Mrs. Bice's Second Grade

Readers Workshop

This week we kicked off a new unit: Growing Word Solving Muscles. Click here (u/n: bice248 pw: family) to view the parent video on what we will focus on during this unit. We began the unit learning how important it is for readers to make movies in our mind. Making a movie in our mind helps us to visualize where and when the story takes place, who the characters are, etc. This is a really important skill for students who are transitioning into chapter books! We also learned that sometimes when we are reading, we face trouble! We might come across a word we don’t know! We have TONS of strategies to help us when we face these tricky, tricky words! Over the course of the unit the students will grow their word solving muscles and have an even bigger set of tools in their tool belt when they face “trouble” in their reading.

Phonics

This week we also met our new student: Gus the dragon :) He will be with us for all of our phonics lessons and will be a great mascot to help us along the way. This week we learned about “troublemaker words.” In 1st grade the students learned snap words that they needed to know in a “snap.” In 2nd grade they transition into calling these words “troublemaker words” because these words bring us TONS of trouble! Many of them don’t follow all the phonics rules so we have to tackle these tricky words head on. We will work each week to tackle these words head on and put them into our brains! The hope is that students can read and write them by the end of 2nd grade! During conferences I will share a list of all the 2nd grade troublemaker words so you can work on them with your child!

During the second half of the week we learned a little bit more about punctuation in our reading and writing. Writers found that they forget to put punctuation in their stories and it makes it difficult to read. We spend time looking over our writing and some mentor texts to see where periods, exclamation points and question marks go! We finished the week making some punctuation spiders! Their legs are crawling with punctuation! Check out Seesaw to see some fo our work!

Writers Workshop

We have finally reached the end of our first 2nd grade narrative writing unit! This week we have been busy setting goals and see how we can fine tune our craft as writers! Yesterday, writers picked one piece to revise and edit. Next Monday they will create a title, fancy up (add color and details) and get it ready for our Author’s Celebration on Tuesday! On Tuesday we will celebrate all our hard work as authors. I ask that the kids dress in whatever makes them feel the most special: Tie, dress, tights, collared shirt etc. Anything that makes them feel like a million bucks for their first Author’s Celebration as 2nd graders! Typically I invite parents to come in to celebrate this momentous occasion but due to Covid we won’t be able to have any guests! I will be sure to document and upload the fun times celebrating all their hard work!

Math Workshop

During math we continued to explore addition strategies! We focused on the near doubles, turn-around and ways to make 10 strategies. Students should be able to apply many of this strategies when they are adding mentally. Inside os using their fingers or drawing a bunch of lines, they should be able to use everything they know about numbers to add efficiently. For example the fact 3+4. Students should have the double 3+3 memorized and then they know to add 1 more. Or when they see the fact 3 + 9, they now know to take 1 from the 3, which makes 10 and now they have 10+2 = 12. Please encourage your child to think of numbers and how they are connected! During Math Workshop, I have been pulling groups to meet their needs as mathematicians. Some kids are working on math puzzles, while others are working on adding single digits. They are all in different spots and we are working on meeting them where they are at so they can be challenged as an individual!

Science

Our first unit of study in physical science is properties of matter. This week we learned what scientists do to explore the world around them. We visited a familiar story, Three Little Pigs to think closely on the materials the pigs used and start to describe those materials! Later in the week we read a book called “What Would Happen If…” where a boy has a very mixed up day and lots of objects have properties that don’t add up! For example, his pillow is made of metal and the slide is made of sandpaper! The students helped to create a chart where we listed all the materials and properties to describe them. Then the students had the task of designing a dog bed and picking out what materials to make the bed out of. We will continue to explore the properties of matter next week!

Social Emotional

We continued to explore self management and continued to talk more about self control and personal safety. These are both really important topics when it comes to 2nd graders being able to manage themselves. We spoke about verbal self control and played a game titled “Think or Say.” We realized that there are some things we should just think and not say but there are other times we should speak up. For example, “I think this dinner tastes yucky!” We decided that might best to just think and not say!

Later in the week, we talked about personal safety and the different rules we have to keep us safe. We realized that as we get older, rules change a little bit because we get more responsibilities. The 2nd graders now know the connection between self control and personal safety! It takes a lot of maturity and self control to follow the rules.

Husky Hustle

The Husky Hustle will take place on Friday, October 30. As a reminder, we will NOT have Halloween festivities but will have a fall celebration and participate in the Husky Hustle. Husky Hustle info sheets/envelopes were sent home on Wednesday. If students return the pledge forms, then they will receive a special bracelet to show their Husky Pride. The bracelets have not been given to classroom teachers yet but I will pass them out (to students who have turned in their pledge forms) as soon as I receive them.