February 22-26

ANNOUNCEMENTS AND REMINDERS:

Welcome back to school, everyone!  I hope everyone enjoyed their vacation.  Fingers crossed for a smooth transition back to school.

A BIG thank you goes out to the parents who were able to meet us on Friday to help us deliver our hand-made valentines!  The residents of Birchwoods loved receiving a special note of kindness from Team Howard!

Regular homework packets will begin again this week.  Remember, homework goes home on Mondays and is returned the following Monday.  For students who turn in their homework on time, they are rewarded with 15 minutes of indoor recess.  For students who forget to turn in their homework packet, they participate in 15 minutes of homework time.  During this time, they can choose to work on RAZ kids, IXL, or spelling city.

Mrs. Thibodeau will be coming to visit us again on Wednesday!  She’ll be here to talk about all things kind.  

This week is a review/challenge week for spelling.  Your child’s individualized spelling list will be sent home with their homework packets.  Practice these words at home.  On Friday, they will take a buddy spelling test to see if they can spell these words correctly.

THIS WEEK IN...

Writer’s Workshop:  Over vacation, I have completely revamped the way we practice our writing goals.  Now, students will be given time to practice one targeted goal.  These goals come from what I see in their writing.  Here are some of the goals you might expect your child to be working on:

1. I can write in complete sentences.  My sentences start with a capital letter and have correct ending punctuation.
2. I can introduce my topic.
3. I can add details and facts to support my topic.
4. I can use adjectives and adverbs correctly in my writing.
5. I can use transition words to help connect my writing.
6. My writing has an order that makes sense.
7. I can conclude my writing in interesting ways.
8. I can edit and revise my writing.

Each goal now has a special writing menu to go along with it.  The menu shows students exactly what activities they can do to help them practice their goal.  Once a student feels like they are able to demonstrate proficiency in their writing goals, they will submit an example writing piece.  

I’m so excited to share these new activities with Team Howard.  Not only do I think they provide more targeted practice for them, but I think these activities are really fun!  

Students will also be introduced to a “Make Your Own Fairy Tale” station.  This is where their imaginations can run wild!  

Reader’s Workshop:  I also spent some time over vacation to revamp our read to self and read to someone choices.  For our read to self time, I was really looking to provide opportunities for students to demonstrate their knowledge of their books in an engaging and challenging way.  As students are progressing through their reading goals, they are expected to be able to respond to their reading in a variety of ways.  Here is a quick list of the new projects that will shared with your child this week:

1. iPad book report
2. Paper bag book report
3. Book commercial
4. Making connections
5. Poster
6. Board Game
7. Reading Comprehension Journal

Students will be expected to complete at least one read to self project per month.  Of course, they are welcome to do more as well.

For our read to someone menu, I wanted to create choices that allowed students to have more fun with fluency.  The new choices now provide targeted practice for students in accuracy, pace, expression, and punctuation.  Here is a quick list of the new choices that will be shared with your child this week:

1. Perfect Poetry
2. Read the room with emotion
3. Alphabet Flow
4.   Buddy Reading with a rubric
5. Fluency Freestyle
6. Super Speedy Sight Words

Math:  This week, students will begin their new flexible groups around place value.  Your child will be placed in a group where they will be provided with targeted instruction and practice around their personal place value goals.  In second grade, students are expected to be able to:

1. Read and write three-digit numbers in numerals, number names, and expanded form.
2. Understand the hundreds, tens, and ones place in a number.
3.   Understand how many bundles of 100, 10, and 1 may be in a given place.
4.   Skip count within 1,000 by 5s, 10s, and 100s.
5.   Compare two three-digit numbers using <, >, and =

On days where we don’t switch for flexible groups, Team Howard will focus on other math goals that we currently have open.  On Mondays, we will focus on money and math facts.  Each week, we’ll begin with a mini lesson on money or a mini lesson on a math facts strategy.  Then, the team will be given time to practice their individual goals.  On Wednesday, we’ll practice telling time as well as have time for some review and/or place value work.  Again, we’ll begin with a mini lesson and then students will be given time to practice their individualized goals.

Read Aloud:  This week, Miss Gilmour will begin reading The BFG by Roald Dahl.  This story is a great story of friendship.  It’s also one with lots of imagination!  The characters use some hilarious made-up words and have some really interesting conversations.

Science:  This week, we’ll conclude our unit on matter with a fun, integrated lesson.  After learning all about fairy tales, one of our favorite stories was the story of the three little pigs.  Unfortunately, some of the pigs did not have the best of luck designing their homes.  So, we’re going to help them!  This week, we will conduct an experiment that allows us to find the best kind of mortar for the job.  Once we’ve found the best mortar, we’ll use some of it to create the framework for a house.  After we have the framework, we’ll begin adding walls and a roof.  Now the challenge here is to build a house that can stand up to the “huff and puff” test.  During this test, all members in your groups will blow as hard as you can, trying to knock the house down.  If your house stands up to that test, you’ll have the opportunity to try the SUPER huff and puff test... a.k.a. Mrs.  Howard’s blowdryer!