January 27, 2017 + Field Day Info!

Dear 2B Families,

I can't believe January is almost over! Although it feels a little bit like Fall with all the leaves we keep finding outside! Thanks Mrs. Smith for this cute video!

On a personal note, it has been quite a busy month! Mr. Dombrowski and I had the joy and privilege to witness not one, but TWO weddings the first two weekends of January! The first one, a dear friend of mine from high school and college. The second one, Mr. Dombrowski's cousin who was actually the best man at our wedding! Mr. D had a chance to return the favor! Last weekend my family and I had the joy of celebrating a Baby Shower for our sweet cousin! They are expecting their first baby girl in March. It's been a busy and blessed month! A few pictures to share...

There is A LOT happening here at Arete in February!

Sign Up: Daddy/Daughter Dance Volunteer Sign Up

MAP Testing: This will take place on Tuesday 1/31 and Friday 2/3. Please make sure your scholar comes to school with a full belly of something nutritious from breakfast! 

Greek Festival: Don't forget about our Greek Festival on Friday, February 3rd.

Please also "Save the Date" for...

Friday, Feb 10: Half Day (Teacher Inservice in the afternoon)

Tuesday, Feb 14: Great Hearts Day 

*8:05-8:45: Assembly, 1:30-2:00: Partner Class Reading/Socratic Discussion, 2:00-2:45: Class Party* 

We have reserved this special day to focus on the virtue of friendship and celebrate the traits that make a great-hearted student. Teachers are planning interactive and fun activities centered around these topics, and time will be set aside for students to create hand-made Great Hearts Day cards for their classmates.  Archway Arete strives to cultivate a rich, academic environment rooted in the classical tradition. This many times requires popular culture to be left at the door. On that note, students will not be permitted to bring store-bought valentines, candy, or gifts to school. Thank you for partnering with us.

Thursday, Feb 16: Class Pictures *We are scheduled for 9:30am

Friday, Feb 17: Athletic Field Day ~ Please wear athletic gear (free of pop culture, sport team logos and brand logos are okay) and athletic shoes (any color) are mandatory. Bring a sack lunch as no school lunch will be served on this day. Don't forget your water bottle! We will eat at 11:00 in the classroom.

Athletic Field Day: Athletic Field Day is Friday, February 17 from 8:30-11:00 for K-2 classes and from 12:00-2:30 for grades 3-5. Each year classes are assigned a Greek City State for their team. This year, our team is THEBES and our team color is YELLOW. There will be no school lunch offered on Athletic Field Day. Please send your child to school with a lunch.

Volunteers for Athletic Field Day: In order to have Athletic Field Day run smoothly, we need your help! Coach Rubino & Coach Steinmann need volunteers setting up and running the event. Please sign up here to help with the events. Also, we need a few volunteers for class to help with donating a cooler and snacks. Please sign up here to volunteer for our class.

Athletic Field Day Attire: Please have your child wear a YELLOW color t-shirt that day. Students may decorate their shirts with their team name and/or symbol of their Greek City State. Students should wear athletic clothing free of pop culture references. Sports team and brand logos are acceptable on clothing. Athletic shoes are mandatory (any color). Hats and sunglasses may be worn. Sunscreen must be applied at home. Please see pg. 52 in the family handbook for more detailed information.

Fun in PE Today...

Curriculum Next Week:

Literature: We will read two chapters in Cricket in Times Square and discuss new vocabulary words!

Writing/Grammar: Next week we will review the writing process, play compound word Pictionary, and continue to classify sentences! Students will be introduced to the pronoun jingle and the subject pronoun jingle in grammar!

Spalding: Monday: royal, objection, object, please, pleasure, measure, treasure, navy
Tuesday: forty, fourteen, four, population, proper, judge, weather, whether, worth, contain, figure
Wednesday: sudden, instead, throw, threw, personal, everything, rate, chief

Math: We will start a new unit on multiplying and dividing by 4 and 5! If you have a moment in the car, at the grocery store, or cleaning up from dinner have your mathematician practice counting by 4s!

Science: Next week we will learn about nutrients that help keep our bodies healthy and strong. We will create a well-balanced meal for breakfast, lunch, and dinner!

We have LOVED learning about the Human Body. Please ask me what I remember about the digestive and excretory systems. We did a super gross demonstration of the Digestive System on Tuesday! Check it out! It all started with a PEANUT BUTTER SANDWICH and we ended up with our solid waste at the end!

We also wrote about the journey of our saltine cracker...

History: I hope that the scholars have enjoyed their journey through Ancient Greece. Please help your scholar prepare for the unit test by completing the study guide over the weekend. We will play trivia on Monday in order to prepare for the test. We are all looking forward to celebrating the culmination of an exciting unit at Greek Fest on Friday! Thank you for donating items and contributing your time to make this a great event possible.

Have a great weekend!

Love,

Mrs. Dombrowski

Healthy Snack Day!

Healthy Snack Day is this Thursday, January 26th. Please pack your favorite fruit or vegetable to enjoy during snack time!

January Fun!

Dear 2B Families,

We survived our 4 day week! Did the shorter week feel longer to anyone else? Just me? :-) 

Just a HEADS UP that February is going to be a VERY BUSY month! We have our Greek Festival AND Great Hearts Day!

MAP Testing: Testing will take place again on Tuesday, January 31 and Friday, February 3. This is more practice for our little ones on how to take tests on a laptop. Just make sure they come to school with a full tummy (nutritious breakfast) and ready to do their best on 1/31 and 2/2! Thank you for your help with this!

Greek Festival: Friday, February 3 (after MAP testing) students will enjoy a Greek Festival to celebrate the culmination of our unit on Ancient Greece and to recognize all we have learned about their culture and history. Please use this sign up link to help with items needed. This is for the ENTIRE 2nd grade!

Great Hearts Day: A Day for Friendship - Tuesday, February 14th is Great Hearts Day! We have reserved this special day to focus on the virtue of friendship and celebrate the traits that make a great-hearted student. Teachers are planning interactive and fun activities centered around these topics, and time will be set aside for students to create hand-made Great Hearts Day cards for their classmates. Archway Arete strives to cultivate a rich, academic environment rooted in the classical tradition. This many times requires popular culture to be left at the door. On that note, students will not be permitted to bring store-bought valentines, candy, or gifts to school. Thank you for partnering with us.

Scholar Shout-Outs:

To ALL of our scholars for working so hard at memorizing Smart by Shel Silverstein. They sound great for only the 2nd week of practice. We will keep working on it!

Thank you Kendall for bringing in this book about the Human Body!

Next Week in 2B:

Language Arts:

Literature ~ In literature next week we will read chapters 4-6 in Cricket in Times Square, answering comprehension questions after each chapter, as well as discussing adults in our lives and the special things they do for us! We will also use context clues to figure out meanings of unknown vocabulary words!

Writing/Grammar ~ We are revising and editing our paragraph about our two favorite colors!

Spalding Words ~
Monday: fairy, knock, leather, linen, mixture, nation, pause, peace, permission, rough
Tuesday: social (society), steal (steel), strange, trophy, voices, voice, eight, ate
Wednesday: afraid, uncle, rather, comfort, election, elect, aboard, jail, shed, refuse, district, restrain

Math: We will be reviewing mental math strategies from chapter 7. Thursday nights homework will provide great practice for the test Friday! Practice some mental math in the car like these problems: 71-5, 245-3, 24+5, 123+10, etc. We talked a lot about how to do this in our head without having to "stack" the problem.

Science: We will continue learning about the human body by studying the digestive system and excretory system (insert giggles and laughter from our 2nd graders)! We will also be conducting a fun (and maybe a little gross?) demonstration of the DIGESTIVE system PLUS we will be making a MODEL of the excretory system using some common items! Please use this link to sign up to donate these items. We appreciate your generosity! Please ask me what I remember about cells, tissues, and organs!

History: We are excited to present the Great Thinkers of Ancient Greece and discover the origins of many of our roots here in the United States, and especially at Archway Arete. Students will connect our Socratic-style discussion to Socrates himself. Challenge your scholars to differentiate facts between Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, and Alexander the Great.

Love,
Mrs. Dombrowski

Welcome Back! Happy New Year!

Dear 2B Families,
Happy New Year! I hope you all had a restful and enjoyable Winter Break! Like I told the kids this week...

I think they were excited about the scented donut erasers!
Happy New Year from Team Dombrowski (Paisley included)!

Scholar Shout Outs: 
Happy Birthday Megan on December 29th! It's GREAT to be 8!

Happy 1/2 Birthday to these sweet scholars: Andrea on January 5th, Thomas on January 6th and Kodie on January 10th!

Next week in 2B...

Language Arts: We will be moving from Reading Logs to Book Reports! I'll be sending chapter books home next week with your scholars. We will start with historical fiction and assign the "hand report" which you will see in your scholar's folder on Monday. Your child will have 3 weeks to finish, reading 20 minutes each night. If they finish early please have them do the report and we will assign them the next book. Thank you for your help with this!

Literature: This week in literature we will be reading from our new book, The Cricket in Times Square. If you have not already please send the book in with your child. We will discuss what it is like to move from one place to another. We will also have a group discussion about a time we wanted something really badly and our parents wouldn’t let us have it. I will ask the kids if they were able to talk their parents into it, or if they realized why their parents told them no. We will read chapters 1-3 in the book and continue to discuss characters. Ask your student how Paul the shuttle conductor was nice to Mario!

Writing and Grammar: In grammar we will continue to diagram sentences! In writing we will use our prewriting map from last week to write a rough draft of a paragraph on our favorite colors!

Spalding Words: We will only have 19 words next week since there is no school on Monday.
Tuesday: dozen, there, their, they're, tax, number, October, reason, fifth
Wednesday: baking, bake, bowl, cheap, cheerful, chicken, driving, drive, echoes, echo

Math: Next week we will continue our unit on mental math! The students are doing a wonderful job on this challenging unit! We had a great discussion and came to the conclusion that mistakes and challenges make our brains learn best! Next week we will be working on adding and subtracting two and three digit numbers mentally!

History: We will continue with our unit on Ancient Greece learning more about Athens, the golden age, and Pericles. We will also learn about some arts in which Athens excelled. Ask me what I learned about the Olympic Games and the Persian War!

Science: Next week students will learn how all living things are made up of microscopic cells. We will describe the relationship among cells, tissues, organs, and systems. Ask me about the body systems at home! What are they and what functions do they perform?

Wishing you a wonderful new year! I know it's going to be a great 2nd semester!

Love,
Mrs. Dombrowski

Thankful Hearts!

Dear 2B Families,

Thank you so much for the generous class gift! We appreciate you all thinking of us this time of year and treating us to our favorite places. Wishing you all a wonderful, cozy, and relaxing Winter Break! Happy Holidays!

Love,
Mrs. Dombrowski & Mrs. Smith

P.S. E-MAIL Issues: There seems to be a delay on our school e-mail and some parents have said e-mails have come back as "undeliverable". If I have not responded to an e-mail, I apologize! It might be because of the delay. If you can try sending it again to see if it delivers on time, that would be great. I was getting e-mails days late it seemed. I hope this corrects itself over the break. Thank you!

Wish List:

Thank you SO much for the Clorox Wipe donations! We are set for a while! However, we are down to our last box of Kleenex. If you would be able to donate a box to share in the new year, our runny noses would greatly appreciate it!

Winter Break is Here! Give a Big Cheer!

Dear 2B Families,

We made it! Hooray! Thanks for "hanging in there" with us these last few days. 

I hope everyone enjoys their much needed break. Have a wonderful time with your family! I hope you can enjoy several mornings of staying in your pajamas and drinking hot chocolate! And HOORAY for not having to pack LUNCHES until January 9th! That's even better!

I told the students that if they can recite "The Night Before Christmas" (this is a recording of the WHOLE class reciting together and it's pretty cute - ENJOY!) to their family over the break I will give them something special when they return on January 9th! Please e-mail me if your scholar recited this poem for your family! I would LOVE to hear about it!

Scholar Shout-Out:

Livia brought in a book "The Night Before Christmas" by Clement C. Moore. We enjoyed reading it as a class and everyone reciting! What fun! Thank you, Livia!

We made cards for Mrs. Smith and sang to her! "For She's a Jolly Good Teacher..." We love you Mrs. Smith!

Here are a few pictures to share from our Boxcar Feast today. Thank you to all of the parents for helping out!

Here is what we will be learning when we return from break...

Language Arts: We will be moving from Reading Reflection Logs for homework to BOOK REPORTS! The students are so excited to start reading chapter books. We will start with Historical Fiction and books will be sent home with your scholars on January 9th.

Grammar: Students will be editing, classifying, and unscrambling sentences! We will also introduce students to the writing process and they will write their first explanatory piece on their favorite colors. We will be in the prewriting stage where students are brainstorming and organizing their ideas.

Literature: We will start discovering the setting of our next book; Cricket in Times Square! Students will learn about Vermont and New York, as well as plot points on a map! Please send in a copy of Cricket in Times Square with your scholar!

Math: We will start a new unit on mental math! This unit is challenging. Please encourage and cheer on your student, fight the urge to “rescue them”! We will rely heavily on place value, decomposing numbers, and visualizing numbers! We will work to round the number to the nearest 10, and then add from there. For example 68+14 would be 70+12 mentally. Please encourage your students to follow the directions and not use the vertical algorithm! Workbook A may be kept at home...hooray! Math Workbook B will be sent home January 9th.

Science: We will start a new unit on the Human Body. We will begin with learning about the five senses associated with our body and will identify these important systems: skeletal, circulatory, nervous, digestive, and excretory. We will also learn about the significant contributions of Anton van Leeuwenhoek and talk about bacteria!

History: Our studies of Ancient Greece (Athens) will continue through learning about how Athenian boys and girls were educated. We will recognize that men and women were not equal in Athenian society. Next, we will locate Sparta on a map of Ancient Greece and understand the military lifestyle and education in Sparta. We will learn the difference between Sparta and Athens. If we have time we will dive into the Persian Wars and identify some important battles. I look forward to hearing what your scholars have to share as we continue learning about Ancient Greece. We are also busily preparing for our Greek Festival! Stay tuned!

Love,
Mrs. Dombrowski

Important Announcements

Important Announcements:

· Winter break starts on Thursday, December 22nd through Sunday, January 8th. School will resume on Monday, January 9th.
· Quarter 2 Evaluations will be sent to parents on Friday, January 6 at noon.

To 2nd and 3rd grade families:

We are holding a grade-level team competition called “Royalty for a Day” to see who can bring in the most tax credits to support Archway Arete’s extracurricular clubs and sports. If 2nd and 3rd grades bring in the most tax credits, I will be crowned “Queen of Sports” for a day when we return from our holiday break. As the Queen, I plan on holding a dodge ball tournament for all my royal subjects! I will also hand out a special treat at the end of the tournament. I appreciate all your help in asking friends, neighbors, and family to help support Archway Arete and help us win this competition!

Most Gratefully, Coach Rubino, Queen of Sports