The energy of a new year is always amazing! Only two full days into our school year and students are practicing spelling words, learning about the liturgical colors, and working on addition. Stay tuned for more updates and pictures!
How exciting it is to be starting another school year! The summer was lots of fun, between travel, running races, and learning to cook some recipes it was certainly a wonderful time off! I can't believe that I am already going into my fifth year as a teacher! Stay tuned to the blog for weekly updates and be sure to check under the second grade classroom information for weekly learning objectives!
This past week we worked on comparing and contrasting two different versions of the same story. The children enjoyed reading many different fairy tales! One activity everyone liked was the hula hoop comparison activity (pictured)! We finished our fraction review unit by celebrating with a fraction pizza party! Next week, we are working on dictionary skills and ABC order. We'll also be continuing to practice reading fluency. In math, we'll be focusing on a comprehensive review of all second grade math skills! Ready set go!
What a crazy week of weather we've had this week! In the early part of the week we enjoyed a delightful lesson on the moon while sitting outdoors. Our focus this week has been on nonfiction text. Students have been asking questions to identify the main idea of a passage. Additionally, we spent time combining measurement and graphing to measure the distance a race car traveled and then creating a line graph to show the results. (Always a yearly hit!)
Our plants all went home this week! I'm already missing their delightful green presence in the classroom. I may have to invest in some potted leafy decorations next year.
In third grade, we finished our architecture projects. I'm excited to grade them and post photos of finished floor plans and designs. One lesson the class learned was that being an architect/ designer is much harder than just finding things that look good together. Learning to measure surface area was a challenge, but I was proud of their determination and enthusiasm to understand the concept.
Preparations for next week include lessons on fraction in second grade, fluency activities, and concluding our space activities.
I am also working on crafting a unit that combines stewardship and creating a budget/ balancing a checkbook for third grade. We'll see what creativity I am able to find this weekend!
Happy Teaching!
The picture below might be my favorite all year! Sitting in a hose! How creative!
What an exciting way to start winding down our school year! The kiddos are growing their very own bean plants! Each day we take time to journal our plant observations. Students have started measuring the height of their plant to the nearest half inch and half centimeter. On Wednesday, we watched a short video clip explaining photosynthesis. Before school lets out for the year, I'd like to cover short units on the planets as well as simple machines. It's this time of the year, when the bulk of the core curriculum has been taught, that I start to pull out some of the more fun activities! :)
An even more exciting project we're starting is the third grade math architecture project. We will be designing, drafting, and estimating the cost of building an entire house. Students are assigned different rooms and must calculate the surface areas of the floor and walls to determine costs of decorating and building. The kids are anticipating this very real world project and I am anxious to see what they'll come up with!
This week, we worked a lot on multiplication/ arrays. Students were excited to start exploring multiplication facts. One of our favorite games this week was multiplication race. Students set out cards on the floor in the shape of a game board. They rolled a dice and moved their colored bear counter as many spaces as they rolled. They then multiplied the number on the dice with the number of the card they landed on. In order to answer they drew an array and their partner checked the answer on a calculator. I found this game on Pinterest, and I love it!
This week, students worked on learning all about plants! We planted bean seeds and started a seed journal. Students are looking forward to watching the seeds grow!
This week, students worked hard to develop a narrative story using Lego's StoryStarter curriculum. Students were given the beginning of the plot, and working in collaborate teams wrote three following events, which included dialogue, and a conclusion. The children look forward to to weeks where we use the Lego sets to write!
We've had such a fun time trying some new multisensory spelling activities. Inspired by a former professor of mine, I changed up my spelling routine. Students were given twenty-four words to study throughout the week, then on Friday they were tested on 10 randomly chosen words from that list. Each day we spent twenty minutes studying the list with a variety of multisensory activities. Children had the choice of what activity they wanted to do. Choices included: shaving cream, playdough, typing, computer games, double writing, paint-in-a-bag (a favorite), tennis balls, bean bags, and dots! I hope to compile my activity lists and post them over the summer! Stay tuned!
Paint-in-a-bag! Put about two tablespoons of colored paint in a plastic baggie. (We did one tablespoon of yellow and one of pink!) Add some squirts of hand sanitizer and you have a fun surface to write words on! The texture is both smooth and squishy! Makes for a great multisensory activity!
We've been working on preparing for First Communion. Students spent time this week learning the sequence of the parts of the Mass. Multiple cooperative learning teams were able to successfully order twenty-one parts! A marvelous job for second graders! As we continue to pursue First Communion preparation we will be delving deeper into the Mass and Eucharist.
Some of our activities from this unit include sequencing, a fan n' pick activity, and the game "Who Am I?" - If anyone is interested in trying out my games send me an email. I'd be happy to share, and receive feedback!