Week 13

Welcome to week thirteen! This week’s theme is: Teddy Bear Picnic!

To celebrate our Teddy Bear Picnic this week we will be having a food drive. Students are invited to bring in a non-perishable food item.  Students who bring in a non-perishable food item as an "admittance fee," will be allowed to bring a teddy bear to school with them on Friday.

It is cold outside.  We will still be going outside for recess on most days. Please make sure your students are dressed appropriately for the weather!

Here is a look at what we are learning this week:

Art: Students will continue working on their student directed art projects using mediums such as collage, pastels, paper construction, and water color.

ASL:  Students have finished the Pledge of Allegiance and will be tested this week individually.  We will begin our study of clothing and special Thanksgiving words and phrases.

Dance:Students will be exploring the different sizes movement can be performed in their kinesphere, small vs. large, and narrow vs. wide.

Health:  Students will continue to analyze harmful substances and identify which side effects result from taking certain drugs through a find-and-match activity.

 

Math: Students will be studying 3D shapes.

Music: Rhythm and bells, lyrics and so me notes; students are learning to play and sing Thanksgiving songs with the bells

PE: Students are working on their Presidential Fitness by running or walking laps of our school. Second Grade has already run 100 miles this school year! We hope to make it to 200 miles by Thanksgiving. Please have your children dressed for weather as we will go out in the cold, clear, crisp air this winter!

Reading:  Large Group Phonics: Variant Vowel oo, Small Group Phonics: “R” Controlled Vowels: ar, Shared Reading: Fables “The Crow and the Pitcher,” Guided Reading by leveled groups, Centers (SSR, iPods, Computers, Partner reading).

Science: Students will begin studying animals and their habitats.

Social Studies: Students will finish up their study of the continents

Spanish: Students will continue to review the vocabulary for clothing.

Writing:

• Writing: Hand writing with Mrs. P: Students will be learning the penmanship of lowercase “y, i, p.”  

• Composition with Mrs. P: During composition time students will be writing final drafts of the biographies they started last week.

• Spelling with Mrs. S: Students are grouped by levels and engage in Words Their Way sorting activities.  Students sort words into categories by sounds patterns according to their present level of functioning.  This week students will play word board games.

• Sentence Fundamentals with Mrs. S:: Students will continue their study of PENSMARK, a self-regulating strategy developed to teach sentence fundamentals: capital letters, end marks, making sense, simple sentence formulas, and subject/ verb identification. PENSMARK is a mnemonic device that stands for Pick a formula, Explore words to fit the formula, Note the words, Search and Check, Mark out the imposters, Ask “Is there a verb?”, Root out the subject, and Key in on the beginning, middle, and end. Everyone has mastered the three requirements of a complete sentence: Capital letter, End mark, and “Makes sense.” We finished the prerequisite skills for identifying subject nouns and verbs:  Now we are applying those skills to identify the subjects and verbs in the sentences.  This is a prerequisite skill for the second grade benchmark skill: I can correctly use adjectives, adverbs and the past tense of irregular verbs.  Since subject-verb identification may be review for some, students will work at their own pace advancing to the next level as soon as they receive a score of 100 on three consecutive trials.  Students are doing well differentiating between mind actions and body actions.  Students also are generalizing their study of quality nouns as we discuss qualities that make a good presidential candidate: honesty, integrity, etc.  Students apply their sentence fundamental skills every other day during composition time.