Thank you all for your thoughfulness in gifts and goodies I've received this week!
News for the week of December 14th
The weeks are going faster and faster!!
Thank Yous First.....
.....to all the wonderful moms who helped with the class holiday party. The above cookie is only one thing they did. They painted ornaments, and played holiday games and exchanged their books. It was a fun afternoon.
David's mom, Logan's mom, Jack M.'s mom, Amy's mom, and Jack W's mom. (Hope I didn't leave anyone out)
.....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.
.....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.
.....to the students who handed in their reading log for December and had it all filled in! Great job! (I'll get back to you about your goal later).
Birthdays in December Joshua on the 3rd
We celebrated Julia because her birthday is in June.
Dates to Remember
No school Dec. 19-Jan. 4th 2010
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. The kids checked out chapter books to be read over break.
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. The class voted for a McDonald's coupon for December and for achieving their AR goal for the second quarter. I'll let you know about your goal when we get back. I cannot access it from home.
We want children 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:
--Ask your child to give you a couple details from the book he/she is reading, especially after doing reading homework and pages are written down....ask what was read.
--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?"
Some students took their writing journal home. Please listen to your child read the journal to you. They are welcome to add more, edit or finish any writing piece in the journal before returning it in January.
We will learn more about creating a great topic sentence when we get back. Readers want to get "hooked" into reading from the very first sentence. We wrote a response to literature by writing a letter to Cynthia Rylant about her book, "The Relatives Came". 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? These are all points I look for in a response to literature.
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.
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.
We had sort 1-19 this week. If your child needs something to do over break, please go to www.spellingcity.com and have your child practice spelling activities. They can play learning games and give themselves a spelling test. They brought home a list of words on Monday that we've had so far this year. If you do not have this list on your refrigerator and would like a copy go to SpellingWordsWe.doc . 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.
In math this week we reviewed any math concept we've had so far. Money and time are two math concepts that can be difficult. Continue over the holiday break asking your child math questions......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.
Whenever you get the chance to see an anolog clock (not digital) please ask you child what time it is. The answer should be to the five minutes or using the words, "half past, a quarter past, or a quarter till".
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.
I've found another great math website for math practice at home. http://nlvm.usu.edu It has everything a second grader should know for math.
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 your child these questions will help them to understand the steps involved in subtraction with regrouping. They must show the regrouping on their paper.
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.
This is a good time of year for our lesson on needs and wants. What do we really need? What do we want? And do we really need it? They made a cute street called "their name" and included on one side "needs" and the other, "wants". Ice cream seemed to pop up on the "needs" side alot.
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 with a lesson in the science lab on push and pull. The children compared pushing a friend in a chair on carpet vs. the tile floor. Words used in the lesson were push, pull, friction, force and motion.
We go to the computer lab every Thursday. This week they took the SRI and STAR reading tests, which I will share with you at your conference time in January. Also, 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 on the school computers is not accessible at home, but if you go to the Tritt website, you can find many wonderful, educational, internet websites to use at home. Thanks again to the great Tritt Tiger Foundation for the computer lab and Mrs. Gravelac, who keeps it running!
If you have any questions, don’t hesitate to e-mail me at any time.
Have a great, safe, happy holiday break!
Smiles,
Mrs. Gentry