Second Grade Newsletter 1.6.23

 Second Grade Newsletter 1.6.23

 

Hello Parents!

 

News: 

In preparation for third grade, Second Grade is moving from agendas/planners to a reading log to record daily reading practice. It is a colored paper that was sent home in your child's yellow folder. Each day your child should read aloud for 20 minutes and retell. Then, your child will correctly write the title of the book on the reading log paper. Parents will sign the reading log paper daily. The students will turn the reading log in on Friday and receive another log for the next week. In order for your child to receive credit for their reading homework, the title of the book (not the name of the book series), minutes read, and signature are required. Students will continue to write their daily assignments in their agendas/planners. Please reach out to your homeroom teacher with specific questions. We are excited for our second graders to grow in their independence and responsibility!

Thank you:

We appreciated your kind cards and gifts in December. Thank you, also, to those who donated items or volunteered in the classrooms for our Winter Celebration. If your kettle has not been returned to you, please let us know. 

Important Dates:  

Saturday, January 7th: Read Under the Stars Event

Monday, January 16th: No School-Civil Rights Day

Tuesday, January 17th: "The Hayloft" Recitations 

Wednesday, January 18th: Math Test 

Tuesday, January 24th: Class Picture Day

Conversation Prompts: 

What is a hypothesis?

What does it mean to "get a taste of your own medicine"?

Which two punctuation marks often follow an interjection? (a comma or an exclamation mark)

What was Shay's Rebellion? 

Academics: 

Math 

Students will continue to practice drawing bar models and using addition and subtraction to solve word problems. We will delve more deeply into solving two-step and two-part word problems. There will be an assessment this week over unit 4.

 

Grammar 

his past week, we reviewed parts of speech and capitalization rules. We also learned about a new part of speech, the interjection. Next week, we will then learn about conjunctions and write based on passages from The Midnight Ride. Students received the poem, "The Hayloft" by Robert Louis Stevenson. The first memory check for stanza 1-2 will be Tuesday, 1/10. The poem in full will be recited the week of Tuesday, 1/17.

Link to poem: https://etc.usf.edu/lit2go/59/a-childs-garden-of-verses-selected-poems/4721/the-hayloft/

 

History 

This week, we have started the foundation for our unit about Making the Constitution.  We discussed what happened when the colonists came home from the war and Shay's Rebellion. Next, we will learn how the colonists united together to form laws which were fair and wrote the constitution we still use today.

Science 

This week students will learn about cells, the smallest unit of life. They will also discover how a microscope helps us observe tiny objects. 

*Parents please note that this week we will read Cells are Us by Dr. Fran Balkwill and there is a brief note on reproduction. The book will teach us this in order to introduce the idea that two cells join to make more cells. We will not be fielding any questions on the topic of reproduction, instead we will inform them that the topic will be covered in fifth grade and leave it to your discretion. 

Also, students will present their insect artwork to the class while reading the paragraphs they wrote about their insect.

Literature 

Students will begin their read of the classic, Little House in the Big Woods, on Monday. Thanks to those families that have already sent it in! Students will meet Pa, Ma, Mary and Laura. They will read about the family’s preparation for winter and how the family survives in the Big Woods. *Reading Groups will begin again, a volunteer sign up will be sent out shortly.