2-S News
Newsletter for November
2011
Here are some of the things we have accomplished and things to come.
Reader’s Workshop: I tell the children that good readers have 2 jobs. First,
they need to be able to figure out and say the words on the page. Second, to
think about what they are reading. I will teach them strategies all year that
promote these 2 important jobs.
When I taught them how to retell a story, I asked them to remember these key
elements:
• Use the characters names
• Tell where the story takes place
• Tell the IMPORTANT events in order
• Use an interesting voice
This month we are Monitoring for Meaning. The students are learning to listen
to that inner voice in their heads when reading. We also practiced reading
with expression.
Grammar: This year we are learning about punctuation marks, sentence types
(declarative, interrogative and exclamatory) run-on sentences, subjects and
predicates, nouns, pronouns, proper nouns, verbs, and adjectives. We just
started learning about nouns.
In Writer’s Workshop, we are learning how to organize our thoughts, have peer
conferences, revise our work to make it better and how to self and peer edit
our work.
We will use the following units of studies to guide our writing:
• Personal Narrative (Small Moments)
• Letter Writing
• Author’s as Mentors
• Writing:
-Fiction
-Non-Fiction
-Poetry
Science: The class had fun watching the ladybug larva morph into ladybugs.
They wrote in a journal tracking their growth and wondering what would happen
next. They also made a chart of the ladybugs life cycle. I read many books
about ladybugs. We discovered many interesting facts about these lucky little
bugs. The ladybugs are the first animal in a year long science unit. Every
month we will study a new animal. They will be able to identify and list
major characteristics of mammals, birds, fish, reptiles, amphibians and
insects. October we studied mammals and this month we are learning about
birds. We also learned what the differences are between living and non-living
things.
In Social Studies, they learned about Christopher Columbus’ journey to
America. They discovered that he is now known for his mistake. They thought
it was very funny that he believed he was in India. It also helped them
understand why he called Native Americans “Indians”. We also take part in The
Second Step program. This program teaches the children about feelings,
empathy, tolerance, sharing and other important life skills.
In Math we are continuing to build our fact power. Please encourage your
child to study their facts every night. The students should be scoring
between 20-30. If they are not, more practice is needed. In geometry, we
finished are starting to learn about scalene, isosceles and equilateral
triangles. We have also been working on writing and solving word problems,
number patterns, place value, graphing, probability, chance, time and money.
Reminders:
√ Coats for recess – the children will not be allowed outside to play
if they are not dressed properly
IMPORTANT REMINDER FROM THE OFFICE: Please send emails about change in
dismissal or if your child is going to be late to the office. You may send a
copy to me if you wish. However, you cannot send it to just me.
Also, if your child is going home a different way, the office needs to have a
note stating so. Thanks!
Thank you all for contributing to the class wish list. I can’t tell you
enough how much WE appreciate your kindness and generosity!
Take care,
Annie Sachse :)