weekly update

Social Studies:  

We are working on two social studies units this week and next. Our first unit is all about economics.  We tackled needs and wants, goods and services, opportunity cost, and scarcity. The second unit we are working on is how public discourse and decision making. We are learning about how communities work through issues but studying real community issues.  We read about a fictional community that was having a problem with too many dogs, and another one where neighbors were disagreeing over how many garage sales is too many. We have talked about our opinions around those issues and tried to come up with idea to solve them.

Math:

We have been practicing fractions, measuring, triple digit addition and subtraction, and word problems involving money. The second graders learned a game with fractions and made a garden full of flowers to measure. These are all skills that were on the test the students took on Thursday and Friday this past week. It is the second-to-last math test of the year! It will come home with a grade slip on Monday! 

Phonics:

We are in a club...a word collector club!  We read two book about being word collectors, The Word Collector, and Max's Words. We decided to make our own word collector club! We are collecting words that are interesting, words that we have never heard of before but sound cool, and words that we think we may want to use in our own writing or conversations.  We are learning how to sort these words into nouns, adjectives, and verbs, and how we can use these words that we are collecting in different ways.

For homework your second grader is going to interview an expert and collect more words. This could be you, the expert pancake maker, vacation planner, or book reader! We are just looking for words to expand our vocabulary, so any subject around which you have some technical vocabulary. You could also talk about your job as well : )

Reading

We have been working on our reading stamina and reading longer books. That means the second graders are reading books that have bigger words. We have been collecting words from our longer books as we read, and read, and read longer and longer books.

Homework:

For homework, your child is going to interview an expert and collect more words.  The expert your child interviews may be a family member, neighbor, or anyone special to your child. 

Extra Information:

April 29- Art Show 5:30-7:30

May 2 - Weekly Friday Bike Bus. Ride your bike to school with your friends!

May 1 - The last Skating Party!

May 9 - Early Release Day