This week we welcomed a new student to our classroom: Mika! All of the students were so excited to meet her!

Thank you to everyone who came to Parent/Teacher Conferences on Thursday. It was great to see all of you and get to share what your child has learned so far in 2nd grade!

Here's a look at our week:

Reading: This week we began learning about making connections while reading. We focused on making Text-To-Self connections. We read several books together and listened for ways that the stories made us think of our own lives. This week we also started our Reading Groups. We read The Mixed-Up Chameleon and worked on our comprehension and vocabulary.

Writing: We started learning about Adjectives and how they help our reader better visualize our story. We learned that adjectives answer the questions What color?, How many?, and What size?

Math: In Math we began working with subtraction. We learned how to borrow from the tens in order to subtract.

Bible: This week we learned about the Baptism of Jesus and how God showed that Jesus was His Son. Then we learned about Satan coming to tempt Jesus in the desert. We learned that Jesus was able to say "no" to the things that He knew were wrong. Then we talked about what we can do when we are tempted to do something that we know is wrong: Run, Pray, Remember the Bible, and Ask for Help.

Important Information:
1. Spelling Words: new, due, cute, blue, use, knew, unit, true, blew, flute, music, few, been, December

2. Bible Memory Verse: "Come. Follow me," Jesus said. "I will make you fishers of people." Matthew 4:19

3. Our Scholastic Book Order will close this coming Friday. If you would like to order you can do so online or send in the order form and US dollars with your student.

4. Walkathon is this coming Saturday! Registration will start at 8:00 in the cafeteria and the race will start at 9:00. If you have any questions please let me know or contact the office.

Upcoming Events:
11/12 - Walkathon
11:14 - School Holiday!
11/19 - PTF Holiday Market in the Gym
11/22 - 1st and 2nd Grade Harvest Day and Pie Day
11/23-11/25 - Thanksgiving Holiday - No School
12/2 - Elementary Christmas Program and Early Dismissal for students

Have a great weekend!

Parent/Teacher Conferences Tomorrow

Parent/Teacher Conference Schedule

2.1 Miss Guiles

8:30-8:45 - Hannah Rubero

9:00-9:15 - Hirohisa Fukuda

9:15-9:30 - Sawa Higashionna

9:30-9:45 - Kiana Kelly

9:45-10:00 - Kai Kobayashi

10:15-10:30 - Ryan Lynn

10:30-10:45 - Mirai Kuba

10:45-11:00 - Ibuki Murai

11:00-11:15 - Ksenya Wilson

11:30-11:45 - Hime Sakane

11:45-12:00 - Trinity Tucker

12:00-1:00 - Lunch Break

1:00-1:15 - Dorothea Wiberg

1:15-1:30 - Seojeong Yoon

1:30-1:45 - Kensei Novak

Here's a look at our week:

Reading: This week we focused on making predictions while reading. We read several stories and stopped to make guesses about what would happen next using the clues in the story. We ended the week by reading The Tawny, Scrawny Lion and making predictions on our own.

Writing: In Writing we worked on our Fiction stories. We learned how to take our pre-writing and turn it into our first draft. Then we peer reflected, edited, and started our final copy.

Social Studies: For Social Studies we split into partners to learn about Peru, Brazil, Venezuela, and Ecuador. We used library books to find out about what they eat, how they live, what language they speak, and some interesting places.

Math: This week we finished learning about two-digit addition and took our Chapter 3 Test. On Friday we started learning about two-digit subtraction.

Bible: In Bible we finished learning about the Christmas story. We learned about the shepherds and the wise men coming to visit Jesus. We learned that Jesus is King! We also finished our Nativity Books to tell about the Christmas story.

Important Information:
1. Spelling Words: hold, those, hope, know, coat, spoke, over, grown, froze, older, obey, goal, hundred, high

2. Bible Memory Verse: And a voice came from heaven, "You are my beloved Son; with you I am well pleased." Mark 1:11

3. We have a new Scholastic Book Order! If you would like to order you can do so online at  http://world-schools.scholastic.co.uk/okinawa-christian-school-intl or by sending in your order form and US Dollars to me. The last day to order will Friday, November 11th.

4. Our PTF is hosting a Holiday Market on Saturday, November 19th. They want to decorate the gym with posters made by our students! Each student received a poster and information sheet today. If your student would like to create a Christmas poster, they can do so and return it to me by next Friday. You can also bring it to the PTF table next Thursday during Parent/Teacher Conferences. Each person that submits a poster will receive one raffle ticket for the Holiday Market. The best poster in each class will receive a free hot chocolate at the Holiday Market!

Upcoming Events:

11/3 - Parent/Teacher Conference - No School for students
11/12 - Walkathon
11/14 - School Holiday - No School
11/19 - Holiday Market in the gym
11/22 - 1st and 2nd Grade Harvest Day
11/23-11/25 - Thanksgiving Holiday - No School
12/2 - Christmas Program and 12:30 dismissal

Have a wonderful weekend!

Here's a peek at our week:

Reading: This week we learned about Story Elements or the pieces of a story. We learned that each story has a character, setting, problem, solution, and key events. Just like a puzzle, a story needs each of these pieces in order for us to see the whole picture.

Writing: This week we began writing our first fiction story! We spent our writing time planning for our story. On Monday we focused on choosing our character and setting. On Tuesday we started working on our problem and solution. Then on Wednesday we worked on our beginning, middle, and end.

Social Studies: For the next three weeks we will be learning about South America! We started this week by learning about Argentina!

Math: In Math we focused on two-digit addition. On Monday and Wednesday we worked on our Addition Books where we sorted problems based on regrouping or no regrouping. Later in the week we learned how to solve addition problems with 3 or 4 numbers and story problems.

Bible: This week we learned about the birth of John the Baptist and Jesus. We learned about the angel visiting Zechariah and Mary and the similarities and differences in their responses. We also learned about Mary and Joseph's journey to Bethlehem and the birth of Jesus.

Important Information:

1. Spelling Words: cheese, teeth, even, please, team, easy, breeze, these, peace, leave, keep, zero, yours, upon

2. Bible Verse: "Where is the child who has been born to be king of the Jews? When we were in the east, we saw his star. Now we have come to worship him." Matthew 2:2

3. Walkathon is coming up soon! If your student would like to walk please fill out the permission slip and send it in with your student. All 2nd grade students must be accompanied by an adult when the walk. If you have any questions, or are in need of another permission slip please let me know. All permission slips and registration fees are due by Friday, October 28th.

4. Parent/Teacher Conference will be on Thursday, November 3rd. Each student received a form with the scheduled time of their conference. Please sign and return these to me by Wednesday. If you cannot attend during your scheduled time, please let me know another day or time that will work for you. I really hope that I will get the chance to meet with all of you and share the ways your child is growing!

Upcoming Events:
11/3 - Parent/Teacher Conference - No School for Students
11/12 - Walkathon
11/14 - School Holiday - No School
11/19 - Holiday Market - In the Gym
11/23-25 - Thanksgiving Holiday - No School
12/2 - Elementary Christmas Program - Half Day of School

Have a great weekend!

On Thursday we had our All School Assembly! We were able to show our school spirit and learn about this year's Walkathon!

Reading: This week we continued learning about using punctuation in our reading. We read several Elephant and Piggie books by Mo Willems to help us see the importance of paying attention to the punctuation. We also added Book Shopping to our Daily 5 time. The students are doing a great job of building their reading stamina, comprehension, and vocabulary.

Writing: This week we finished our unit on personal narratives. Throughout this unit, the students have written many different stories about experiences they have had. They picked three different stories to take the through the revising, editing, and final copy phases of writing. Each student has made great improvements in their capitalization, punctuation, and their details. Great job!

Math: In Math we focused on two-digit addition. We learned how to regroup tens by using base-ten blocks. We also practiced adding a one-digit number to a two-digit number. On Friday we started adding two two-digit numbers. We will keep working on this next week as well.

Bible: In Bible we worked on our Old Testament timeline. Each student was given two stories to illustrate and then we put them together to show the story of the Old Testament. Here is a picture of our finished timeline:

Important Information:

1. Spelling Words: why, fire, wild, Bible, try, bright, mind, life, Friday, skylight, mild, kind, story, could

2. Memory Verse: "I bring you good news of great joy. It is for all people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you. He is Christ the Lord." Luke 2:10-11

3. Please check your student's take home folder for more information on this year's Walkathon. If you have any questions please let me know.

Dates to Remember:

11/3 - Parent Teacher Conferences - No School for Students
11/12 - Walkathon
11/14 - No School
11/19 - PTF Holiday Market
11/23-11/35 - Thanksgiving Holiday - No School

Have a wonderful weekend!

Here's a look at our short, but busy week:

Reading: This week we focused on using punctuation while reading. We learned what our voice should sound like when we see an exclamation point, a period, and a question mark. We will continue practicing this next week.  During our Daily 5 time we learned about Listen to Reading. Each student had a chance to record and listen to stories on RazKids.

Phonics: Our focus this week was on long a words. We learned about the four ways to spell the long a sound and practiced in groups.

Writing: Throughout this week we finished our second personal narrative. Each student worked hard to make sure they had capital letters and periods.  They also worked hard to add details to their story.

Math: This week we started our Unit on 2-digit addition.  We learned how to add 2-digit numbers by breaking up the numbers to help us get to the nearest ten. We also focused on knowing when to regroup in addition.

Bible: In Bible we finished learning about the Old Testament.  We learned about Elisha healing Naaman's skin disease and about how the people of Israel and Judah were exiled because of their disobedience. However, just as God promised, they were brought back to their land after 70 years. On Friday we started making our Timeline of the Old Testament. Each student picked a story from our studies to draw. Next week we will then these together to show the whole story of the Old Testament.

Important Information:

1. Spelling Words: grade, played, train, eight, faith, today, neighbor, gave, railway, praise, wave, weigh, enough, children

2. Bible Verse: "But you are the only true God. You are the only living God. You are the King who rules forever." Jeremiah 10:10

3. There will be NO SCHOOL on Monday.

4. Next Friday we will be having our Elementary Math Night from 6:30-7:30. This will be a chance for you to hear about our new Math program, learn how to log on to the online resources, and ask questions.

Upcoming Events:

10/21 - End of 1st Quarter
11/3 - Parent Teacher Conferences
11/12 - Walkathon
11/14 - No School - OCSI Holiday

Have a wonderful weekend!

Here's a look at what we learned this week:

Reading: In Reading we focused on Retelling the story. We learned that when we retell a story we remember the characters, setting, beginning, middle, and end. We practiced as a class, with a partner, and then on our own. This week we also added Word Work to our Daily 5 Reading time!

Writing: This week we continued writing narrative stories about our own lives. We also focused on our capital letters and periods. We learned that we need a capital letter at the beginning of each sentence, for people's names, and for places.

Math: This week we learned that even numbers can be written as the sum of two equal numbers. We also worked on our word problem skills and finished learning about "Join" math problems. On Wednesday we reviewed for our chapter test by playing Jeopardy and then we took our Chapter Test on Friday.

Bible: In Bible we learned about the prophet Elijah and that God is the only true God. We also learned that God takes care of His people by providing for their needs.

Important Information:

1. Spelling Words: grade, played, train, eight, faith, today, neighbor, gave, railway, praise, wave, weigh, enough, children

2. Bible Memory Verse: "But you are the only true God. You are the only living God. You are the King who rules forever." Jeremiah 10:10

3. There will be No School on Monday, October 10th.

4. It looks like we will be hit by a typhoon sometime early next week. Please check the OCSI website for information about school closings.

Have a great weekend!