The Beginning of Second Grade

Welcome to our 2nd grade blog!

So strange to say we finished our 3rd week of school, but have had only attended for 10 days! With this gradual transition we are all settling into routines and creating new friendships. From my perspective we have a great group of students who show kindness and positive attitudes. I am excited to see what we will learn and accomplish this year together!

This first blog will be a bit longer than most, but please read it through to learn more about your child's 2nd grade experience.

Important items: 

·         Please always take time to review all work sent home in your child's folder.  Note that if they are marked with a B,D or S they represent beginning skill level, developing at grade level and secure (a 1/2 sheet explanation was part of the curriculum packet). These are the grades you'll see on the report cards as well.

·         Cookie Dough sales start this week.  This is a Dublin fundraiser to help raise money for the many activities our PTA plans and organizes for our families. 

·         PTA is running a contest for membership among classrooms.  Please consider joining, as it is an incredible support to your child's school experience. If you did not attend curriculum night, you may want to check out our PTA Website to see the video they presented.  It was fun and informative.  One of the myths it clarified was that you do not have to attend meetings to become a member...another point was the benefits you get from joining.  A big one is the Dublin student contact book with families' addresses for birthday parties and such.

·         No School this coming Wednesday (Yom Kippur)

·         Picture day is September 24th and we have one of the first time slots at 9:15am (PLEASE BE ON TIME!)

LANGUAGE WORKSHOP

Students enjoyed the story, Wolf. This book shares the concepts of perseverance and practice with learning.  As discussed at curriculum night, we use a growth mindset each day in our classroom. I'll send the video in case you missed it (https://youtu.be/KUWn_TJTrnU).  This coming week we will read Goldisocks and the Three Libearians to learn about choosing just right books and discuss comparisons between classic tales and fractured (rewritten) tales.

WORD STUDY

We quickly recognized that most 2nd graders are not confident with short and long vowel sounds.  This is a crucial concept they must learn quickly to continue with 2nd grade expectations.  We made plans to practice this through charts, chants and songs daily. We also had lessons on consonant clusters. Some students tend to place a vowel sound between the blend such as "bul" for "bl".  Please practice these with your child and ask him/her to name the blends. For example, ask what letters make the blend in dress.

WRITER'S WORKSHOP

Our launching unit teaches expectations and components of writer's workshop with poetry. Next week we begin writing our own poetry. Mini lessons included:

·         Basics of poetry

·         How to study a poem

·         Poets & writers write from the heart

MATH WORKSHOP

Math workshop seems to be the favorite at this point.  We do a lot of hands-on practice.  We have also started some work in our math journals.  Because we do much of our practice work in class in these journals, you won't always see a lot of math practice coming home.  However, our home link (homework sheets) will begin at the end of unit 1.  Please take time to review your child's home link work with him/her before returning them back to school.  This is a time when you will be able to help support your child's learning one on one. I am noticing a handful of students that seem to be struggling with basic number concepts including place value (tens and ones) and hundred grid concepts. 

 Here is a snapshot of our beginning lessons:

·         Practice making 10

·         Beginning year pre-assessment

·         Recognizing penny, nickel, dime and quarter (and the value of each)

·         Review of number lines and how they work

·         Review of 100 grid and 4 important rules on using them (ask your child to tell you the 4 rules...I taught and reviewed them 3 days (going down one adds 10, going up one subtracts 10, going right one adds 1 and going left or back one subtracts 1)

·         Students were introduced to math work stations

·         Open response work...students solve a problem and have to explain how they did so in written form.  This is difficult for many, but will be a large part of our math learning this year.  

SOCIAL STUDIES

We are beginning our first unit on our local community.  For this unit, we introduce it by first creating our classroom community. Here is the classroom promise our class created for our community after learning all about the Constitution on Constitution Day! We have set the bar high for the year with outstanding expectations from all of our learners in 204.