It has been nice to get back into a regular classroom routine after the holidays. I love that we have a solid 6 weeks of learning between the Winter Break and February Vacation!
Over the past couple of weeks in math, we have spent some time wrapping up Unit 4 and doing our Mid-Year Assessment. We have also started Unit 5 which focuses on addition and subtraction strategies and using money to buy things at "pretend" stores. The next few lessons students will be using various diagrams to help them organize and solve number stories.
Our reading groups have been reading fictional texts and working on visualizing and making inferences while reading to help them with their comprehension. We continue to practice retelling and summarizing stories. We are currently using a summarizing strategy that asks the kids to answer the following: "Somebody, Wanted, But, So, Then." This helps them organize their thinking when summarizing longer texts.
The children have been very excited about our new "Opinion" writing unit! Together we created a list of things we have opinions on and discussed supportive vs. not supportive reasons. The students have also completed a graphic organizer for their first opinion piece which is a restaurant review. This is being modeled by creating a class review of the Robinson Cafeteria. Over the next month or so, the children will have the opportunity to write several different reviews. They may choose to review a movie, book, toy, place, game, etc.
Our content blocks have been a combination of both science and social studies. We have begun to learn about the 7 continents of the World. The students will be exposed to one continent per week for the next several weeks. We are currently on our 3rd continent. The hope is that this will give them a general overview of the world and the various cultures and geography.
Our science unit is called "Earth's Surface." The children have learned that the world is covered by 70% water and 30% land. We have also discussed some of the landforms found on earth's surface such as: mountains, valleys, rivers, ponds, streams, oceans, islands, etc. The children enjoyed creating these landforms out of clay and will be bringing home their 3-D models soon! In the next couple of lessons, the children will investigate how earth's surface changes with wind and water.
The Second Grade compassion project is well underway! The Robinson community has collected over 550 books so far! We will continue to collect books until January 31st. Our goal is to get to 1,000. I know we can do it!
Upcoming Dates:
January 20th- No School
Week of January 27th-31st- Great Kindness Challenge Week
February 5th- Early Release for Professional Development
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