by Jill & Sarah | Sep 21, 2019 | 2nd/3rd Grade News
September: Dress as your favorite movie/movie character. Fun!
La Lectura
We read a great story, Niña ángel, niña dragón. This was a realistic fiction piece about a girls who’s family immigrated to the United States but she didn’t speak English. This story told of how the girl adapted to her school and how once she started sharing about her family, the other students welcomed her and even helped her family.
Our learning objectives this week were to:
- work with the diphthongs: ie and ei
- work with cause and effect
- identify closed and open syllables
- identify pronouns and when we use them
Students received their second reader of the year. They read with classmates and worked to identify pronouns within their two readers.
Looking for subject pronouns in our readers.
We will have a spelling test on our new words (received Thursday) on Friday, September 27th.
Las matemáticas
The kiddos did such an amazing job completing their math packets, working in stations, and completing their first test of the school year. They took their test on Thursday and the entire class did an excellent job! Next up: Mental Math!!
We reintroduced Prodigy during our station time on Friday. All students should have brought home a parent letter (on yellow paper) to remind the family how to login to student accounts. Students also have their login information inside the front cover of their planner.
We will:
- rely heavily on composing and decomposing numbers (with number bonds)
- take weekly multiplication tests
- use prodigy to reinforce skills (during a twice weekly math stations)
This week students were asked to look at their previously created list of possible ideas and choose one. We talked about thick and thin questions and how ideas that required thicker questions would be better to research. Students then chose their topic/idea, formulated their main question, and received teacher approval. (We are learning the step-by-step process involved in research!) Formulating their questions was really great because it made them really think about their purpose and even reconsider their topic.
Science
This week we learned to:
- Identify the Andromeda Galaxy as the closest spiral galaxy in our universe
- Describe gravity
- Describe the effects gravity has on Earth, within the solar system, and the universe
- Describe the characteristics of stars
- Compare and contrast our sun and other stars
- Describe a galaxy as a very large cluster of many stars
- Identify the Milky Way as our galaxy and Andromeda as the closest spiral galaxy in our universe
- Explain what constellations are and how useful they are
- Recognize and name important constellations in the hemisphere in which you live.
Our English spelling lists for the test on October 4th.
Labeling our large World map. We will be working on this for several weeks, adding to it daily.
History & Geography
Our objectives this week were to:
- Describe the mouth and source of a river
- Refer to a map and identify the location of the Murray River
- List at least two ways people use the Murray River
- Understand the meaning of : drainage basin, orchard, vineyard and pasture
by Jill & Sarah | Sep 14, 2019 | 2nd/3rd Grade News
Friday, September 20th: Dress as (or with) something from your favorite movie.
La Lectura
Place value with Ms. Laura.
This week the students received their first reader of the year. We will be using the readers to continue our fluency goals. We will also use the readers to point out spelling and grammar points of interest. Our learning objectives this week were:
- Dipthongs ue and eu
- Distinguish between proper and common nouns
- Identify purposes of writing
- Understand the difference between a biography and an autobiography
- Write a list of important facts for their own autobiography
- Understand the use of pronouns
This week we also began our first Genius Hour. We will spend one hour each week where the students research a specific topic of their own interest. They will complete a lap book, walking through the research process, and end with a class presentation to share their new knowledge. A big Thank YOU to Ms. Laura for helping with Genius Hour! (And helping with math stations!!)
Las matemáticas
Using digits to show greater than and less than. (Mayor que y menor que).
This week we continued our study of numbers up to 10,000. Our learning objectives this week were to:
- Use base-ten blocks to compare and order numbers.
- Use place value to compare and order numbers. (Greater than > and less than <)
- Read, write, and represent numbers to 10,000 in standard form, expanded form, and word form.
Science
Our learning objectives this week were to:
- Identify the sun as a constant source of heat and light energy
- Classify the sun as a star
- Identify our planet Earth as the third planet from the sun and ideally suited for life
- Describe the eight planets of our solar system and their sequence from the sun
- Identify our solar system as the sun and all of the smaller bodies that orbit it
- Describe the characteristics of a planet
- Explain that Pluto has been reclassified as a dwarf planet
- Describe the asteroid belt
History & Geography
We learned to:
- Measure straight-line distances on a map scale
- Use the maps in the atlas of the Student Reader to find geographic information
- Describe two ways that rivers bring life to farms and cities
- Compare the Nile and Yellow River
- Understand the meaning of the following domain-specific vocabulary: river, riverbank, source, irrigation, silt, and flow.
Character Education
This month in Character Education we are focusing on Kindness. We have done a few hands-on lessons with cotton balls, sandpaper, a tub of water with rocks/leaves/feathers/pinecones. Our objectives for the lessons were:
- What makes a good friend?
- Words, tone, and facial expressions can affect our message to our friends.
- Cotton ball words/tone/facial expressions are received as kind. (Please, Thank you, May I help you? Good job!)
- Sand paper words/tone/facial expression are not kind.
- Each Kindness by Jaqueline Woodson – to show how each small act of kindness has a ripple effect.
- Compliment circles- practice giving and receiving compliments (say thank you!)
by Jill & Sarah | Sep 7, 2019 | 2nd/3rd Grade News
La Lectura
Volteretas – Cartwheels
Friends helping friends.
We jumped right into the new school year with our friendship unit / la amistad. Our learning objectives this week were to:
- make connections, summarize, and predict while reading Gloria, quien podría ser mi mejor amiga.
- create vocabulary notebooks and strategies
- spelling words with s (Spelling tests will be on Fridays.)
- cursive letters: i and t
- writing: planning stage- listing ideas
Place value!
Las matemáticas
This year, we will focus on:
- building problem-solving skills and strategies
- using models to solve real-world problems involving the four operations
- making and interpreting data from bar graphs
- identifying fractions of a set
- finding angles and identifying lines
- understanding area and perimeter of figures
Our first unit of study is Numbers to 10,000. Some of the skills your child will practice are:
- counting, reading, and writing numbers to 10,000
- reading and writing numbers in different ways
- comparing and ordering numbers
Friday is “Movie Popcorn” snack day! Palomitas!
Science
What a great first week we had! We celebrated two birthdays: Andres and Evelyn D. We spent a lot of time doing back to school activities and discussing classroom and student routines, procedures and expectations to help make this school year be as successful as possible.
In addition to all of our back to school activities, we also started our unit on astronomy. Our objectives this week were to:
- Identify the sun as a constant source of heat and light energy
- Classify the sun as a star
- Identify our planet Earth as the third planet from the sun
- Demonstrate how day and night on Earth are caused by Earth´s rotation
- Explain the reasons for the seasons
- Describe the characteristics of a planet
- Describe stars as hot, distant, and made of gas
I have really enjoyed getting to know this awesome class! I am looking forward to a fabulous school year!
History & Geography
Stay tuned………
