Dear Families,
Happy October! I hope everyone is enjoying the beginning changes of the new fall season. The children have been very busy learning about place value of numbers up to 99, writing during writing workshop, reading in small guided reading groups, and getting acquainted with the second grade routine.
We are working on our first unit in Writing Workshop. Students are learning about the different parts of Writing Workshop: mini-lesson, workshop, share, and publishing. The authors will soon celebrate with a publishing party where we will share our pieces of writing with other students. Students will choose 1 piece of writing to publish for the celebration and they will be proudly displayed on our “Wild for Writing” bulletin board outside our classroom. Our next unit is Small Moments: Personal Narrative Writing.
We have been reading a variety of authentic literature during reading time. In September our class read many different versions of the fairy tale Little Red Riding Hood like Red Riding Hood, Lon Po Po, and Pretty Salma. While reading these stories we have been practicing comprehension skills such as: prediction, character traits, setting, and author’s purpose. Next week we will read The Pumpkin Blanket by Deborah Turney-Zagwyn and focus on making inferences as we read the story. Students will then create a class “pumpkin blanket” of our favorite parts from the book. Make sure to ask your child about Clee and what she gave up to save the pumpkins.
In word study we have been practicing phonics skills such as: beginning consonant blends, short vowels, compound words, and long vowels spelled with magic e. We have been working on grammar skills such as: complete sentences, nouns, and the four different types of sentences (statement, question, command, and exclamation). Below is poem we learned to help us remember the powers of MAGICAL e…
Shhh… It’s the magical silent e!
I hang around the ends of words,
so silently I sneak.
But oh the magic I perform,
to make the long vowel speak!
I hang around the ends of words
and I am not to blame…
Because I like to pinch the vowel and make him say his name!
In math, we are learning about place value of numbers up to 99. Students are practicing identifying the tens and ones place of a number, building the number with manipulatives, identifying numbers that are greater than, less than, and equal to a given number, writing the expanded form of a given number, and rounding a number to the nearest ten. We have also been working on our addition fact strategies to 20 and have learned a few different dice games to help us practice automaticity of these facts. Next we will learn about solving 1 step words problems to 60 using numbers, pictures, or words.
In science, we are very eager to start our study of the Vernal Pool. This is a year long unit. We plan to visit the Vernal Pool at least once per season. Next week, we will have a guest speaker from the Audubon Society come in to talk about how to identify different leaves we find outside. She will also bring in a stuffed owl that the students have loved from year to year.
Best, Miss S
Dear Families,
Welcome! We are off to a great start in second grade and I look forward to a fantastic year. I know my teaching must begin with making your child feel at home in the classroom and helping all the children come together into a learning community made up of unique individuals, each with his or her own learning style, interests, and hopes. We have been spending time getting to know each other by writing about our hopes and dreams, working on all about me activities, and participating in morning meeting.
Here are a few things that might prove helpful in getting your child settled into the second grade routine…
We eat lunch everyday at 12 pm and then head out to recess until 12:45 pm. Our specials are all at different times. We have no specials on Mondays. On Tuesdays we have art. On Wednesdays we have physical education. Please remember to send your child to school with sneakers to ensure their safety. On Thursdays we have music. On Fridays we have library. I encourage students to choose books they are highly interested in, since they may be taken home and used as books for their weekly reading logs, which will begin next week.
Each day children will have snack in the morning. I ask that you send in a small healthy snack and drink for your child to enjoy. It may be easier to pack the snack and drink in a separate bag from lunch so your child knows what they have for snack. We also have a morning recess each day from 10:50 to 11:05 am.
Just a reminder HOME TO SCHOOL folders should be checked each night by a parent. In the folder you will find newsletters, notices, corrected papers, and soon to be homework assignments. Any corrected papers should be taken out and reviewed by you and your child. I sometimes make comments such as try again, relook, please finish, etc. Please use these comments for additional practice at home (papers do not need to be returned, unless it is specified). White backpack folders will go home once a week on Thursdays and need to be returned the next day. These folders will contain school wide notices and information.
We will begin homework next week starting with a reading log on Monday. The expectation is that your child will read every night for at least 20 minutes. The reading will be recorded on the log and the log will be returned on Friday with a signature. The reading can be done by the child reading to themselves, the child reading to someone else or the child can listen to someone read to them. I will be emphasizing that we become better readers by practicing. The other homework nights will be Tuesdays and Thursdays, it will either be math or language arts. Students will bring their homework home in their HOME TO SCHOOL folder and will be expected to return it the next day. The homework is usually a review of material covered in class, it is designed to help the students develop a routine on how to get the homework from school to home and back again.
We will be celebrating every child’s birthday in the classroom by singing Happy Birthday and having your child bring in one of their favorite story books to share with the class during read aloud. When selecting books, please keep in mind the books will be read in a ten to fifteen minute time span. If your child is having a birthday party the school policy states that invitations are NOT be brought into school to be distributed. I have found in the past that student’s feelings get hurt if they are not included and invitations can be lost. If invitations are sent to school I will return them. Please use the Green Meadow Family directory to contact parents and students for activities outside of school.
Please make sure to mark your calendar for Green Meadow’s Curriculum Night on Wednesday, September 25, 2013. I look forward to seeing you all then!
Thank you to everyone that brought in supplies for our classroom. Just a friendly reminder, if you have not sent in your $5.00 for Weekly Reader please do so as soon as possible.
Best, Miss S