are dressing up in black pants/skirt and a white top for the concert.  The concert date is Thursday December 18th, with one concert at 1:30pm.  The evening concert begins at 7:00pm. We ask that you bring your child to the school at 6:30 where they can head to their classroom.

Language Arts

Spelling:

Our spelling words for this week are as follows;

grass   trunk   truck   flew   flat   class   plate   from   glove   friend

Phonics:

We continue to work on long vowel sounds, now working towards recognizing if a word has a long vowel sound or short vowel sound.  (Kit - Short, Kite - long)


Math

We a will be finishing up our unit on patterns with some assessment being done next week. We have been working hard on showing and representing increasing patterns.  In the Numbers to 100 unit we will continue to work on estimation for the rest of the week.

Science

We are doing really well in our Hot and Cold unit.  We recently did an experiment to show what takes up more space, snow or water.  The students had fun collecting snow and recording the temperature before letting it melt to see what happened.    Some of the students are still having a hard time reading thermometers though and could use extra practice at home.  We look at weather every morning during our morning routine, recording the temperature, but more practice is always an asset.

Social Studies

In social we continue to study the early years of our 3 communities, Meteghan, Iqaluit, and Saskatoon.  We are comparing and contrasting the 3 communities together with our community of Leduc.

Short Week

Good evening.  A couple of quick reminders for this week.  There is no school on Friday because of teacher P.D.  we also have no spelling test this week.  We will have a new set of words next Monday.


Math

This week in Math, in our patterning unit, we are focusing on increasing patterns.  An increasing pattern is a pattern that increases in size with each additional element.  for example, 1, 4, 7, 10, 13, is a pattern that increases by a value of 3.  A question that arises from this pattern might be "What is the 8th element in this pattern?"  This also will assess their knowledge of ordinal numbers.

In our numbers to 100 unit, we are in the midst of working on estimation.  At this point estimation is still a difficult concept for most students, but we will spend more time doing activities and questions to practice our estimation skills.

Science

In science, we are continuing our hot and cold temperatures unit.  Reading thermometers remains a big part of what we are trying to accomplish in the unit.  This week we will also be talking about many weather terms and definitions that deal with hot and cold, as well as doing an experiment called "The Great Meltdown" on Wednesday.  Feel free to ask your child about the Great Meltdown in our classroom.



Next week I will be sending out a sign up to some parents for our Christmas potluck lunch.  It will be done on sign up genius and if you receive an email to sign up for an item, it will be first come first serve.  I hope everyone has a great "long" weekend.

Mr. Aasen

Nov 24-28

Spelling Words

the spelling words for this week are as follows;

feed   sea   meet   real   keep   week   deep   easy   beach   clean

Week of Nov 17-22

Odds and Ends

Happy weekend everyone.  I hope you are all enjoying some rest and relaxation.  Coming up this week there are a couple of important things due.  First is the orders for Christmas cards.  Our art work has been completed, and if you would like to order any cards with your child's artwork on it, the forms must be in by Wednesday the 19th.  Also, if you would like some shoe boxes sent home for operation Christmas Child, those forms must be in ASAP as the collection for the completed shoe boxes is this week.  Also, December book orders will be sent home on Monday and will be due back on Friday the 22nd, as to make sure there is enough time to receive your books before Christmas.

Language Arts

Spelling:

The spelling words for this week are as follows (long "o" words);

those   low   goat   own   coat   go   hope   sold   over   ago


Writing:

The topic of our writing this month is forest creatures.  Our main focus this week will be using descriptive verbs in our writing.  We have called them "no-go" words.  Instead of using words like go and went, how can we describe how we are moving better?  We can use words such as waddles, skipped, zoomed, etc. All of our writing still revolves around informative and narrative writing pieces, and how we can write them successfully.


Math

We are continuing in our patters unit as well as our numbers to 100 unit.  We wrote a quiz on continuing a pattern as well as creating a pattern.  This week our focus will be on increasing patterns.  In our numbers unit, we will still be doing some work on skip counting, as well as recognizing numbers to 100.

Science

We have began our next science unit, Hot and Cold Temperatures.  Our main focus at the beginning of the unit is learning to read a thermometer.  Any chance you get at home with your child to read a thermometer/ask them what the temperature is, that would be fantastic.  The more practice they get the better.

Social

We are continuing our unit on learning about other communities.  We have looked at the history of Iqaluit and what makes it unique. We have learned why people settled in Iqaluit.    We will be looking at the history of Meteghan and Saskatoon this week and finding out when and why people settled in those communities.

I hope everyone has a wonderful week ahead.

Mr. Aasen

Halloween Week!!!

I don't think anyone is more excited that Halloween is on a Friday than teachers.  As much as it is a wonderful day for the kids and teacher at school, we do not have to see them the next day after they have had all that sugar :)  We can hear all the wonderful stories the following Monday.

Now for some odds and ends.  Just a reminder that we will be walking to Salem Manor for our annual Halloween parade in our costumes.  Please send your children to school dressed up in their costumes.  Also we will be having a potluck lunch.  We will have cheese and crackers, fruit, vegetables, and juice boxes.  It is hot lunch day as well, so if you have ordered hot lunch for your child, they can eat that. They do not have to feel pressured into having the potluck lunch.

Language Arts

Spelling:

Our spelling words for this week are as follows:

wide   mile   line   hide   fire   nice   fine   mind   find   behind

Phonics:

In phonics, this week we are continuing with unit 3, looking at long vowel sounds.

Writing:

In writing there is still a major focus on sentence structure, but now we are putting an added focus on adding detail through the form of descriptive words (adjectives). We will be writing a descriptive piece of writing at the end of the week with a Halloween theme to it.  I have been encouraging the students to describe things using their senses.  What do you see, how does it sound, what does it feel like, how does it smell?  I am seeing some great progress and some great descriptive/detailed writing.

Science

In science, we will be writing our Unit 1, Magnetism, unit test this Thursday.  I think all the students are well prepared and will do very well.  

I hope you all have a wonderful Halloween and safe "trick or treating" to everyone.

Mr. Aasen

Week of Oct 20th - 24th

Good evening parents.  Here are a few reminders.  Tomorrow and Wednesday are parent teacher conferences.  If you haven't signed up as of yet there is still time to do so.  Just use this link:

www.SignUpGenius.com/go/20F0C44A4A629A6FD0-mraasens 

Also reminders that we have library tomorrow and hot lunch on Friday.  Here is a snippet of how our week is going to look.


Language Arts

Spelling:

Our spelling words for the week are as follows;

save   lake   face   same   gate   rake   tape   sail   paint   afraid

The spelling test will be the regular Friday this week.

Writing:

We are continuing our autumn theme for writing.  This week we are really putting a heavy focus on sentences and what makes a good and proper sentence.  Feel free to ask your children what we have been discussing regarding what every sentence needs. (Beginning capitals, ending punctuation, a who/what (subject) and a doing/describing (predicate)).

Phonics:

We are continuing our phonics unit on long vowels.  To coincide with our "long a" spelling words the first parts of this unit deals with "long a" words as well.

Math

This week in math we will continue with patterns on Monday and Tuesday.  Today we learned what "attributes" are in a pattern.  The students now know what pattern "cores" are (the part of the pattern that repeats) and pattern "attributes" (the "objects" that you see in the pattern.  eg. a square and a triangle).  On Wednesday and Thursday we will continue with representing numbers to 100.  Our goal this week will be able to confidently recognize and identify numbers that are higher than 12, just by seeing them written.


I hope everyone has a wonderful week and see you over the next couple of days.

Mr. Aasen

Parent Teacher Interviews

Parents,

Here is the link to sign up for parent teacher interviews.

www.SignUpGenius.com/go/20F0C44A4A629A6FD0-mraasens