Monday, August 25, 2014

Dear parents,

We have successfully ended our second week. I want to thank all the parents that made it to school for the curriculum night. If you were unable to make it, please feel free to call or send me an email if you have concerns or worries about school. I will continue to share bits and pieces of our curriculum in my newsletter as the weeks go by.

This is our third week’s schedule:

ASSESSMENT/EVALUATIONS

The ultimate aim of giving a test is to assess scholars' learning and to see if there is urgent need to go over a concept. The tests will also be graded to keep track of scholars' performances and development over a period of time. If a scholar fails a test, I will go over the concept again, and the scholar will be reassessed to see if mastery of concept has been achieved. Therefore, the ultimate goal of testing is not predominantly to assign grades; the aim of testing is to assess where your scholar is, and to make sure your scholar achieves mastery of content to a large extent. Please let me know if you have questions about testing.

LANGUAGE ARTS

SPALDING PHONICS – Most students are doing well with the phonograms. We will complete the first 54 phonograms on Monday, and begin spelling hopefully on Monday. Many students have improved their handwriting on the practice, and we are so proud of the improvements we are seeing.  We will continue to work on penmanship.

READING – We finished the first six chapters of Charlotte’s Web, discussing the friendships that are being forged in the barn at the Zuckerman farm.  Wilbur has learned that he is being fattened up to be a Christmas ham, and Charlotte assured him that she is going to save him.  We will find out how, this week. We will also focus on main idea and details . Scholars will also read a folktale from Mexico: El Pajaro Cu, they will learn what a folktale is and discuss the main idea and lessons from the story.

In second grade, we teach sayings through short readers’ theaters.  (Each student will have a chance to present a saying through a readers’ theater at some time during the year.)  The readers’ theater gives the students a scenario which helps illustrate the figurative meaning of the sayings in a real-life way.  Last week, we learned the saying to develop, “Cold Feet.”   This week, our saying is "Go back to the drawing board".

GRAMMAR – Students will learn what a verb is and how a verb functions in a sentence. They will be introduced to being verbs.

WRITING – In writing we will continue to do our story narration, summary, copy-work, and dictation. Look out for graded worksheets coming home.

MATH

Students will compare and order numbers, as well as evaluate number patterns, such as counting on or back. Please, practice with your scholars at home.

Please do not let your child go ahead in the math workbook! We are very purposeful with our homework assignments, and just because a child might “know how to do it” doesn’t necessarily mean they know the strategy that we are stressing in class.  Please encourage your child to show his/her work.  It helps us see how s/he is thinking through a problem.

 We ask that you continue to work with your child on mastering the addition and subtraction facts to 20.  Once students learn how to use their facts to decompose numbers, they should be able to master their facts and do mental math more easily and do more complicated problems.  (Remember that students should be striving for automaticity with their basic facts.)

SCIENCE

 In our study of seasons, we will begin with summer and fall this week.  Students will participate in a reader’s theatre that describes what animals do in Summer and Fall. Every child will participate in the four reader’s theatres. I will have them bring their scripts home to study.

This week, we will learn about the typical activities that happen in summer.  Since the weather does not display a wide range in the valley of the sun, students don’t always know how to readily identify “summer activities,” especially since they can swim at least three seasons in the year!   This is why we are reading Charlotte’s Web now, to help students see the differences in the seasons as they are described by the author.

GEOGRAPHY OF THE AMERICAS

Our Geography this week, will take us to Mexico and the West indies. Our scholars find History so interesting that sometimes its so hard to stop the great conversations we have. I am looking forward to all we will learn this week.

HOMEWORK

Homework Folders and Agendas -   We have appreciated your help in establishing good work habits at home.  Most students have been bringing homework back the next day!  Thank you for your support with this at home.

VIRTUE

Our virtue this week is still Friendship. Please encourage your scholars to make new friends. I agree with Aristotle that:

“wishing to be friends is quick work, but friendship is a slow ripening fruit.”

PROGRESS REPORT

Initially, I planned to send out progress reports this weekend out of my own volition to tell you how your scholars are doing, but I have decided to wait till next weekend after our Reading assessments. The reason is that I will be able to give you all the reports at once and tell you if your scholar would need tutoring or intervention. Thank you for your patience!

ANNOUNCEMENTS

Please, remember to give your scholar a healthy snack on half days.

Academic folders containing graded class work, tests and quizzes will come home every Friday.

Sincerely,

Ms. Peterson and Mrs. Toyin