Weekly Updates - November 30

I am sorry to have been behind on the blog! Between the workshop I attended before Thanksgiving, Thanksgiving break, and getting back into the swing of things this week, it has been a little hectic!

Here's what is going on in the school day!

ELA/Writing



We have gone through the main parts of speech this year: nouns, verbs, adjectives, and adverbs. My focus now is on having them incorporate these into their writing and being able to identify them.

This coming week we will begin work on a personal narrative about a time they got hurt. I am calling it an Ouch! story.

We will also learn about using commas in a series.

Reading

Continue to encourage your children to be reading AR books. They have until winter break to meet their goals, and there are many who have not yet done so.

We are continuing to focus on story elements in reading: character, setting, problem/solution.

Social Studies

We are working on the 5 regions of Georgia, the 7 rivers in Georgia, and map skills.

Next week we will finish learning about the rivers and where they are located in Georgia, and we will learn about grid maps.

At home, playing the game Battleship is a great way to build grid map skills.

I will probably test in Social Studies on Thursday December 13. This date may change.

Math

Next week we will continue learning how to add two digit numbers.

I have started them off by teaching them strategies such as estimation by rounding the addends, counting up (by 10's, then by 1's), and partial sums.

We will work more next week on partial sums. Please see my post (about 2 posts back) about partial sums. It is not a strategy we grew up with, so please be patient. I really do believe it is a better, more developmentally appropriate way for them to learn 2 digit addition.

I will probably test in math on Tuesday, December 11. This date is subject to change.

Field Trips

Monday December 3- High Touch High Tech comes to school

Friday December 7- Atlanta Ballet - The Nutcracker

Pictures from Math Game

Nikolaos

Carter and Sophia

Important Note about Two Digit Number Addition

Important Note about 2 digit numbers- Please do not have your child do math where they are carrying a number over. I am teaching it to them in a different way, called partial sums algorithm. Partial sums is a better way to develop number sense.

A "Family Note" is on Home Links 4.9 explaining how this works.

Here is an example.

    42                          First I have them add the numbers in the "one's" place. 2+9 = 11. They write
+  39                          11 under the equal line. Then they look to the "ten's" place. 40+30 =70. They
---------                       write 70 under 11. They now have the sums of the "ones" and the sums
    11                           of the "tens". We have broken the number up into tens and ones. Then add
+  70                           the two sums together. It makes for an easier addition problem.
______
    81

We've got CHARACTER! Mask Book Reports

Weekly Updates November 5

ELA and Phonics

This week we will slowly begin to talk about adverbs. An adverb is a word that describes a verb, an adjective, or can describe another adverb.

The underlined word is the adverb. The bold word is the word is describes.

Describing a verb - The boy walked slowly.

Describing an adjective- She is very good at math facts.

Describes another adverb- He ran very quickly.

We are working on suffixes in phonics. These are things we have incorporated into ELA in the past, so it should be pretty easy for the kids.

Phonics Rules to Think About for This Week:

1. To make a word plural, add -s or -es.

We choose -es when the base word ends in s, ch, sh, x, or z.

Any other time we use s, unless its irregular.

2. We add -ing to a verb to show it is happening now.

We add -ed to show it already happened.

3. We add -er to an adjective to compare two things.

We add -est to an adjective to compare two or more things.

Reading

We are continuing to study story elements.

Your child has a book report due on Friday, November 9. It is a project all of second grade is doing together. Directions were sent home in the binder today, as well as a rubric on the back.

I will be incorporating story elements, adjectives, and Thanksgiving themes all together over the next couple of weeks.

Math

We will have a math test on Wednesday. I sent home a review today. Please have your child turn this in on Wednesday.

Social Studies

This week we will be learning the 5 regions of Georgia. Today we learned the names of the regions, and this week we will work on characteristics of the regions.

I had the children snap a map of Georgia with the regions into their MOOSE binders to look at with you at home.

Ms. Perlman Updates

I will be out the following dates:

Thursday November 8 (APS New Teacher Workshop)

Monday November 12-Thursday November 15

(Focused on Phonics Workshop)

These are required workshops for various teachers. Thank you for your patience in my absence. I am leaving some good activities for ELA and lesson plans for math and social studies with a good sub who is a retired educator.

Mystery Reader October 26 and November 2

Thank you Lisa Milam for being our Mystery Reader on October 26.

Thank you Liz Lieberman for coming in with their friend JJ to read on November 2!