Hello Weckie Parents!
We have been SO busy in 2nd Grade! It appears the cold weather season is upon us and I have a couple of suggestions to help out your Weckie at school this winter. On Thursdays, we go outside for Block Recess anywhere from 30 to 60 minutes (depending on weather). Then the kids are in for 40 minutes before they go to lunch, and then recess again. It would be super helpful for them to have an extra: pair of gloves, pair of socks and hat on these cold, wet days. You might want to just get in the habit of leaving these in their backpacks in a gallon Ziploc baggie.
Thank you to EVERYONE who has signed up to help with our Halloween Party! We are good on three parent volunteers now and the sign-up genius looks pretty great too! It is linked here as a reminder for all who have volunteered to donate items. Anything that is NOT food, can be sent in ahead of time! Kids will be allowed to wear their costumes to school that day but all scary masks and weapons should remain at home.
Boo Bash 2nd Grade Sign-Up
Readers' Workshop
We are approaching the end of our first unit, "Readers Grow Like Beanstalks" and I can confirm our readers are growing like beanstalks!! Mini-lessons have focused on:
- I can notice the beginnings and endings of new words.
- I can tackle tricky vowel team sounds in my reading.
- I can not only say the words, but I can figure out what they mean.
- I can check myself by fixing my mistakes when my reading does not make sense.
- I can notice how an author makes reader's react.
- I can notice when and how an author makes a powerful text.
- I can notice powerful author's craft and try it in my own writing.
I am in the midst of doing reading assessments with many of our readers and hope to launch guided reading groups and small group instruction soon!
These are the mentor texts we have read, re-read and LOVED these last two weeks:
Anchor charts from our Unit of Study in Readers' Workshop.
Writers' Workshop
In Writers' Workshop we continue to focus on writing personal narratives in the form of a smalll moment (a time we did something). Mini-lessons have focused on:
- I can tell a meaningful story like a master author.
- I can use my partner to help make my beginning stronger.
- I can make a plan for my small moment.
- I can stretch out a tiny moment into one story.
- I can elaborate my writing with actions and feelings.
- I can magnify my small moment with details.
- I can fix my ending to make my story better.
Phonics/Word Study
We continue our work in word study with vowel teams and first grade SNAP words! We have spent time looking at different vowel teams and in particular lately, when the vowel plus 'y' makes a long vowel sound. Our word detectives have done a nice job finding examples of these words around our room and in books that we read!
Math Workshop
In Math Workshop we have been learning MANY different strategies for addition! I have attached a picture of the chart we have created and will continue to add onto during this second unit. We have spent time working with doubles. The hope is for all second graders to know their doubles facts up to 20 pretty routinely by the end of the year. We have worked with combinations of 10. We have learned to use a double tens frame when adding two numbers. And we have looked at the near doubles strategy for addition facts that are almost doubles facts! Lastly we have spent the last few days with the turn-around-rule, learning how it works great for addition and proving how it does not work for subtraction! We ended this week with math stations that reviewed new math games including: Doubles are no Trouble, Fishing for 10s and the Money Exchange Game.
Social Studies
In Social Studies we are wrapping up our first unit about our local community! We have had great discussions about the people and places that make up our community. We have learned about human and natural features of a community. Then we took time to talk about needs and wants and how they can be met in our community. Last we learned about the three different types of communities as we read the story, The Little House (urban, suburban and rural).
No comments:
Post a Comment