October 25 Update...

Hello Parents, 

Thank you for visiting our blog today.  Mrs. Capes and I had a wonderful time meeting with all of you this week for conferences.  Please check out below to find out what we've been doing this week...

Phonics/Spelling:  This week in groups, we compared short and long vowels and we looked at the many spelling patterns of long a.  We also reviewed past challenge word lists. Make sure you revisit old lists. Once a pattern or a word has been introduced, your second grader is responsible for it.

Reading:  We read the book Two Bad Ants. We talked about how the ants in the story encountered many forms of energy.  We also discussed the characters, setting, problem and solution in this story. We read several informational books on turtles and discussed the topic and specific details. We created a chart with ideas sorted into categories that we used as our research for our first informational paper. We also began a new chapter book, The Bad Beginning by Lemony Snicket.  We worked in small groups reading our independent chapter books, working on fluency and comprehension.  We completed several activities (breath boxes and one minute timed readings) to help with our fluency as well.

Writing: We began our unit on Informational Writing.  We researched our first topic, turtles. We created a chart that included details about where turtles live, what they look like, and what they do for protection from predators.  We worked on our table of contents and cover pages also.

Math:  We are working on ways to represent three digit numbers.  We also began adding and subtracting three digit numbers using expanded form.  We explored ways to break apart numbers to help us when regrouping is involved. Please do not teach your child the algorithm (the way we all learned) when borrowing or carrying. This will confuse them when we ask them to show their place value knowledge and explain these strategies we are teaching. They will learn the algorithm next year after this strong foundation has been established.

Science:  We completed our unit on Energy.  We learned that four types of energy are heat, light, sound and motion.  We learned about the ways that these types of energy can change matter.  The unit test is graded and in your child's folder today.

News and Information...
Please remember that we do not dress up at school for Halloween. We will be doing some fun activities that day that also support the learning we are doing in the classroom.  

Make sure you are reviewing past spelling words and lists occasionally. The children will see these words often.

We are OUT of extra snacks. To help us out, please encourage your child to send a snack daily!

Next week is Red Ribbon Week. Check out the calendar on this blog for special events!