Thank you for sending all the beautiful leaves yesterday! We read the book The Leaf Man by Lois Ehlert (see the video below) and were inspired by her leaf illustrations to make our own leaf animals. The students were very creative and careful with their leaves. You can see your child's leaf art on Seesaw!
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Given that we are quickly becoming experts on Canada here in 2B, and the fact that Greta Thunberg is visiting Canada this week, 2B set to work making a short video with important Canadian facts and places so that she can get the most out of her trip. The students were very excited to share their knowledge, and to see the news coverage of when Greta came to Montreal today!
In our continuing work on repeating patterns, we enjoyed touring the school this week in search of repeating patterns around Millgrove. The students took their iPads and posted patterns they saw around the school on Seesaw. We found that repeating patterns are truly all over the place, and the students composed collages of some of their favourites. Even Mr. Cherry had patterned tie on when we were searching close to his classroom! It’s neat to see that the concepts we learn about in Math time are visible all around us in real life  We ran our annual Terry Fox run today and Millgrove is still counting all our fundraising to see if we raised enough for Mr. Lillico to get a pie-in-the-face! The students were very inspired by the story of Terry and how he put others first. They ran hard in the run, and showed great concern for the people they were running for!
We are wrapping up our focus on increasing patterns in math this week. Increasing patterns are a brand new concept in grade two, and can often prove to be tricky, but the students in 2B have worked hard to describe, reproduce, extend, and create increasing patterns over the past couple of weeks. You can practice increasing patterns by taking the link to the game below!   With our Canadian "passports" We’ve completed our three “visits” to Meteghan, Saskatoon, and Iqaluit, and both the flight there and exploration of these three Canadian communities were very memorable. The students now have stamped “passports,” and they are such experts now that they served as travel agents this week and planned trips to a Canadian destination of their choosing. The class used their knowledge of these locations’ geography, climate, and people to envision the ideal trip and items required. Now if only our field trip budget could make those plans a reality!
 PE this month has been focused on learning expectations for the gym and building teamwork skills by playing cooperative games! They especially enjoyed getting across the lava-like gym floor as a team using gym equipment, and playing Colours. Next up in PE, we'll be brushing up on our running skills!
A big highlight so far this month in 2B has been the start of our unit on magnetism in Science. We've been exploring what materials are attracted to magnets and which are not, and observing the effects of magnets on a variety of items. In this unit, we will be learning:
Later in the unit, students will be asked to construct a toy or game that uses a magnet at home. Stay tuned for more details about that project, and for our further learning about magnets!  Today we celebrated Dot Day in 2B! Dot Day is based on the book "The Dot" by Peter Reynolds about a girl named Vashti who initially believes she can't draw, but later discovers that everyone can make a mark in the world. 15 million people in 181 countries are celebrating Dot Day this year, and we marked the occasion in 2B by dressing up in dots, collaborating on a group dot art project, and reflecting on how we can all make a mark in the world after reading the book. You can see the students' ideas and the book "The Dot" below!
We've been working hard in 2B over the last couple of weeks on our reading and writing! Grade two is a big year of growth for students as readers and writers, and we've been practicing building our stamina in both of those areas. In Reading Workshop, we've been talking about how grade two readers take charge of their readers by choosing how to read, taking a sneak peak of their book, reading a lot, reading in longer phrases, and keeping tabs on their comprehension. Students have especially enjoyed practicing their partner reading skills and keeping track of how much they're reading in their reading log. Our Writing Workshop this year is starting with a focus on narrative writing. Our class has been hard at work discovering small moments to write about, writing with detail, crafting powerful endings, and rereading our writing like detectives. It's a big job getting back into the swing of writing after the summer, but students are starting to get into more of a groove getting their ideas onto paper and having stamina during writing time. The students love getting to hear their peers' writing during our sharing time! You can see photos below of how we closely examined the details in seashells to inspire use to include details in our own writing topics. |
Mrs. BarkerMrs. Barker is a grade three teacher at Millgrove School. She loves science and reading, and lives in a little brick house with Mr. Barker and her kids Jack and Ellie. 
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