Dear parents and carers,
It has been a diverse, productive and very enjoyable week in the Year 2 neighbourhood.
This week we have been investigating what a character trait is. Some examples of character traits are (Ihsahn):
– Jack (Hey Jack): he is very worried (Alex)
– Uncle Vernon (Harry Potter) is very mean (Vivienne)
– 26th Story Treehouse: Terry is very silly Ihsahn:
– Billie B Brown: nervous at first then brave, creative (Evie M and Edie)
– Amber the Orange Fairy: happy (Aimi)
– Tom Gate: confident (Ivy Belle)
– Piggie: cheeky (Seb J)
– Charlie from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory: curious (Ava)
– Manny (Diary of a Wimpy Kid): annoying (Iggy)
– Sheila (Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing): bossy (Tuesday)
– Grandma (The Witches)
As part of our ongoing Inquiry “The Self”, we have been finishing our stunning abstract portraits, drawing pictures of our emotions, writing curious facts about ourselves and sharing our family trees. We have also begun brainstorming our captivating autobiographies in our Writers Journal. An autobiography is a factual story about your life (Edie). An autobiography has to be written by the person writing it. Some of the things we are thinking about including in our autobiographies are:
– Our first words (Gigi)
– The hospital where we were born (Vivienne)
– Times in our life when we hurt ourselves. For example I have a scar next to my eye. (Charlotte)
– If we were born early or not. For example I was born 2 weeks early (Joanna)
– How old we were when we started to walk (Evie M)
– The name of the first book we read (Thomas)
– Places we have travelled to (Nina)
– How old we were when we became friends with other people. (Owen)
– How old we were when our siblings were born (Tuesday)
– How old we were if we have been on an airplane (Alex)
Everyone should be treated equally.
A range of independent inquiries have also begun this week. Here is a snapshot of of few of those:
Charlotte: I worked out what a prime number is. To work out what a prime number is I started working out the factors of each red number on the prime numbers poster. When I got to 11 I realised there was a pattern with prime numbers. The pattern is that prime numbers only have factors of 1 and themselves. I used counters to help me work out the factors. “It took me about ten or eleven minutes to work it out. Eleven is a prime number. Ten isn’t. The factors of ten are 1, 2, 5 and 10”.
Evie and Zoe:
We wrote up some research questions in our writers journal about sharks. We were inspired by the bee investigation and the World Oceans Day provocation. We found out that:
6,000 sharks are killed a day . Most are just killed for their fins and the rest of the body is thrown away.
We found out that sharks have 300 teeth.
We found out sharks like to sleep near coral and the bottom of the sea near the sand to camouflage themselves.
Great white sharks have 300 teeth.
The biggest shark in the world is whale shark.
Whale sharks live 18 meters and 30 feet down in the water.
We were thinking we would like to do a big poster about our shark findings. We would like it to be like the poster Alex did for her response to My Community. Evie wants to find out how big megalodon teeth were when they were alive.
Wilco and Iggy:
We wrote up some research questions about snow leopards. Here are some facts we now know about snow leopards:
Snow leopards prey upon blue sheep.
They can run about 55 miles per hour.
They have evolved to live in some of the harshest conditions on earth.
Their grey or white coat is spotted with large black rosettes blended in perfectly with the steep and rocky mountains of Central Asia.
They have 32 teeth.
There are 4000 snow leopards left in the world.
No one knows how many spots they have.
Owen and River were looking through the microscope and a magnifying glass. They looked at a flower stem, a petal and some pollen. Firstly, Owen looked through a microscope at the petal that wasn’t working. He knew it wasn’;t working because it was blurry. River had an idea to put the microscope on top of where the laptops charge because there was brightv light coming through the window. Then the boys put the petal onto the microscope stage, then put a magnifying glass on top of the petal and between the magnifying lens. When they looked through the microscope it looked like purple scales of a lizard. Owen was surprised to see it. Then the boys looked at the stem following the same above procedure. It looked like a giant green leg that was very hairy. Next the boys put the pollen on the microscope stage. It looked like it had juice in it.
After Owen explained to us about his experience with the microscope, many of the students in our Neighbourhood wanted to look through the microscope at the pollen. Here are their observations:
Aimi: I think the pollen looks like dry mango.
Makaila I think the pollen looks like her dog Miko’s dog treat.
Blai: It looks really grubby. I can see a hole.
Binderiya: It looks like it is really wet inside.
Tucker: It looks like dry mango that is wet.
Iggy: It looks greenie and pinkie and wet.
Gabriel: It looks like a banana.
Thomas: It looks like a yellow mushroom.
Zoe: It looks like dry mango.
Another stellar ensemble of performances for our Friday afternoon. A big thank you to our two dazzling hosts Francie and Gigi. Thank you to Gigi for stepping in at the last moment.
We hope that you enjoyed reading our blog this week. Goodbye and we will see you again next week.
Your sincerely,
The Year 2 Neighbourhood