Lots of Things Going On In Second Grade

We have had a very busy beginning tothe school year. Students have been great making the transition into second grade. In reading we have covered many of our decoding strategies as well as our first two expanding strategies - visualizing and using our schema. We have used these strategies in our shared reading with Cam Jansen and the Mystery at the Monkey House, Magic Treehouse Dinosaurs before Dawn, and Ready Freddy Apple Orchard Race. Guided reading groups are running well. We will soon start our reading response journals (responding to our reading by writing).
We have completed our first units in writing - expository writing - with our "How to . . " and our "All About . . . " books. We are very excited to use our writing to inform, teach,and instruct our readers using this kind of writing. We will be doing Small Moments (personal narratives) next. Some students have jotted down some great ideas already!!
We all love math time!! We finished unit one (addition, subtraction, and the number system 1)and will be finishing up unit two (Geometry) this week. It has been lots of fun to watch students construct 2-d and 3-d structures with symmetry. Next we move into addition, subtraction, and the number system 2.
We all said good bye to our student teacher on Tuesday - Miss Abbott. She leaves for Ghana, Africa on Thursday to student teach there! She promised to come back and visit us when she returns in 8 weeks! We can't wait to hear how it went!
Halloween party on Friday, the 29th. Please send in a labeled costume in a labeled bag with your child. (Please don't put make up on in the morning.) We will be going to the Friendly Home in the afternoon to bring the residents a little holiday cheer! Mr. Wikiera