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Welcome to Ms. Renda's class website. You will find all sorts of news
written here about your child's class. It will be important to check in
every week. I update the website by Monday, usually on Sunday if I'm not
away. Reading this news will help you stay connected to important events
going on in class and homework. If you ever have any questions or concerns,
please feel free to call me at 898-9586 from 8:15-8:35 or from 3:20-3:45, or
just jot me a note.
Every once in a while the weekend gets away from me. This was one
of those times! I needed to visit Keene, NH for the weekend, brought
my laptop with all intensions of updating my website, but no reception!
So, this part of the website will not be updated this week. I am diligent
about its update, but realistic about the times when it would put too
much stress on the teacher and we don't want that! I will still update
the student of the week and hide him or her in and around the
paragraphs. So, stay tuned next week for a synthesis of the two
weeks. Thank you for understanding! Paula
Reading-Fostering your children to be life-long readers is a number
one goal for me. I try to achieve this goal through my response to
literature, the students excitement of a special book, and sharing
the love of and connection to characters in literature.
Our beloved principal, Mrs. Armfield, put herself in jeopardy and
proved her passion for reading by kissing a live goat during a whole-
school assembly. Of course, she protected her lips with lipstick, placed
a tiny carrot in her mouth and smooch, smooch! She announced the
next day that in fact goats really do have lips! We loved it! The kids
went wild! We will never forget that the community of readers at
Golden Brook grouped together to read 3,150 books and were responsible
for Mrs. Armfield's daring behavior.
On Tuesday, we bought in our Teddy Bears, or something that
looked like one and sat around listening to the story, Corduroy.
Corduroy is a delightful story about a stuffed bear who remains on
the shelf in the toy store until a little girl saved up all of her money
to purchase him. We all shared our feelings about buying a new
stuffed animal and leaving the ones behind on the shelf. Maybe they
are real and have feelings we have all wondered. Now, do you see
why I still teach second grade??
We have been focusing on the skill of retelling which includes
ones ability to tell a story from beginning to end. You must include
the following: setting, the characters, problem, solution, and
resolution, as well as the main idea. Because this concept is so
complex, I like to spread it out over a few weeks. We began with
identifying the setting. Setting refers to the time, place, period in
history throughout a story or book. By the end of the week, we
began to include characters. Since we know Arthur and his family
and friends so well, my little plastic statues of Arthur appeared
and we identified them and began to describe their characteristics
and qualities. The concept of retelling will continue for the next
few weeks. To reinforce our study, please ask your child to tell
you about the setting and characters.
Handwriting -The Red Phonics book will be the measure by which the
children will realize their potential and the expectations of quality. As
they are graded in handwriting in this book and on their Friday "check-
point", their will shoot higher for quality work.
The following letters have been taught and practiced:
Kk, Ww.
Each week another letter will be added until we finished
the alphabet.
A few handwriting rules to reinforce at home:
1. Your pencil should be loosely placed in your hand so that it can
be pulled out easily.
2. Most letters are formed from the top down.
3. Pay close attention to tall letters and letters that hang down.
4. Use lines and spaces to make full letters.
5. When your pencil moves slowly, your handwriting will be neater.
6. Correct pencil grip-keep trying!
Written Expression -We continue our study of the person we
admire in our lives. We added to the writer's web and began
to tell more about the person. The transfer from web to
narrative began, deciding how to proceed and in what order.
This is a difficult process for adults, never mind second
graders. I am anxious to see how they will do this week
coming up. Please ask your child who they are writing
about and have them bring in a photograph of this person
Monday or Tuesday. Of course, we will be sharing with each
other every step of the way.
During the Phonics Checkpoint, students are asked to
write the three sentences I dictate. I hope this will increase
the child's ability to remember information delivered orally,
transferred from oral to written. I dictate each sentence
fully at first, followed by phrases, and finally repeat the
entire sentence again. I expect children to capitalize,
punctuate, and spell words correctly. The words in each
of the first two sentences are words they have seen previously
in first grade and in the second grade Phonics Program.
The last sentence
is the Challenge Sentence which contains words they may
not have come across. Each word spelled correctly in this
third sentence gives them an extra bonus point. They
receive bonus points for capitalization and punctuation.
It is time to introduce the VIP person of the week.
Our Weekly Readers have finally arrived. The company
missed our class somehow. We managed to obtain one
set from another class from the September set. Mrs. Longo
took over on Wednesday afternoon while Ms. Renda went
to the orthopedic and found her little toe to be broken!
Ouch! The class read, Going Places, in the Weekly Reader
all about animals and how they travel. The following days,
students learned how to answer questions in complete
sentences by reformulating a question into a statement.
The children achieve points for each word they use from
the question in the statement. This is hard work! We
celebrate each little achievement by sharing our results
with each other.
Language-While discussing our new Phonics words this week, we
noticed pairs of homonyms, sometimes called homophones. These
are words such as: deer and dear, two, to, and too. It is important
for second graders to know the different spellings, definitions and
use of such words.
During our morning meeting letter, Ms. Renda attempted to
leave out ALL the periods and see whether the children could
punctuated the paragraph. Well, those little rascals did it! I am
going to have to try harder next week!
We realized when writing in the morning meeting message
about attempting to break the Guinness Book of World Records, the
use of the word "record". Our school was attempting to record the
number of students listening to the reading of Corduroy to break
the record. We realized the same word can be read differently and
mean different things.
Math-Increasing the difficulty of concepts by using more difficult examples
will continuously be part of the Everyday Math program. Students used
greater and less than to determine less and more with money
combinations, addition and subtraction problems, and numbers in hundreds
and thousands. Review of concepts were a big part of the week due
to the fact that Unit One came to a close on Friday. I will continue to assess
on Monday and begin the new unit on the same day, still reinforcing
concepts with children who are weak. You will see the Unit One math
booklet come home soon with your child's work since September. Some
students will need to finish and correct pages and return the unit to
school.
Science-Our unit about Geology began this week. We have basically just
introduced the concepts of rock formation. The children have shared their
rock collection with a partner to generate excitement. If your child has
not brought their collection to school, they need to do that by Tuesday.
We are learning about the different categories of rocks: sedimentary,
igneous, and metamorphic, as well as minerals. The Audubon Society
visited us on Tuesday and bought a wonderful sampling of rocks for us
to put our hands on.
Some students take their assignments seriously and others go beyond
the call of duty. Once such student resides in our class and his name is
Christopher. Last week the Phonics Bonus word was igneous rock. Chris
took it upon himself to explore the National Park website and found
"Rock Hound". There he found a wonderful diagram of a volcano and other
rock formation drawings. Chris did a beautiful job copying the diagrams,
color and all. He showed the class and they were so impressed. I love
it when these things happen! In addition, Christopher is helpful in class,
always willing to volunteer. He is the person who prepares the table for
student incoming mail and notes and he is responsible about his job
each day. Christopher is a joy to have in class. -Ms. Renda
Social Studies-Now that we have started our Weekly Readers, our study
of social studies increase on a regular basis. WR often includes history
and geography in their issues.
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