Week of February 6th

Last week was so great! Your children did such a wonderful job with their famous American reports. I'm so proud of each and every one one of them. And isn't Seesaw amazing?!?! I'm so glad Mrs. Leet was able to capture everyone's presentation so that you can have your own copy!! Great work everyone!

CHRISTIAN CHARACTER FORMATION PROJECT
This week we will reevaluate the virtue of courage through reading about Peter in Matthew 16:13-28. As a reminder, we study Courage as God’s power for you to overcome fear. We will read about how the disciples followed Jesus and saw many miraculous things. They still, however, often misunderstood what Jesus was telling them. Nevertheless, one day Simon showed great clarity and courage when he boldly declared Jesus as the Messiah, and Jesus confirmed his declaration. In turn, Jesus gave Simon the name Peter.  As you have conversations with your child this week, ask yourselves this big question, “Who do you say Jesus is?” I pray that we would have the same courage as Peter—to boldly proclaim God’s name!

PHONICS and SPELLING
This week we will study and spell words with oo and ou spelling patterns. I'm excited to officially add could, would, and should to our word wall. The words on our word wall are expected to be used and spelled correctly in each child's writing. Keep up all the good work at home, and keep studying those spelling patterns!
LIST ONE

shook	hook	soot	brook	stood
should	would	crook	foot	could

LIST TWO

shook	hook	soot	brook	stood
should	would	crooked	wooden	couldn’t

BONUS – courage

READING SKILLS and STRATEGIES
Good Readers constantly ask questions before, during, and after reading. The purpose of asking questions while reading is to critically engage the reader and to promote higher order thinking skills. This week we will practice these good reading habits as we read! Questions are answered many different ways: in the text, from prior knowledge, inferences and further research. We may also discover that some questions can’t be answered! Don't forget to keep asking questions to your reader at home too!

GRAMMAR and WRITING

I'm so excited about writing this week! Our school is participating in something called March Book Madness. It's a lot like the basketball "March Madness" but with... you guessed it... books!! So, before the first round of voting, we will do our best to read the 16 nominees for the bracket. Then, during writing, we will be writing book reviews about the books. Near the beginning of March our class will get the chance to vote on our favorites. We will follow the bracket online and vote every few days... It's going to be exciting to see how our class matches up with other classes and schools across the country. What a SUPER fun way to get excited about reading and writing! Be sure to ask your second grader about what books he/she enjoyed this week!

Although we are always working on grammar, our focus this week will be on irregular verbs. Irregular verbs have special forms in the past tense. We'll be checking for that and all other grammar rules in our book reviews! Also, feel free to chat with your child about the letters they are sending in their journals each week... enjoy some good teachable moments!

NEWS and NOTES

• February 9th - Candygrams due to the office
• This Friday, February 10th is our class Valentine's Day party!
• NO SCHOOL - February 13th and 14th (teacher professional development)
• CCLS Auction - February 18th
• NO SCHOOL - February 20th - President's Day

BLESSINGS ON YOUR WEEK!