Friday, September 20, 2013

Reading and Language Arts   

The read aloud is Jamaica Tag-Along by Juanita Havil. The story is about a girl named Jamaica and her brother, Ossie. Ossie refuses to let Jamaica play basketball with him, so she goes off on her own and makes a new friend.

Comprehension Focus
-Students make text-to-self connections
-Students informally identify important ideas in a story

Social Development Focus
-Students relate the value of caring to their behavior
-Students develop the group skill of explaining their thinking

Vocabulary Words
-ruckus
-victory
-risky
-glee

Writing  In writing next week the focus will be:
Students will hear and discuss good writing, learn about the writing practices of professional authors, draw to generate writing ideas and write about their drawing. We will continue building our writing community where students are learning the procedures for silent writing time, working in a responsible way and listening respectfully to the thinking of others and sharing their own writing.

Reading Logs  Second graders are expected to read 20 minutes each night. Please help your child record their minutes in their September reading folder. Reading log folders should be returned to school at the end of the month after reading for 21 days. Reading logs are due October 1st.

Word Sort Activities:  Here are some of the different activities (sorts) you can work on with your child when they bring home their own set of words:

Regular Sort - Student sort the words in their sort by creating columns or groups of words.

Buddy Sort - Students sort together, read the words in each column to check the correct placement of the word, and then discuss the generalization covered by the sort. 

Blind Writing Sort - Students work with a partner. They take turns reading the words to another student who then tries to write and categorize the words.

Writing Sort - You write key words or headers to label each category. Then the student sorts individually accordingly to the categories by turning over one word at a time from his/her collection and writing it down. 

Speed Sort - Using a stopwatch, students see how fast they can correctly sort their words.

Word Hunt - Students select a magazine or book and search for words that fit into their sort.

Math  We began the chapter on subtraction.   Students will use the strategy of count back to find differences, and use fact families to find sums and differences. Students will use the inverse relationship of addition and subtraction to recall basic facts. Students will use drawings to represent a variety of addition and subtraction facts.

Flash Cards  Students should be practicing their addition facts with their flash cards. Weekly timed tests are given.

Social Studies  We will be discussing a map scale. Students will use a map scale to figure out the distance to places on a map. We will also discuss a political map, a map of the U.S., and identify states on the map. Lastly, we will look at a landform map and identify the some landforms on a map of North America. 

Important Dates & Announcements

I would like to thank the following families for the book fair certificates:

Cerny Family, Crowely Family, Obeid Family, Clair Family,
Kerfin Family, Kenyeri Family. 

I was able to pick out some really great books for our classroom library! Thanks so much!

The Magazine Drive is underway. This year the the PTO will award a pizza party to the class:

     1.  with the most participants
                         and/or
       2.  who raises the most money.

Hope you can help us!

If the Bears win on Sunday, wear orange and blue Monday!

Please look for an email from Miss Wyse!

September Dates to Remember

24 - Magazine Turn in Day

26 - Picture Day

27 - Early Dismissal @12pm - SIP Day

October Dates to Remember
  1- Reading Logs are due
11 - Progress Reports issued
14 - Columbus Day - No School
24 - Early Dismissal @12pm
31 - Classroom Halloween parties

November Dates to Remember
  1 - Family Halloween Party @6:30