It's December in Our Town!

Yes, it's that time of the year when we learn about all of the holidays people celebrate in December.  What a better way to learn than by singing and dancing?  Here's a glimpse of our second grade play, performed on December 10th.

Our Holiday Play on PhotoPeach

Our Holiday Play

We performed our second grade holiday play for the school and our parents. Once on a Rooftop proved to be educational and fun at the same time. Two of our favorite songs were Lotsa Latkes and Break the Pinata. After weeks of practicing our lines, learning the songs, and developing our acting skills the night went on perfectly! It will be a memory we treasure forever!

Taking a break for fun

As we prepare for winter break, it's nice to take a day to have some fun and enjoy being with our friends. On Thursday we spent the day creating ornaments: a candy cane reindeer, a mitten - wreath - or tree, a paper clip angel, we made cards and snowflakes, then we read a book called Stranger in the Woods and created a snowman out of a sock! We revealed our Secret Santa identity to everyone's surprise, and we danced to a DJ as we dipped treats into the chocolate fountain. Everyone in our class was happy and everyone behaved. We work so hard that it's important for us to take some time and enjoy ourselves and our friends. My only regret is that we forgot a camera!
Happy Holidays to all from the M&M's!

December Holidays

What a perfect time of the year to learn about the many cultures represented in our classroom. Yesterday we enjoyed latkes, jelly doughnuts, candy dreidles, and lighting a menorah. We read books about Hannukkah and listened as Rachel, Sarah, Sande, and Tyler shared some family traditions. In keeping with our functional writing and reading focus, please take a look at this Morris family latke recipe.

Potato Pancakes

2 eggs 2Tbsp. flour

1/2 small onion 1/4 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp. salt 3 Cups raw cubed potatoes

Put eggs, onion, salt, flour, baking powder, and 1/2 cup of potato cubes into blender container.Cover and process at grate until potatoes have gone throught the blades. Stop blender and add remaining potatoes; cover and process at chop until all potato cubes have passed through processing blades. Use rubbern spatula to help guide potatoes to blades. Do not overblend! Spray griddle or pan with cooking spray. Pour potato batter as you would pancake batter and flip when the edges turn brown. Serve warm with applesauce or sour cream.

By Mrs. Morris

A Plump and Perky Turkey

The November book of the month is called A Plump and Perky Turkey by Teresa Bateman and Jeff Shelly. This book is funny! The people in Squawk Valley were trying to find a turkey for Thanksgiving. They put up signs looking for a turkey to model for pictures and sculptures. Their plan was to eat the turkey on Thanksgiving but Pete (the model) was too smart for them. He camouflaged himself in the art work and escaped! He left a note saying Goodbye and he took the bird made of oatmeal as his modeling fee. The people of Squawk Valley were left to eat shredded wheat on Thanksgiving!
I made a connection to this book because I eat shredded wheat too, but for breakfast. On Thanksgiving my favorite foods are turkey and key lime pie!
By Sande

Pumpkin Math

On October 31st we had a day filled with Pumpkin Math! Ten wonderful parents sent in pumpkins of various sizes. The children split into small groups and estimated how heavy their pumpkins were, what the diameter and circumference would be, and how many seeds they would find inside. Our awesome parent volunteers helped the kids actually weigh and measure the pumpkins and then cut off the top so the children could count the seeds. When all data was collected and recorded the kids drew jack-o-lantern faces and the adults cut them out. At the end of the day the pumpkins were raffled off and sent home!

By Mrs. Morris

Painting our Literary Pumpkins

We read the book More M&M Math today in school. We painted our pumpkins like M&M's using blue, yellow, orange, green, red, and brown. We each got our own pack of M&M's and as we read the book we sorted them in colors and put them in lines (like a graph), and then we divided them into groups before we ate them. On Monday we will be taking the pumpkins downstairs to set up a display. Be sure to stop by the school to see them.

By Jared