This week, students will finish presenting their Passion Projects to the class on Tuesday and Wednesday. It’s been so fun watching their creativity and learning shine through their work!

On Thursday, in place of traditional student-led conferences, we’ll have all Passion Projects on display for the community to see during the carnival from 3:00–5:00 PM.

If your child created a diorama, tri-fold board, or model, please plan to take it home when you leave on Thursday. We’re so proud of all the hard work and heart they’ve poured into these projects!

This week, students will put the finishing touches on their visual presentations for their Passion Projects. Presentation options include a diorama, trifold board, model, or PowerPoint. Students will have time to work on their projects in class on Monday and Wednesday, and presentations will begin on Thursday.

Parent Volunteers Needed

We’re looking for a few extra hands during the afternoon this week from 12:30 to 1:15 PM to help students as they complete their projects. No special experience is needed—just a willingness to help and encourage!

Possible ways to help include:

• Assisting students with placing poster letters in a straight line
• Helping students choose and email pictures for their project
• Supporting students using PowerPoint
• Typing paragraphs for students who need extra help catching up

If you're available on any day this week, please reply and let me know which date(s) work best for you. Even one day of your time would make a big difference!

We’re excited to begin the project portion of our Passion Projects starting this Monday! Students will be creating a visual presentation of their topic, such as a diorama, tri-fold board, model, or PowerPoint presentation.

If your child is planning to make a diorama, model, or tri-fold board, please make sure they bring any supplies they’ll need to school on Monday. The school will provide tri-fold boards for those who are using them, but students are responsible for bringing in any display materials they’d like to include—such as decorations, craft supplies, printed pictures, letters for the project title on a tri-fold board, labels, or stickers.

Parent Volunteers Needed:

I’m still looking for parent volunteers to come in during the afternoon from 12:30 to 1:15 this week.

Your help might include:

• Helping the students to navigate Microsoft word in creating a new document.
• Typing their work while the student reads it to you.
• Helping students to save their documents.
• Helping students to share their typed-up paragraphs with me.
• Helping students plan out their tri-fold board or diorama.

No special experience is needed, just a willingness to help and encourage! If you’re available on any of these days, please reply and let me know which date(s) would work best for you. Even just one day of your time would make a big difference!

Last week, students began to research their topic, take notes, and write their informational paragraphs. Your student should be finished with research and note-taking. If they are not finished yet, please help them with this at home so that they will be on target to finish their passion project on time. 

This week students will:

• Finish writing their paragraphs: Students are moving beyond the 5-sentence "hamburger" paragraphs to write longer, 8+ sentence paragraphs for their Passion Projects. Using the TIDE structure — Topic sentence, Information, and Detailed explanation (repeated three times), and an Ending sentence — they will practice developing and supporting their ideas more fully.
• Type their paragraphs on the computer.

Parent Volunteers Needed:

I’m looking for parent volunteers to come in during the afternoon from 12:30 to 1:15 this week.

Your help might include:

• Helping them to navigate websites.
• Reading information together with students.
• Guiding them to understand what they’ve read.
• Supporting them in taking clear and accurate notes.
• Helping students transfer their notes to their paragraph graphic organizers.
• Helping the students to navigate Microsoft Word in creating a new document.
• Helping students to save their documents.
• Helping students to share their typed-up paragraphs with me.

No special experience is needed, just a willingness to help and encourage! If you’re available on any of these days, please reply and let me know which date(s) would work best for you. Even just one day of your time would make a big difference!

Passion Projects:

Last week, students chose their topic for their passion projects. I have never had such unique project topics as this year! After choosing their topic, students began to research their topic.

This week students will:

• Finish researching and note-taking.
• Begin Paragraphs: Students are moving beyond the 5-sentence "hamburger" paragraphs to write longer, 8+ sentence paragraphs for their Passion Projects. Using the TIDE structure — Topic sentence, Information and Detailed explanation (repeated three times), and an Ending sentence — they will practice developing and supporting their ideas more fully.

I am excited to see how their research and writing skills are growing!

This week, our class will kick off Passion Projects—an exciting and time-honored tradition in 2nd Grade at Westgate. Each student will choose a topic related to Social Studies or Science, such as panda bears, the biography of Helen Keller, or the country of France, etc. They’ll spend time researching their topic, writing a detailed paragraph, and creating a final project to showcase what they’ve learned. Final projects might be a tri-fold board, diorama, costume and performance, model/construction, or PowerPoint presentation. Projects will include non-fiction elements like maps, graphs, diagrams, timelines, photographs, or captions. Students are also welcome to bring in a related artifact or real-life object connected to their topic, for example, a piece of volcanic rock for a project on volcanoes—to help bring their presentation to life. I can’t wait to see their curiosity and creativity shine through!

This week students will:

• Choose 3 possible topics that they are interested in but would like to learn more about. We will do a little bit of research about each topic before deciding the final choice.
• Make our final topic choice and plan out what to research.
• Begin researching and note-taking.

Last week, we learned about how water shapes the Earth’s surface. Our lesson was called, “What’s strong enough to make a canyon?” Through a hands-on activity, we saw evidence of how water is strong enough to carry rocks, sand, and dirt, and leave behind landforms like canyons. We also made observations of Earth events using videos, images, and text. We analyzed these sources to provide evidence that Earth events can occur quickly or slowly.

This week, we will solve the Mystery, “How can you stop landslides after a wildfire?” Students will design their own ways to stop rain from washing away a model hillside. We will wrap up this unit with a post-test.

Here’s something you can do to encourage your child’s curiosity: next time you’re driving together, look for steep places along the road where engineers have tried to prevent erosion, like hillsides or cliffs. Your child will know to look for walls, nets, and plants that hold back the rocks and soil!

Last week our class continued our current Earth Science unit, “Earth Surface Changes.” We solved the mystery, “Why is there sand at the beach?” We learned how rivers can be powerful enough to carry rocks and slam them into each other, breaking them into smaller and smaller pieces along the way.

This week, we will discover why flash floods are more likely to happen in some places and less likely in others. We will learn how steep slopes, soil that doesn’t soak up water, and heavy rainstorms will all contribute to flooding.

Here’s something you can do to encourage your child’s curiosity: next time you’re walking outside, take a look at the ground at your feet. In some places -- like a grassy park or a garden — the ground soaks up water. In other places — like a paved parking lot — water doesn’t soak in. Discuss with your child — where do you think you are most likely to find puddles after it rains? On a rainy day, check to see if you are right!

Last week, students learned about chemical and physical changes to matter. For example, breaking a stick is a physical change, and making pancakes is a chemical change.

This week, students will be making Oobleck – a non-Newtonian liquid. You can learn what Oobleck is by clicking here. Students will also take the Social Studies Pre-test. After Winter Break, we will begin our new Social Studies unit “My Community in the Past.”

On Friday of last week, students began to learn about the 3 states of matter – solids, liquids, and gases. Students learned about the properties of each type of matter, including how the molecules are different in solids, liquids, and gases.  

This week, students will continue to learn about states of matter. They will also learn about chemical and physical changes to matter. For example, breaking a stick is a physical change, and making pancakes is a chemical change. 

This week in science we will explore the idea that some solid materials can be melted into liquids then frozen back into solids again. In class, students will learn about the history of toy-making and how the invention of plastic made it possible for toys to be mass-produced. Then students will investigate the melting property of different types of candy.

Later in the week, we will learn how new materials are constantly being invented, and that this makes it possible to solve new problems. In class, students will learn the story of how “Post-it” notes were invented and learn that often new materials get invented before anyone knows exactly what problem they’ll solve. We considered the question, “What materials might people invent in the future?”, then came up with inventions involving a hypothetical new material, “bouncy glass.”

This past week in science we explored how different properties of clothing materials are good for different situations.  In class, students imagined that they were on a remote island.  Using materials that washed ashore, they designed hats that would protect them from the sun. Students created hats, based on the material’s properties such as stiff, absorbent, soft, etc.

This coming week in science we will explore how different materials can conduct and insulate heat.  You can help you child’s learning by talking with them at breakfast about the different things your family uses to handle hot food.  Maybe you use oven mitts to take hot food out of the oven?  Maybe you use a plastic thermos for hot coffee?  Discuss how these materials insulate and protect your hands from the heat.

In class, students will imagine that they are still on a remote island.  On the imaginary island, they will need to cook an egg using a piece of metal as a pan and then have to figure out what materials they could use to pick up the hot pan and not burn their hands. 

This week, we will begin our second Science Unit, “Matter and Materials” in which we will be focusing on Physical Science.  In this unit, students will learn that matter exists as different substances that have observable different properties.

Our focuses for this week:

• Tuesday: We will first take a virtual tour of a foundry to make observations about the hot work that takes place there. We will generate observations and questions about how foundry workers stay safe around so much heat. We will write and discuss our initial thoughts about what foundry workers wear, and how it protects them.
• Wednesday-Friday: We will plan and conduct an investigation of the properties of various materials.
  • We will begin by exploring different materials and grouping them into categories.
  • We will then explore specific properties of materials used for clothing, such as texture, flexibility, and absorbency.
  • We use this information to design and build a hat that protects from the Sun.

We will continue to learn about biodiversity and ecosystems. This week we will focus on these concepts:

• Water, sunlight, and plant growth
• Different Needs of Different Plants
• Biodiversity in global habitats
• Biodiversity in local habitats