News for the week of November 16th
On Dec. 8th second grades classes are going to the Cobb County Civic Center to see the Nutcracker Play. Some of you signed and returned the form for permission last August. If you see a form in your child's folder, please sign it for permission for your child to go and return it November 30th.
The weeks are going faster and faster!!
Thank Yous First.....
.....to Bizzy's mom for yummy birthday treats!
.....to those who are using the suggestions on this class website to help your child at home with math, reading and writing. THANKS!!
.....to the Tritt Tiger Foundation and all those who donate to it. We at Tritt are very lucky to have the TTF (and those tho donate to it) because this allows us a great science lab with an activboard and a great teacher in Mrs. Keck, and two computer labs with a great computer teacher in Mrs. Gravelac. I have had an activboard in my classroom for a couple years now which my students and I enjoy using. The students can manipulate math problems to see why addition and subtraction work the way they do. Seeing and using the hands on activboard is great!
.....to those who have returned the red stocking THANKS! Nov. 30th is the last day to return them. Thanks!!
.....to those who have brought in food items for the Family Box.....it was huge!!!
.....to my students who are doing their reading homework every night!
.....to my students who are turning in their spelling homework!
.....to my students who are working hard and getting classwork finished!
.....to parents for reading and doing homework with their child.
Birthdays in November Logan-9th, Bizzy-17th, Maddie-24th
Dates to Remember
November 23-27 no school
November 30th-last day to return red stocking
Every Friday is Library Day -please help your child remember any books that have been checked out, to return so they are able to check more out.
Don't forget each day your child has homework. Some reading should be done whether it is a page, chapter, or the entire book. Then your child should write what was read and how much, on the reading log kept in the back of the red folder which I check every morning. If he/she needs more paper to do this, they can get it at school. Thank you for helping with this. This month starts the meal coupon opportunity for achieving the goal the students made for themselves. These will go home the beginning of each month for the prior month's achievements. I gave students a Chili's resturant coupon for a free child's meal for October. The class voted for a McDonald's coupon for November. I will collect the reading log on Nov. 30th.
We are reading stories with ideas in our minds about the author. How would we respond to the story? What would we tell the author? Ask your child what he/she would ask the author. We also want to read with fluency. When you listen to your child read, look for expression and if they slow down at a comma and stop at a period.
When we read stories we think about how we can make a connection. While reading with your child you can ask if a connection can be made to their world, to themselves or even another book. Don't forget those nouns, verbs, and adjectives within the stories. We know our own writing will be better if we use good ones too. We are also, learning what a root word is and how a root word can have a suffix like s, ed or ing.
Things to do at home to help:
--As you read with your child, ask him/her to point out a noun, verb and/or adjective, and look for words with endings so you can ask, "What is the root word? What is the suffix? and prefix?"
This week we wrote a narrative about things we are thankful for. Your children are thoughful writers. You will enjoy reading it. We are continuing to learn what a response to literature is and we can do this by writing a letter too. How do we write about a story we just read or heard? Can we retell it? Do we know characters, setting and the problem it has and its solution. What would we ask the author if we could? We will practice responding, by writing a letter to Fireperson Larson who did a fabulous job describing, showing and informing us about fire safety and other safety lessons.
When we think about talking to an author, we also want to make a connection to the book. Students are learning to search their memories in order to make a connection to the book they've read or heard. We can do this with field trips as well and Fireperson Larson will enjoy reading the kid's letters! (see photos of the field trip on the Photo Page)
Our class has some great writers! We are good at using transitional words in our writing too.
Things to do at home to help:
When you are reading with your child ask if the book reminds them of another book (text to text) or if it reminds them of something about themselves (text to self) or of their world (text to world). This help with comprehension and retention.
Ask your child what a transitional word is and maybe suggest additional words for our transitional word wall. So far we have, first, second, third, then, next, and last. Ask your child about the list of new transition words they have in their writing notebook.
Our next sort is sort 18. Please go to www.spellingcity.com and have your child practice the words during the week. They can play games and give themselves a test! We have some Super Spellers! You can also go to the Spelling Page to see the words for next week. As we add to the list of words learned, those words will be expected to be correctly spelled on all future spelling tests as well as in the writings we do in class. We want to be super spellers every day not just on Friday during spelling tests.
We worked on money problems this week. Over the holiday break ask your child if they had a 5, 10 or 20 dollar bill and went to their favorite store to get something that cost(make up an amount), what would the change be? They should also check their answer by adding the two amounts together to get the amount of the money they started out with. We worked with two different strategies to get the answer. Money can be a difficult concept and practice is always good.
The kids are doing great with the timed addition facts quizes. The students take the top portion in class and the bottom portion goes home for you to help with. I do not need the bottom portion back. This is for you to use at home. I use a two minute timer in class. I noticed the bottom portion says "1 minute". Please, unless your child really wants to, 2 minutes is fine. They need to know their addition and subtraction facts. The point of these short quizes is that they learn them, not so much quickly, but that they know each fact.
http://resources.oswego.org/games/mathmagician/mathsadd.html This is a great website for your child to review math facts. Please allow them to use it for great practice. We have begun to subtract two digit numbers with regrouping!! I'm so proud of the class for learning this, sometimes very difficult concept. Please practice at home by writing a two, two digit subtraction problem with regrouping. In class I ask questions: for example, 52-29=?
What do you do first? (look at the one's column)
They should tell you the ones subtraction sentence like 2-9.
Then ask: Can you do it? (no!)
What will you do? (the 2 asks the 5 for one of its tens)
Then what? (the five says yes, and the 10 is added to the 2.
Then can you subtract? (yes! 12-9=3)
Then the tens column is subtracted and the answer given.
Asking these question to your child will help them to understand the steps involved in subtraction with regrouping. They must show the regrouping on their paper.
Next in math we will begin geometry. Reviewing shapes and continuing with the shape's angle, verticies, faces and sides.
Things to do at home to practice math throughout the year:
--addition with and without regrouping of two, two digit numbers.
Ask your child one digit math facts will be a great help too.
--- I am always asking the kids what time is it? Any time you notice your clock at home (not digital) and it shows a time with five minute increments, please ask you child what time is it? They should count by fives and tell the time. If the minute hand is between numbers, then your child should say, "It is about.....". That is what we do in class. Thanks for helping at home.
We enjoyed seeing Mary Musgrove and Sequoyah on Monday. Georgia history is very interesting.
We are learning about goods and services and ways we can get them. One way is by majority rules, which we use in class often. Ask your child what majority rules is and other ways we can get goods and services.
We will continued our lessons on energy in the science lab this week. The kids worked with a toy car and different items to roll the car on to see which one made the car go faster. Mrs. Keck introduced friction and force to the kids. Check out the lesson with photos on wind energy on the Photo Page.
We go to the computer lab every Thursday. In the computer lab the kids take any AR test they need to take and then work on either math, writing or reading. We use kidpix, kidspiration, Mega Math, in addition to using the internet for www.spellingcity.com . The software we use in on the school computers and not accessible at home, but if you go to the Tritt website, you can find many wonderful, educational, internet websites to use at home.
If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to e-mail me at any time.
Have a safe, healthy, great Thanksgiving!
Smiles,
Mrs. Gentry