Mrs. Latimer's and Mrs. Black's Class

There is no school on Monday.  Enjoy your long weekend!

We had our first banana split timed test on Friday.  The test was on adding 0 and 1.  The time limit is five minutes.  We will have another test on Friday.  If your child passed the test he/she will move on to adding 2.  Continue to practice facts with your child several times a week.  Our regular seven minute timed test will be on Tuesday every week.  This test has 100 facts 0-18.  Practice makes perfect! 

Banana Split Parts:

0-1     Bowl

2        Spoon

3        Napkin

4        Banana

5        Ice cream scoop

6        Ice cream scoop

7        Ice cream scoop

8        Syrup

9        Whipped Cream

10      Cherry

Today we read Pigsty by Mark Teague and completed a flow chart.  We included five important details from the story.  Ask your child to retell the story to you.  Make sure your child uses the main character's name (Wendell), the setting (his bedroom), and the problem and solution (messy bedroom, clean bedroom).

Don't forget to return the green early release form handed out at open house as well as the t-shirt form and  money to Mrs. Hernandez.

Friday we continued to read Gooney Bird Greene.  We learned about her magic carpet ride as well as how she got her diamond earrings.  Ask your child why Gooney Bird says all great stories use the word suddenly.  Also see if your child can tell you the difference between primary and secondary characters.  We gave several examples of secondary characters from this story (Mrs. Pidgeon, Malcolm, Felicia Ann).  The only primary or main character in this story is Gooney Bird Greene.

We have been reading books written by Mark Teague.  He is the author we are studying this month.  The story we read on Friday was called The Secret Shortcut.  Wendell and Floyd are the main characters in this story.  These two can also be found in other Mark Teague books such as The Lost and Found which we read on Thursday.  The class performed The Secret Shortcut through reader's theater Friday morning.  It is an accelerated Reader and we will be encouraging everyone to take the test this week.  The book is a higher level book but since we have read it several times in class and discussed it we feel everyone should be ready to take the test.  Ask your child to retell you the  story.  See if he/she can make a connection.  The ability to make a connection after reading or hearing a story shows good comprehension.  Making a connection means connecting the book to another book read, to yourself, or to something in the world(a current or historical event).

Continue to practice math facts!

We started a new "read aloud" book this week.  It is called Gooney Bird Greene.  It is about a second grader who likes to be the center of everything.  She is a wonderful storyteller!  She insists that she only tells true stories.  The class has a hard time believing that since she says she arrived in town on a flying carpet from China.  They can't wait to hear about it.  Gooney's story today was about how she got her name.  Ask your child to tell you all about it.  Gooney also reminds her second grade classmates that all great stories have 3 essential things, a beginning, middle, and end.  She also reminds them that it is important to be descriptive and have a cliffhanger.  Hopefully your child can remember some of these key facts.

Send in your box tops!  We have started collecting for a contest that ends in October.  I am really hoping we win!

Snack and Water Bottle Reminder:  Please make sure your child has a healthy, easy to eat snack each day.  Please don't send in anything that requires a fork or spoon.  Also, please send a water bottle with your child daily as this prevents the need to get up and get water during lessons.  Please do not send any drinks other than water.  We are not allowed to have anything else due to spills.

Our first banana split test will be this Friday.  Your child will be adding 0 and 1.  The time limit is five minutes to answer 100 facts.  Please practice addition facts with your child several times a week.  It is important to have all addition and subtraction facts 0-18 memorized.  We need to get past the habit of counting on fingers.  Please let us know if you need any ideas for practicing.

ESSENTIAL QUESTIONS

Science:  What is matter?

Math:  What can I do with numbers?

Reading:  What does it mean to be an independent reader?

Writing:  How does using the writing process help me share my thoughts and knowledge with others?

Social Studies:  How does an understanding of intermediate directions help us travel from one place to another?

Sitton Spelling:

Here is a poem to help your child with "surprise" words.  We wrote it and said it several times today.  Please encourage your child to practice it at home as it will help to spell "said" which doesn't follow phonetic rules.  We will use this poem for tricky words throughout the year.

Read said, see said.

It's a spelling surprise!

To spell said correctly,

I have to use my eyes!

S-A-I-D                              

Lauren!

It was great to see so many of you at Chic-Fil-A tonight.  I wonder what class will win the cow!

Just a reminder that we need all school forms filled out and returned this week.  I will be giving you an early release form to fill out at Open House.

Thank you to everyone who signed up at Sneak A Peek to provide sweet treats this year.  We will put the list out again at Open House for anyone who missed it last week.  In addition we will also be asking for copy parents and reading parents once a week.  Please sign up at Open House if you are able to donate your time.  We greatly appreciate your help and support.

Your child wrote you a letter today in his/her letter home journal.  Please respond to your child's letter and return the journal to school by Monday morning.  Your child will write to you every Thursday.  For the next several weeks we will write the letter as a class.  Your child has the option of adding his/her own details, but is encouraged to copy the letter from the Promethean Board.  The purpose of this is to teach basic letter formation, the parts of a letter, and to demonstrate what is expected.  Therefore, you should see most words spelled correctly, as well as correct punctuation and capitalization.  If you do not see this, please discuss paying attention and copying carefully with your child.  Once your child is writing the letter independently we will check to make sure that the letter is complete, however we will not make any changes or suggestions about content or conventions.  This should give you a true picture of your child's writing ability.  This is a great time to discuss errors and how to correct them with your child.  The letter home journal (LHJ) should be a way for your child to communicate with you as well as a way to practice writing skills at home.

In math this week we worked on all baseline data.  The class took the addition and subtraction timed tests, and the first Exemplar.  The class took part one of the first nine week unit test.  Part two will be taken tomorrow.  This test will help us place the class into math groups based on ability.  A new test will be given to assess abilities at the beginning of each nine week grading period.

This week we read short stories such as First Day Jitters and How I Spent My Summer Vacation, as well as the chapter book Hour of the Olympics.  We sequenced the events, made connections, and discussed vocabulary.  On Friday your child will take the SRI which is a computer test that measures your child's comprehension.  We will use this test as well as the ending DRA score from first grade to place your child in an appropriate reading group.  We will meet our book buddies from Mrs. Satterthwait's class tomorrow morning.  We will be reading with this class every Friday morning (8:20-8:50).  We encourage your child to bring a favorite book from home each week to read during this time.  When reading out loud to someone else it's important to have a familiar story.  This will help with fluency.

Open House on Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Isabella!

We had a great first day of school!  We read a book called, First Day Jitters.  It has a great ending!  Ask your child to tell you about it.  The children wrote about their first day and drew pictures of themselves.  We also did a math activity that helped us to get to know our class mates.  A large part of the morning was spent discussing school and classroom rules and expectations.  Please review these with your child and then both of you need to sign the back and return the booklet by Friday.

Tonight's homework is a Dear Parents spelling worksheet.  It is due tomorrow.  Your child also has a math project due every Friday.  The information can be found in your child's blue take home folder along with this week's Sitton spelling words.  We discussed several ways to practice spelling words at home.

Mark your calendars!  Next Tuesday, August 19th at 6:30 is open house.  Please make sure you are there as we will go over the new county report card for second grade as well as our plans for a successful year.  This is a really important meeting that you don't want to miss!  We hope to see everyone there!

Welcome Back!

Welcome to second grade!  We are excited about the new school year and the many adventures ahead of us.