The View from 2-2

Hi, all!

The children and I had a great week together at school. Everyone is becoming a bit more settled, and they are really showing me how ready they are to learn! I was excited to get all of our reading groups up and running this week! It was great listening to every child read, and their leveled group seemed to fit them nicely. We've now practiced 4 out of our 5 "Daily 5" centers: Read to self, Read with a buddy, Writing, and most recently- Word work. There are a few different ways to practice new words during the week, but the children practiced "Buddy Spelling." They quizzed and checked their buddy's spelling words as they wrote them on a dry-erase slate. If the child misspelled a word, their buddy had the magical power to instill the "Tower of Terror!" (Have them show you!) I'm so pleased at how confident and independent the children are becoming during these Daily 5 practices. The more independent they are, the more quality practice they will receive, and the more reading groups I can meet with! Its a win-win. :)

* Our September book orders arrived! Of course the children were excited to receive their new reading material, as expected! Thank you for ordering.

* Our PTA Progressive Dinner Project is just about complete! With your donations, Mrs. Geisler and I arranged a "Family Night In" bin. It contains several games, some snacks and candy, some soda, and a $20 gift certificate for pizza at Tortorices! The children and I also created a game of Memory to add to the bin- with their faces as the playing cards. (Match the child's happy face with their silly face to make a match!) Its everything you will need for a night of family fun. We hope that a family in our class will win the raffle! Thank you Mrs. Geisler, for all of the organization and execution! It really looks like a great gift.

Spelling

The children are doing a nice job of adapting to our new spelling routines in second grade! This week they focused on words with the short /o/, short /u/, and short /e/ sounds. Coming up next week will be words that have long and short /a/sounds!

Reading

Our theme this week was “Making Friends.” The children listened to a fable about the Lion and the Mouse, and did a nice job determining the moral of the story. We read another story called “Mr. Putter and Tabby Pour the Tea.” The children analyzed the story structure and plot. They identified the beginning, middle, and end of the story. They also worked to retell the story in their own words using laminated picture cards. New vocabulary words we worked on include: company, delighted, enjoyed, share, thinning, and wonderful. We worked on our fluency by rereading select portions of the text. The children also noticed that sometimes words are italicized in a text. We practiced emphasizing words in italics as we read aloud.

Grammar

The focus for this week was identifying commands and exclamations. The children showed much success with this skill!

Math

This week the children familiarized themselves with the hundreds chart, identified patterns they noticed on it, and worked to fill in a number scroll up to the number 1,300! We reviewed the term “equivalent,” and found equivalent names for given numbers. The children played a game called “Broken Calculator,” in which they had to get an answer on their calculator without pressing a particular button that we determined would be broken. Finally, the children practiced calculating the value of a variety of coin combinations! They will be ready for their first math test next week.

Social Studies

The children created beautiful landform murals demonstrating their understanding of each of the new terms we have been learning! We have quite a roomful of artists! Wow! We also worked to identify all seven continents, and five oceans. Pull out a map at home and have your child sing for you the "Continent Song," and label those oceans! The children also identified the equator, and determined if various countries and continents were in the northern or southern hemisphere. The children were assessed on their understanding of these concepts this week. Our Arlington Heights unit is next!

Please view the side bar for details about upcoming events. MAP testing is coming up this week. Good nights of sleep and breakfast each morning will give the children lots of energy to focus on these tests.

I hope you are enjoying the weekend!