Instant Snow!

On Wednesday, we continued our exploration of matter!  This time, students were given a cup of water and a cup of "mystery matter".  They observed both and drew models on their posters.  Then, we predicted what would happen to the water and mystery matter when they were combined.  It was SO fun to watch their reactions when they poured the Instant Snow into the water and watched it "grow"!

Then, we discussed what type of matter the Instant Snow was.  Solid?  Liquid?  (We eliminated gas right off the bat).  In the end, we decided that since each tiny particle of instant snow had its own shape, it would be considered a solid.  We also decided to let the snow sit out for a few days to see what will happen to it.  Some students think it will keep growing, others think it may turn back into powder!

If anyone would like to purchase Instant Snow to try at home, you can get it at Hobby Lobby! You can also put food coloring in your water to tint your snow.

Salty Water

We have started a new science unit this week, and we are all pretty excited about it!  To start off our unit on matter, students made some observations on two different types of matter: Epsom salt and water.  First, each group was given a cup of salt to observe.  They used their senses to describe the salt, and drew a model of it as a group.  Then, they did the same thing with some warm water.  After they had recorded their findings, we combined the water and the salt.  They stirred to see what would happen.  Most of the students knew that the salt would "disappear" but we had a great conversation about what actually happened to the salt!  Some described it as "melting" into the water.  :)  Our salty water is still sitting at the back of our classroom.  We are hoping that over the next few days, or weeks, it will change again!

Christmas Partying!

We had the BEST day on the last day of school before the break!  I am still recovering from all of the fun, which is why I am just now posting! :)  We started off our morning with our class party, put together by our amazing room mom and mom volunteers!  Students got to make candy cane reindeer, santa handprint ornaments, and decorate bags to hold it all!  They also got to play some fun snowball and jingle bell games!  I was so impressed by how many parents showed up to help!

Next, we went caroling in the lunchroom with the rest of the school.  This is one of our most treasured, Woodruff traditions!  2nd Grade sang "Have a Holly Jolly Christmas" and the teachers did a special "12 Days of Christmas" performance.

After lunch students came in and we filled out some pretend passports for our Christmas Around the World activity.  This is another one of my favorite things we do during the year.  First, our class went and "visited" Mexico in Miss Wooten's room.  Then they "traveled" to Mrs. Olsen's room, in Finland.  After that they "jetted" to Miss King's room for a little African holiday fun!  Next they "zoomed" to Miss Pierce's room to learn all about England's holiday traditions!  Last, they "flew" back to my classroom to learn about Denmark and the fun Christmas traditions people participate in there.  They learned about the Nissa Man and got to try a traditional danish aebleskiver (like a pancake).  We had so much fun!

I hope everyone had an amazing Christmas!  Thanks to all of you who sent me gifts!  I felt so loved and special!

Utah State Hey!

Since the beginning of the school year, students in my class have been working very hard to reach their AR reading goals!  To celebrate, those who met their goals were invited to attend a USU women's basketball game on Thursday!  We had a BLAST!

Halloween 2016!

Yesterday was such a fun day here in room 16!  We tried to keep our morning as normal as possible, even though everyone was wearing costumes!  We worked on self start, writing, reading and comprehension.  Then, after lunch, it was time to PARTY!  Here are some of the highlights from our class party!  A big shoutout to our awesome mom volunteers who made it so special!

We had four centers: Skeleton Crafting, Bingo, Musical Chairs, and Donut Decorating!

After our party we joined in on the Woodruff Annual Halloween Parade!  It is one of our most loved Halloween traditions!

A Little Spooky Fun!

Halloween has always been one of my favorite holidays, and I love to celebrate all month with my students!  Last week we practiced writing in complete sentences as we described some mummies.  We wanted to have something cute to go with our writing to put in the hall for PTC's so we made toilet paper mummies!  They turned out so cute!

We also used witchy fingers to help us track as we read during Power Hour.  Students also practiced reading in their best zombie, witch and ghost voices!

This week, for math, we got to make dancing math skeletons.  Students had to complete all the addition problems on their skeleton bones before they could cut them out and make them into a dancing, spooky friend!

We have also been working on using adjectives to describe nouns in our writing.  Today we brainstormed a long list of Spooky adjectives on a poster and then used them to describe different Halloween pictures!

Halloween is so fun when you are a second grader, and even more fun when you are 26 and get to party like you are a second grader!  We can't wait for our Halloween party!

Fire Safety

This week we had some special visitors at Woodruff!  The Logan City Fire Department sent some firefighters to our school to educate our students on fire safety!  We took a little tour through their safety truck and learned all about being safe in our homes and what to do if we have an emergency!

We also got some great tips about calling 911.  Please work with your child to learn their address and home  phone number.  These are two things that they would be asked if they called 911 during an emergency!

The boys finished early and had a little fun posing outside of the trailer.