Week 5

                                                                                                                         

                                                                                             September 11, 2016                                                                                   

Dear Second Grade Families,

The weather is getting cooler, soccer, football, and other fall activities are in full swing.  Miss Garcia and I are loving that our second graders are in their school routine.

Math

Last week in math our focus was to continue renaming 3-digit numbers.  This is challenging concept but the students of Room 17 are beginning to be pros.  It has taken a lot of work with manipulatives and working with partners but I believe we have it!!  Here is an example of a few of the combinations students could come up with.  We will continue to work on this skill daily just to be sure that all students have a firm understanding of it!

375
Hundreds	Tens	Ones
3	7	5
3	6	15
2	17	5
2	16	15

Along with renaming we continued to work with writing numbers in standard form, word form, and expanded form and comparing 3-digit numbers using <, >, and =.

Monday- IXL M.4 Identify a digit up to the hundreds place

Tuesday- IXL M.5 Place value 10’s and 1’s

  Wednesday- XL M.6 Place value up to 100

Thursday- IXL M.8 Convert to/from a number tens and ones

Language

We finished our Tree Maps to help us see the different ways to make singular nouns (names one person, place, or thing) into plural nouns (names more than one person, place, or thing).  As we make nouns plural, students are learning about the irregular forms of plural nouns, which include changing the “y” to an “i” and add “es” (cherry = cherries), adding “es” (lunch = lunches), and changing the “f” to a “ves” (scarf = scarves).  This week we will work with irregular nouns such as child-children, tooth-teeth, goose-geese etc.

Writing

We are hoping to have our “Who Am I?” writings finished by Tuesday.  The 2nd grade students have been working on their art piece to go with it.  They are drawing their self portraits to go with their writings.  Miss Garcia and I hope to have them hung up in the hallways be the end of the week.  Stop by to see how creative your kiddos are!

Projects

Second grade students have been working on our first project--Tribes in Action.  During the first 4 weeks of school we worked on learning about the Tribes Agreements--Attentive Listening, Mutual Respect, Appreciations/No Put-Downs, and Right to Pass.  Students ended the week with a clay activity that involved Attentive Listening and Mutual Respect.  They started out with “magic clay”.   After discovering their color, students divided their clay into 3 parts and traded with students that had a different color.  With trading completed students mixed clay colors together, ending up the activity with 6 different colors.

 

This past week students were broken into groups.  We will continue this week creating puppets and writing short puppet show scripts that shows each agreement.  We will have a firm date for the puppet show this week and will put that in an email later on this week for the exact date and time next week (at this point it will more than likely be September 20th or the 21st at 2:30 pm).  Again, look for an exact date and time in an email this week.

Loving Learning,

Mrs. Bloomfield and Miss Garcia      

Here’s Reading information from Mrs. Loop...

Hello Second Grade Families,

We got right back into the routine of reading groups last week.  It is fun to see what 2nd graders are able to read compared to 1st graders and the students are pretty excited with the new books they are being asked to read each day.  Please remember to support your child’s learning by having them complete their reading homework daily.  Often times students will be rereading what they read together with me in class.  They will have a paper to fill out comprehension questions or other reading related activities each night.  Students who do not complete their reading nightly will need to attend study hall during their P.E. or specials class time (which is currently Art) and it will impact their “work ethic” grade on their report card.

The kids continued reviewing closed syllables and open syllables and began learning about vowel-consonant-e syllables.  They practiced sorting a variety of words that fit are these syllable types.  This week we will begin to look at multisyllabic words and identifying these syllable types in each syllable of the words.  This knowledge will help students be able to better read longer words independently.

Happy reading,

Mrs. Loop

Week 4

      September 6, 2016                                                                                   

Dear Second Grade Families,

Already done with the third week of school...these weeks are just flying by.  How can we be in September already???  

Math

In math we have been very busy learning about the hundreds place.  Students have been exploring up to 3-digit numbers with base ten blocks and place value charts.  As we work with 3-digit numbers, we are also reviewing ways to write a number (we worked on this with 2-digit numbers already).  Here are some of the ways your child is 3-digit numbers:

standard form = 274

word form = two hundred seventy-four

expanded form = 200 + 70 + 4,         

place value chart = hundreds    tens    ones

                                  2           7         4

 

Another math skill being worked on is writing number words up 3-digits.  Students are using resources in the room, an Interactive Writing that we created together.  This Interactive Writing piece has the numbers and the number words 1-20, the decade words (thirty, forty,...), and one hundred.  With this resource students are able to write the numbers from 1-999 correctly.

Here is this week's homework.  Please have your child work for 15 minutes on the following objectives.

Monday-No Homework-Labor Day

Tuesday- C.4 Writing Numbers Up to 1,000 in Words

   Wednesday- B.2 Comparing Numbers Up to 1,000

Thursday- A.8 Number Line Up to 1,000

Language

We are adding on to our knowledge of nouns.  Students are now learning about singular and plural nouns.  As a class we are creating Tree Maps to help us see the different ways to make singular nouns (names one person, place, or thing) into plural nouns (names more than one person, place, or thing).  As we make nouns plural, students are learning about the irregular forms of plural nouns, which include changing the “y” to an “i” and add “es” (cherry = cherries), adding “es” (lunch = lunches), and changing the “f” to a “ves” (scarf = scarves).

Writing

Students are continuing to work through the writing process with our riddles about ourselves.  This writing project will not only create a great beginning writing piece for your child's writing portfolio, it is also taking the students through the complete Writing Process-- pre-writing, rough draft, editing and revising, and final draft.  Miss Garcia and myself are so proud of our 2nd grade writers.  They are doing an amazing job with this first piece, we can't wait to get them hung in the hallway.  We wonder if you will be able to guess which one is your child!?!

Projects

Second grade students have been working on our first project--Tribes in Action.  During the first 3 weeks of school we worked on learning about the Tribes Agreements--Attentive Listening, Mutual Respect, Appreciations/No Put-Downs, and Right to Pass.  While working on Appreciations, students picked a classmates name at random.  They observed this person for a day then created a “Campaign Button” for this person focusing on the secret person’s positive qualities.  Students then got to present the “Campaign Buttons” to their secret person.  The presentations were very heart warming.

 

 

This past week students were broken into groups (They selected their top 3 agreements that they wanted to work on.).  We will continue this week creating puppets and writing short puppet show scripts that shows each agreement.  We will have a firm date for the puppet show this week and will put that in the blog for next week (at this point it will more than likely be September 19th or the 20th at 2:30 pm).  Again, look for an exact date and time on next week’s blog.

Looking forward to another great week!!

Sincerely,

Anne Bloomfield and Miss Garcia      

Here’s the Reading Information from Mrs. Loop and Mrs. Rowlett…

Hello Second Grade Families,

Last week we met in reading groups for the first time since school began.  Most of the kids did a great job reading their books and returning their plastic envelope with their book and completed comprehension questions each day.  Please remember to have your child read to you each night.  Many second grade students are very capable readers but they still need an adult to listen to them and ensure that they are understanding what they are reading and reading the words correctly.  

The kids continued reviewing closed syllables and began to learn about open syllables.  Open syllables have one vowel that is not followed by a consonant and makes the long vowel sound such as: hi and pro.  This week they will be learning about vowel-consonant-e syllables such as in words: like, shade, etc.

Happy reading,

Mrs. Loop and Mrs. Rowlett

Week 3

                                                                                                        August 29, 2016

Dear Second Grade Families,

It’s hard to believe we will be entering our 3rd week of school!!  The first 2 weeks have been very busy and all  2nd graders are getting settled into a rountine.   

Math

This week in Math we worked on a very difficult but important skill--renaming tens and ones.  I must say, Miss Garcia and myself are  very proud of how hard students worked to understand this concept.  We used manipulatives and drew pictures to help us work on this skill.  Here's an example...

If the number is 32, it can be renamed the following ways.

32
Tens	Ones
3	2
I I I	■■
2	12
I I	■■■■■■■■■■ ■■
1	22
I	■■■■■■■■■■ ■■■■■■■■■■ ■■
0	32
	■■■■■■■■■■ ■■■■■■■■■■ ■■■■■■■■■■ ■■

We will continue to review this skill as it will be very important for mental math.  Other skills we worked on were reading and writing 2-digit numbers.  Remember to check out our math resource page on the blog, we are updating it often.

Here is the homework for the week...

Monday	IXL A.6 Number Lines- Up To 100
Tuesday	IXL A.9 Even or Odd
Wednesday	IXL M.2 Place Value Models-Up To Hundreds
Thursday	No Weekend Homework (Enjoy the long weekend with your family!!)

Language

We continued to study nouns this week.  Our focus was with common and proper nouns.  Students are learning that proper nouns name a specific person, place, or thing.  All proper nouns are capitalized. This is a review of a first grade standard, but will lead to the 2nd grade standards that relate to nouns.

Writing

In writing we are continuing a work on our riddles about ourselves.  We were able to take our prewriting (circle map and tree map) and write a rough draft.  Students needed to pick 6 to 9 ideas from their tree map and turn it into a clue.  This writing assignment is really coming together, I can hardly wait to see the finished product.

Projects

Our work with our Tribes Project has continued.  We focused on the Tribes Agreements of Mutual Respect, No Put Downs, and Appreciations.  For each agreement we have made an artifact for the class so that we will remember the agreement throughout the year.

We finally got on our Chromebooks.  It is very exciting for 2nd graders, since each 2nd grader is issued their own Chromebook.  Every week we will be using the Chromebooks more and more.  The students of Room 17 have been so patient as we have started this journey.  It is so amazing to see students gain proficiency with this technology as the year progresses.

This weekend we celebrate Labor Day Weekend.  Miss Garcia and myself hope that you and your family enjoy the extra day!

Sincerely,

Anne Bloomfield

and

Shannon Garcia

Reading information from Mrs. Loop...

Hello Second Grade Families,

We had a great week of learning last week in reading class.  The students have done a great job getting back into our routines. 2nd graders will begin guided reading groups this week.  We are so excited that we can begin reading groups so soon.  Your child will have  book to read beginning this week.  Your child will be bringing their books home in a plastic envelope, this will need to be returned daily along with any reading logs that need to be completed.  Please listen to your child read nightly.

Last week the students learned about the closed syllable.  These are syllables that have one vowel, that is followed by one or more consonants and the vowel is short. Examples of a closed syllable are (stop, prob, lem, cat, fish,). We also finished our review of reading secrets by looking at students names.

Below are some pictures of some things that we discussed and learned about last week.  The names are showing the reading secrets that were found in them.       

Katy Loop

Fabulous First Week

Week 2: 2nd Grade Blog

One...

...problem...

Last week we focused on mainly review skills that your students learned last year.  I wanted to get a feel for where their learning was after our summer break!  The 2nd graders worked on skip counting by 2’s, 5’s, and 10’s.  They recorded a 2 digit number within 10-99, began writing numbers in word form AND found found one more, one less, within 100 by using a 100 chart as a tool.

...3 ways to solve.

 In Language Arts we focused on nouns.  The students created a circle map listing any person, place or thing as a noun.  This poster will be used as a tool in the room to refer to as the year goes on.  

Here’s the Math Homework for this week....`

Monday	IXL B.1 Comparing Numbers Up to 100.
Tuesday	IXL A.7 Hundred’s Chart
Wednesday	IXL C.2 Writing Numbers Up to 100’s in Words
Thursday	IXL M.1 Place Value Models-tens and ones

Here are some fun pictures from the 1st week of school!

  

Project Time--Students are making a poster for Attentive Listening.

   

Second Graders enjoying P.E. at the end of the day.

Here's some information from Mrs. Loop...

Hello Second Grade Families,

I am so happy that I get to work with your children still in second grade.  They meet with me every morning from 8:15-9:35 for reading class.  

Last week we reviewed how to shop for books in our class library to fill up our book baskets.  The kids also began building stamina while reading to self and writing in their journals.  They are all so eager to get back in the swing of things in our classroom so this week we will be adding choice during our building stamina times so they can choose if they want to read to themselves or work on writing first.  They are all working at being able to read and write for 20 minutes without being interrupted.  

We are also reviewing reading secrets in student’s names which correlate with secrets found in words when we are reading.  We have also reviewed what a syllable is  (a word or part of a word with one vowel pattern).  We discussed that every word needs a vowel and the kids practiced sorting sticky notes with groups of letters on them under the heading “IS A SYLLABLE” or “IS NOT A SYLLABLE”.  They put a dot under the vowel in the letter groups and placed the sticky note under “IS A SYLLABLE” and if they did not have a vowel they placed it under “IS NOT A SYLLABLE”.

We will continue discussing syllables this week, reviewing secrets in the remaining student’s names, and building stamina with read to self, read to someone, and work on writing.

Please encourage your child to read a book of their choice each night.  Please listen to them read or even take turns reading a sentence, paragraph, or page with them.  Assigned reading books will not be sent home until probably the first week in September.  

Happy reading,

Katy Loop

Welcome to 2nd Grade

Week 1

Second Grade Homework

August 15 -18

Welcome to the 2016-2017 school year!  Mrs. Bloomfield and I were so happy to see you on Thursday afternoon!  We can’t wait to see more of our students and families on Back to School Night on August 18th!  We would also like to express a HUGE thank you to all of the Oasis helpers and volunteers, we couldn’t make all of this happen without YOU!  

Our main focus of the first week of school will be working on the day to day routines that are so important to establish.  Time spent on routines early in the year make the rest of the year run very smoothly.  Even though we will be working hard on our routines our academic work will begin as well.  We will begin switching for reading with Mrs. Loop and Mrs. Rowlett  starting on Monday.  Our first writing assignment will also be started this week.  We will also begin our first project of the year, which will focus around the Tribes Agreements of Mutual Respect, Attentive Listening, Appreciations, No Put-Downs, and the Right to Pass.  It's going to be a busy week!!

Remember, it's a long day for 2nd graders!  Going to school until 4:00 PM is a big transition from last year!  When you take a longer school day and add on activities such as soccer, football, or dance; there is bound to be an adjustment period.  Please make sure that your child has a second snack for the afternoon.  They will definitely be tired, be sure to establish bedtimes that ensure that your child gets enough sleep.  

As we move into this new school year, Ms. Garcia and myself will be sending home assigned math homework starting Monday.  The homework schedule for the week is listed below.  We will be teaching classroom routines and beginning some informal assessments.  We suggest that you practice your homework time routine on Monday and Tuesday evening by spending 20 minutes reading with or to your child and practicing 15 minutes of math OR 10 math problems - not NOT to exceed 15 minutes.  It is our hope to ease your 2nd grader and your family into the new school year.

Happy Back to School,

Mrs. Bloomfield & Miss Garcia

Monday	IXL A.1 Skip Counting
Tuesday	IXL A.3 Skip Counting Sequences
Wednesday	Worksheet page  7-8
Thursday	IXL C.2 - Writing numbers up to 100 in word form