Dear Parents,
Believe it or not we are already into the month of September! Most of the children seem to be adjusting well to our busy day. The curriculum in second grade, as you most likely have noticed, is more difficult than in first grade. I work very hard all year long preparing the students for third grade. This takes
the full year and much hard work. As we work we also have a lot of fun. If your child seems to be having any trouble with the new work load, just hang in there, at times it takes some students a little longer to adjust.
Each month I will be updating my website with a monthly newsletter, to inform parents
of any important information that is happening in our room. I also let you know
exactly what our curriculum will cover each month. I hope this curriculum update is helpful to all parents. It should be helpful also to any students that are being tutored. Feel free to pass this information on to the tutor.
Remember that on this website I offer a great deal of information about our classroom. You will find the yearly spelling words, a spelling practice test site, vocabulary words, math flashcard practice, telling time practice, counting money practice as well as science and social studies guides. I also have an explanation of Four Block Reading which is used in second grade and Six Traits or Simple Six Writing which we also use. I spend a great deal of time updating and adding to this site. Please use this sites as a resource for you and
your child. Each week I update the test alert page. Make sure to check it for the weekly tests and alone grammar worksheet.
In the month of September we will be studying the following topics.
READING- I am sure you have already noticed that the vocabulary is somewhat harder in our reading series than first grade. The class seems to be adjusting well. Each day we work with words on our word wall, we write weekly and we read for comprehension and for enjoyment. The students seem to love this approach to reading. We began AR at the end of August and the students are loving it. Remember that AR books can be used for the nightly 20 minutes of homework reading. So many children want to take tests daily I am having a hard time fitting all the students that want to test into one school day. We go to computer class every Tuesday. All students have a chance to take an AR test that day. Hopefully this will help the frustration some children have when they are ready to test and we didn't get to their turn that particular day!
Skills we will be practicing during this month include, long and short vowels, main idea and details, suffixes- er, est, ing, ed, s and es, subjects and predicates, and combining subjects and predicates in a sentence. Remember spelling tests are on Thursday. The spelling test consists of ten spelling words with a common sound, two review words from the previous week, and three high frequency words that come directly from the story we are reading in our reader.
Spelling words for the entire year can be found in the Language Arts section of this site. Many parents find it helpful to have the list early to begin practice.
You can also connect to the McMillian site from the Language Arts page and play fun games with our spelling words. This is a fun way to practice those spelling words.
MATH- Rocketship Math is going wonderfully! The kids love it and can't wait to jump to the next level! Remember to practice Rocketship five minutes each night. Don't forget to send the practice test that comes home back to school the next day.
In our regular curriculum this month we will complete topic three in our math book which concentrates on addition and subtraction facts through 18. Each day we do the colorful folded daily lesson together in class for instructional purpose. The children then follow this up with an alone workbook page. The first few pages in their workbook had so few problems I stapled two pages together to record as one grade. As the book moves along there will be more problems on each daily alone paper. It is a good idea to review the daily together page with your child. Also, remember every child is registered at the pearsonsuccessnet.com site. This allows you to review daily lessons on line.
SCIENCE-We will continue working in the theme of life cycles. Class participation and listening skills play a big part of our science curriculum. There are very few worksheets that we do as a follow-up to the daily lessons. We do several activities in our notebooks. Every worksheet or notebooking activity is done together as a class. For this reason there should be no errors on these papers. Remember, there are study guides available on this web site for each unit of our science curriculum. Be sure to check them out. Hopefully they will be useful when studying for exams. Until the website is up and running for students to log into I will print the study guides and send them home. I pretty much just typed the entire chapter from the book!
RELIGION –This is a very important year for your child. We will be preparing the students for two very
wonderful steps in their faith. All year we will be working on preparation for First Communion. Mrs. Broyles is the Religion teacher for second grade. Any questions you may have can be directed to her.
them.
Thank you for all of your support. If you have any questions please feel free to
stop by school, or drop me an e-mail me. I want this to be your child’s best year ever.
Mrs. Barth
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