Ahh, it feels good to be communicating with you once again about the happenings in the classroom. We've been doing a lot in these past few weeks. I'll provide some highlights here...
Morning Meeting
The kids are now in full swing in regards to the expectations for our news shares and classroom journals. They know they need to share at least one of each every month. A few weeks ago I asked all the kids to bring in a news article to share as part of their weekly homework. This served as their November news share. These articles helped us learn about and discuss charitable organizations, money spent nationally on Halloween, scientific findings, local homecoming events, an 11-year old college graduate, healthy eating programs, times when people were not allowed to use public libraries, flood damage in our area, a Halloween dog parade, candy hoaxes on Halloween, an earthquake in Afghanistan, and much more. I brought in an article about a school in Michigan that had banned the new Captain Underpants book from their book fair (this same book was in our book fair). The principal of the school was concerned because in the book the boys, George and Harold, travel into the future and we see that one of them is married to a man and has a child. The principal was worried about kids selecting this book without their parents' approval and creating a firestorm. The kids in the school could purchase it electronically but not in the actual Book Fair.
I asked the kids what they thought about banning books. A number of them shared things they don't think should be in kids' books such as cursing and extreme violence. Some of them also mentioned that children's books should not be inappropriate. By this, they meant crass humor. My response was to wonder aloud whether or not everyone would agree on what is and what isn't inappropriate. For instance, Captain Underpants is a series of books about two boys who have hypnotized their principal into running around in his underwear with a cape on while the boys play pranks on teachers and parents. I supposed this could be considered inappropriate by some, yet very funny to others.
It was a great discussion. We didn't all agree on what should or should not be deemed inappropriate but we did come to see that opinions sure do vary. The trick, then, becomes figuring out how we make decisions for ourselves and for others knowing there are these existing differences in what each of us hope for in our families, schools, communities, country, and world. This is a great segue into a study of government. We won't get there for a while but at least we'll have this experience to draw upon when thinking about a representative democracy and the creation of laws. Actually, what we'll do with this in 2nd grade will be pretty basic but next year, as 3rd graders, we'll explore it with greater depth.
Reading Workshop
The last few weeks we've been working to build discussions around literature in which each of us builds on the ideas of others. The kids often begin these discussions by taking turns talking. It's not uncommon at all for these to sound more like conversations (a simple sharing) than discussions (responding back and forth around a central topic in an attempt to create new meanings). To grow into discussions, we read a wonderful book together called Stone Fox. It's the story of a boy who must win a dogsled race to not only save his family's farm but save his Grandfather's life. It's bittersweet ending is devastating yet uplifting. This is certainly a book that draws out lots and lots of classroom talk. We used these opportunities to turn and talk to discuss the ways in which someone might build on the ideas of another. Mrs. Shealy and I "spied" on the kids as they worked to do this and reported back all the phrases we heard people using such as "That reminds of...", "Yeah, like when...", "I think so too because...", "No, because...", and many more.
Building discussions around literature will be a topic we'll explore many more times over the next year-and-three-quarters. Eventually we will create classroom book clubs in which the kids select a book they want to read, set out a plan for their daily pages, and get together with others to discuss the story and the characters. Learning to have discussions, agree and disagree, find new meanings, generate new questions, and fall in love with great reads is well worth the time and effort it takes to scaffold the kids into this work. They are already doing so well. I can't wait!
This week in reading workshop we are exploring suffixes. Ask the kids to talk to you about this. They've been awfully excited to find endings on all sorts of words. Of course, they tend to overgeneralize this ("Hey Mr. Hass, 'her' has a suffix. It's -er!") but that is part of the learning process. It's how growth happens.
Writing Workshop
Okay, this newsletter is getting awfully long already so I'll say more about writing next week. We're working on an author study of Cynthia Rylant. One of the many things she does so well as a writer is to carefully describe the setting for us. Most recently, this is the work we've been taking on in our own writing.
Math
This week we transitioned to a study of place value. We are using base-10 blocks to construct numbers while we pay attention to the values of the 100s, 10s, and 1s. This began with the construction of a "block sculpture," moved to "sculpture puzzes" (build me a smiley face that is worth exactly 120), then to number riddles and even a few worksheets (heavy on the work, light on the sheet).
That's it for now. Please remember we are now collecting food items for our annual Passing of the Cans food drive. Our class has collected 20 items so far. We have an unofficial goal of 200, though we will talk many times about focusing on the purpose of this work rather than reaching any arbitrary number. We are also launching an inquiry into power, homelessness, and hunger that will help to contextualize the specifics of the food drive. Please send in cans!
As always, thanks so much for the amazing support you all offer at home. Thanks too for all the kind emails I have received over the course of this school year. I won't pretend as though they don't mean a whole lot. They do!
Have a great week,
Chris
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