This is Where the Voting will Take Place!

We will be voting right here on this blog, here at school after we read and explore the books!

Children's Choice Book Awards

One exciting tradition we have in second grade is voting in the Children's Choice Book Awards! This is the fourth year my class has participated.  It's a great chance to vote for some favorite books, as well as discover some new ones!  I have checked the books out of the Walpole Public Library and we will be reading them here at school so that we are ready to vote before Children's Book Week, May 13-19th.  Check out the link here to see the new nominees for 2013: http://www.bookweekonline.com/.

Here are the winners from 2012:

K-2 Book of the Year

3-4 Book of the Year

Author of the Year

Illustrator of the Year

Biblionasium

Today I introduced the class to a website called Biblionasium. It is like a goodreads for kids!  Students chose avatars and backgrounds today.  They also learned to navigate the page, but this will probably take some more practice.  On Biblionasium, students can explore books, add books to shelves as read or want to read.  They can log reading minutes, write reviews, and suggest books to friends.  In order for students to get "friends" they need a parents assistance as they need your email address.  Their "friend" choices are limited to me and the students in the class.  
I am trying to decide on book to assign as a class challenge, along the lines of a "One Class, One Book" sort of thing.  It will be like we are all reading a book together!  More info to come soon! 

Blog Posts

I have to apologize for being so neglectful of this blog!  I have been enjoying the ease and efficiency of posting updates on our class Facebook page!  In case you haven't yet found it, here is the link: Miss Perron's Class Facebook Page

Because of this, I haven't been posting on this beautiful blog!  I welcome any ideas you might have.  Are there any peeks into life in our class that you are especially interested in?  Please email me, if you do!

One update I have made here is creating a page for homework links.  As you know, the two we use regularly are Xtra Math and Spelling City.  I am going to add other links that the students enjoy using.  As I add them, I will also post a bit about them here. 

The first website I would like to tell you about is Education City.  This is the second year we have subscribed to Education City.  It is a fun site that covers many of our standards through visually fun games.  If students do not sign in, they can still play the games.  If students DO sign in, however, they have the option of SAVING their scores if they are pleased with their work.  These scores are reported to me so that I can see which activities they have completed and how they are doing.  (If they save a score and later get a better score, they can replace their score!)  Their sign-in information is located in their binders.  Unfortunately, it is assigned and I can not change it. 

At times I will set up a My City (ask your child to show you where this icon is) for our center time.  Here I can specify assignments I want them to work on. 

A favorite activity is Play Live. Here, students can play a challenge (math facts or spelling) against other students. They can choose to play against a student who is playing somewhere else in the nation, school, or class.  This is great practice for Xtra Math.  Enjoy! 

International Dot Day!

Wow! So the final number of teachers, students, libraians, and others who registered to celebrate International Dot Day this year was over 600,000 worldwide! Every state in the United States and 6 continents (anyone have a friend in Antartica?!) were represented. Last year there were about 17,000. What growth! I am excited to say that this was my third year celebrating with my class and second year making our awesome t-shirts! (I'll post a short video with the technique we used at the end of this post.)

After celebrating at school on Friday, Emily and I headed to the Blue Bunny in Dedham and helped create a huge collaborative dot with Peter! You'l see it in this slideshow. Didn't it come out beautiful?!

 



On Saturday, we headed in The Children's Museum in Boston where we were able to participate in the Dot Day celebration. Emily and I even had our picture taken with the Mayor of Boston, Mr. Tom Menino.

To learn more about the message of The Dot and Dot Day, here are the Reynolds brothers in a really cool Discovery Education webcast to tell you all about it!

 

Looking forward to next year.  It is the 10th anniversary of the book.  I am sure exciting things are to come!

 

Here's the tie-dye Sharpie tie-dye project video:

 



           

New School Year!

Dear Second Grade Stars and families,
Welcome back to a new school year!  We had a wonderful first couple of days and I am confident that our year will continue as such.  I can already tell this is a fun, enthusiastic group of students.  I know many of you already, but for those parents who I have not yet met, here is just a little bit about me.  I grew up in Roslindale and Hyde Park (though my families roots are JP).  I attended Holy Name and then Boston Latin School, from which I graduated in 1991.  I received my Bachelor's of Science in Elementary Education from Bridgewater State College and my Master's in Elementary Education from Framingham State College.  I have taught in Walpole since 1998. 
I had two favorite teachers in elementary school, Mrs. O'Grady in 5th grade, and Mr. Bernazzani in second.  I have no idea where either of them are now or if they are still teaching, but they truly inspired me to become an educator.  From what I remember of them, they were patient, yet firm, and taught with a sense of humor.  They also allowed us to be curious and creative.  I like to think that those are qualities that I have maintained in my own teaching style. 
Teaching is constantly evolving.  Standards and policies change, students and classroom dynamics change, families change.  What works one year, may not work the next.  What works with one student, may not work with another.  While there are certain practices that work from year to year, please know that I am not afraid to try new methods or make adjustments to old ones so that I can best meet the needs of the children in my class.  Learning is not "one size fits all" and it sometimes takes a few tries to figure out the "right fit".  It is my hope that we will have open communication and work together to make this the very best year yet!   

Biblionasium, Etc...

Here is a new, exciting website that I have shared with the class: Biblionasium.  If you have ever used Good Reads for yourself, you will see that this is a similar, although kid friendly, site!  I've been able to show the kids some limited features in class, as they do need your permission and email to access other features.  Kids can rate and review books they've read, get recommendations from friends, and win virtual prizes for logged reading minutes.
This site is a Beta version, so we have discovered some glitches, such as able to log in one time, but unable another.  Despite that, however, the kids seemed REALLY motivated to use it, and ANYTHING (well...almost) that motivates kids to read and share what they've read is a good thing!  I plan on checking in and hopefully interacting on the site over the summer, so I'll be interested to see if students continue to use it.


Also, I will leave their blogs and  XtraMath up for them to use until I have to enter my next year's class.  Education City will also be available, along with any links from my website.  Great ways to avoid Summer Brain Drain!! :)