Each week, I will try to post the home-school letter, which details what we will be doing in the Reading Wonders program.  Note, we are starting to practice spelling routines, and homework routines, in class.  The children will soon be bringing home a list of words, and suggested practice activities.  Their spelling words will be highlighted at the bottom of that page.  Each students’ list will be individualized to their needs.

 

As previously stated, the next two weeks will be about routine building, and learning how our classroom will run.  We will be spreading out Unit 1 Week 1 over the course of two weeks, to allow for additional practice, and time for the kids to increase comfort, and get back in the swing of being in school.  As always, if you ever have any questions or concerns about your 2nd grader, or what we are doing in our classroom, don’t hesitate to contact me!

Friday, we had our first STEAM challenge!  We talked about what STEAM means, and the process that we will go through each week.  The kids were excited, and did a great job for their first challenge!

and the process!

This week, our challenge was to create a name tag that would stand up (this was the most challenging part), had to be a certain height, and could only be created with certain materials.  Their name tag had to show their name, and something about themselves.  It was fun to watch the kids thinking, and to revise their plans.  I was very impressed with the success kids had after some multiple attempts.  I look forward to watching the kids turn their thinking caps on for STEAM challenges throughout the year!

 

We practiced our first game on iPads this week, as well!  We will use iPads regularly in the classroom.   They will be a regular part of our math rotations.  This week we practiced with an app called “Math Slide”.  We practiced recognizing the different ways that numbers can be represented.  The kids did a great job with general iPad skills, and  working with a partner!

Wow!  What a great group of second graders we have!!!  It has been such a great week, learning our friends names, all about each other, and getting comfortable in our classroom!  I am very excited about this school year, and this wonderful group!  I hope your second graders feel the same way!  This will be a great place to take a peek at some of the exciting things we are doing in our classroom.  This week, we started to learn some classroom routines, school expectations, and had some fun with some friend activities.

This fun game with M&Ms took a lot of patience and good listening, but was very tasty, as well!

  

In this activity, the children had to find different friends around the classroom.  This was a great way to get to meet some new friends!

Yes, week one also included plenty of indoor recess!  We had lots of fun, anyway!

We have been busy with some handwriting practice, after a long summer break!

In case you didm’t receive or want to reference.

 

 

August 22, 2016

Dear Second Grade Families,

I hope you all are having a wonderful summer!! I can’t wait to hear all about your summertime adventures. My family and I have had a great summer; we have been busy, camping and exploring New England! We have had lots of fun experiences this summer that I can’t wait to share with you. I am also excited to hear all about yours! I hope you are excited to return to school this fall as second graders. I am excited to be returning to school as well!

 

I have spent a lot of time setting up our classroom and am very excited about sharing our room with you. We have a great space, and I can’t wait to have lots of fun learning experiences in it! We are going to have a great year! I hope you are eager to see old friends and make new ones. We have a great class and I can’t wait to get to know all of you better!

 

Our classroom is stocked with the supplies you will need for all of our learning adventures this year, so you do not need to worry about bringing anything with you. However, back-to-school supply shopping can be exciting – so if you’ve already purchased some of your own supplies you can certainly bring them with you. We will be using lots of pencils, erasers, crayons/colored pencils and glue sticks, but we have everything you should need. Throughout the year we go through an extensive amount of disinfectant cleaning wipes (primarily “green”, non-toxic wipes that are safe for all the growing bodies and minds in the room) and soft tissues – especially during stuffy-nose season – so donations of these items are always GREATLY appreciated!! I try to keep us well stocked, but we do go through quite a few at different times of the year, so donations are always appreciated!

 

I hope you all enjoy the last few days of your summer vacation and are ready to have some awesome adventures this school year. If you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to contact me at jennifer.prive@sau19.org. If you could please complete the enclosed forms and return them to school on the first day, I would greatly appreciate it!

 

Sincerely,

Mrs. Prive

Wow!  What an incredible summer we have had!  They say that time flies when you are having fun, and this summer sure has flown by!  I have been getting back into “back to school” mode, and am getting super excited about this year!  We have such a great class, and I have lots of fun new ideas for this year!  I can’t wait to start learning and exploring new things, with all of you!

You should receive a back to school letter from me in the next week.  Included are a few forms that need to be filled out.  Please make sure that I have the transportation form, by the first day.  I want to make sure that we all get home safely!  The others can be returned as soon as you have time to fill them out!  I can’t wait to get to know all of the wonderful families in our second grade classroom!

As always, if you ever have any questions or concerns, do not hesitate to contact me.  I will be in and out of school in the next couple of weeks (sometimes early mornings and late nights), so it is best to reach me via email, until school starts.  I will be checking it regularly, and usually return emails promptly, so if you don’t hear from me, I probably didn’t receive it.  We have switched over to a new email system that is still learning what is “junk”, so don’t hesitate to try and contact me again, if you don’t hear from me.

I hope you all continue to enjoy the last couple of weeks of summer!  I can’t wait to hear all about them!

June 16, 2016

Hello Everyone!

Welcome to what will be a wonderful second grade year for you and your second grader! I am excited about this great group of second graders! My name is Jen Prive, and I have been teaching for eleven years. I am passionate about teaching, and am grateful that I get to do this job everyday! I have lots of fun things planned to enrich and encourage growth and learning! I will be here for you and your children every step of the way, so please feel free to contact me if you ever have any questions or concerns. I check my email daily, or you can call my extension at NBCS. I have very high expectations for this wonderful group; and I am confident that with a lot of encouragement and motivation these kids will reach great heights!

This upcoming year will involve a lot of new endeavors for these kids, and we will work through all of them until they become routine. Some of these new experiences include reading, adding and subtracting multi-digit numbers, as well as exploring some new topics in science and social studies, and some incredible STEM challenges (that you will hear all about!).

Back to school shopping is a fun way to get excited for school. The following is a list of things that would be helpful for your second grader to have, however, I have many of these supplies in the classroom, so if you are unable to get them, I will have them available for your second grader.

• a large glue stick (I find elmers lasts the longest)
• pencils and erasers
• a small pack of crayons or colored pencils

We go through a lot of soft tissues, especially during cold season, paper towels and green cleaners, so any donations of those supplies would be greatly appreciated. I will make sure that the kids have everything else that they need. It is also a great idea to have a set of supplies at home, for homework. These might include pencils, erasers, and a ruler.

I look forward to an incredible year of learning with your children. I am so excited to get to know each and every member of our new class, and get started with building our new classroom community. Next year, I will keep a class blog. This is similar to a webpage, but is more interactive, and will hopefully provide you with a little glimpse into our classroom, and your second graders’ life at school. You will receive a permission slip regarding their participation in this blog. Please feel free to check it out at: privesclass.edublogs.org.  If you have any questions or concerns about your children’s second grade year, please do not hesitate to contact me. Thank you in advance for all of your support and open communication. I hope you all have a wonderful summer, filled with lots of fun experiences.

 

Take care,

 

Mrs. Prive

jennifer.prive@sau19.org

We spent all day finishing up end of year “stuff”, and working on our biome research, that it didn’t leave a lot of time for a STEM challenge today.  So… the challenge today was to create a pencil topper or grip out of two pipe cleaners.  They deserved a fun break at the end of the day today.  They have worked hard all week!

We have made some really great progress researching biomes!  We have utilized text and web-based resources to find and record information about our biomes, as well as some specific information about the animals in them.  We are creating a glog on www.glogster.com to represent the research we have done!