Week 26

                                                

Grade 2 Newsletter

Important Dates

• February 25 - ES Trimester 3 Begins 
• March 4 - ASA Session 3 Sign up begins 
• March 6 - ES Assembly - 2S (7:55 am - 8:25 am, ES Hall) 
• March 7 - Early Release Day (All Students Dismissed at 11:30 am) 
• March 7 - ES Trimester 2 Report Cards Issued 
• March 8 - CAC Holiday 
• March 12 - Shelter in Place Drill 
• March 18 - May 17 - ASA Session 3

Student work going home

This week most students will be taking home the mid-module 5 assessment and a writing samples. Please review with your kids their strengths and areas to work on. Don’t forget to sign and return to school.

Math Challenge

Due to the long and challenging problem that our students were facing last week. The whole grade 2 will work one more week in the same problem. We will do it all together, in a guided way were teachers and students will preview the 2 parts to work on every day. The next day we will review this 2 parts and preview the next 2. Students will learn to work in on challenge during the whole week. We encourage students to work on this problem and bring it back to school with questions and successes.

To find the rich task, click on the Home Learning tab on the top left-hand, click on “Math Challenge of the Week”.

Core Value Books

The core value for February  is CREATIVITY. We will be sending home the core value book with the theme of creativity: The Almost Terrible Playdate. Please read it with your child, then return it to school for the next student to take home.

Exercises for Boosting Creativity

When facing a problem, define the issue clearly and then practice divergent thinking (ex: developing multiple solutions/outcomes rather than just one solution). Set time aside each day for creative thinking or creative activities (such as: writing poems or using an everyday household object in a new way).

What’s Going on This Week in Grade 2

Readers’ Workshop

Grade 2 is moving along and we are moving into our 5th unit Reading About Science Topics to Become Experts. In the first bend, we will focus on reading as scientists to build up a base of knowledge on a topic by reading deeply about the topic. Readers will choose what they want to learn about, read about it, and integrate ideas from the science unit forces and motion. Students will learn to analyze text in parts in relation to the whole by using non-fiction features. Readers of nonfiction texts will learn to use all the sentences on the page to think about what’s most important—the big, main idea of that section. We often say our main idea not just as a word but instead as a phrase and back up this idea with details.

The students will focus on the following essential questions:

• How do readers read non-fiction differently from fiction? 
• How can I read non-fiction books to become an expert on a topic? 

Some suggested discussions to do at home:
Discuss non-fiction features and how these features help us as readers understand even more about a topic. Also, determine the main idea and supporting details of any think non-fiction such as articles, pamphlets, and books.

Writers’ Workshop

This unit is integrated with our science unit forces and motion. students will learn to write lab reports and science books. In the first bend, we will learn to write as scientists do. When scientists conduct experiments to learn about the world, they have a certain way they usually write - they use a lab report format. They record what they expect to happen in an experiment, and they record what they actually do in the experiment, then they record how things go and what they learn. Students enjoy this unit as it is hands on and they become scientists as they explore simple machines and forces and motion.

The students will focus on the following essential questions:

• How do I find out information about a topic? 
• Why do I need to revise my writing? 
• How do I present my findings to the world?

Math - Addition and Subtraction Within 1,000 with Word Problems up to 100

After the mid-module 5 assessment, we continue to work in the module. students build upon their mastery of renaming place value units and extend their work with conceptual understanding of the addition and subtraction algorithms to numbers within 1,000, always with the option of modeling with materials or drawings. Throughout the module, students continue to focus on strengthening and deepening conceptual understanding and fluency. This week we will do the Mid-module assessment and go over it to complete our two stars and a wish.

Some of the objectives are:

• Use math drawings to represent additions with up to two compositions and relate drawings to the addition algorithm. 
• Choose and explain solution strategies and record with a written addition method. 

Essential Questions

• How can strategies help me to quickly add and subtract? 
• How do I explain my mathematical thinking and why is that important? 

Key understandings of Module 5:

1. I can add and subtract numbers from 0 to 1000 using different strategies based on place value and regrouping. 
2. I can mentally add or subtract 10 and 100 from any number from 100 to 900 
3. I can explain why various addition or subtraction strategies work using numbers, drawings, or objects.

*Don’t forget to check out Eureka Math at https://greatminds.org/
*Module 5: Topic A, Lesson 13-18 Parent Tips Letter 

Science

This week we will explore inclined planes. How does an inclined plane make work easier? Check out this BrainPOP movie (username: cacegypt, password: cacegypt) to learn more about inclined planes.

Essential Questions:

• How do objects move?
• How do force and motion help me understand the world around me?

Some suggested discussions you can have at home:

• Discuss how simple machines help us in everyday living using unit vocabulary:
• direction, slide, back/forth, pulley, movement, push/pull force, gravity simple machine - any of the basic mechanical devices for applying a force, such as an inclined plane, wedge, or lever, wheel and axle, pulley
• Force - energy that moves something
• Effort x distance = work
• Discuss motion and forces.
  Vocabulary: simple machines, lever, fulcrum, effort, load, screw, wedge, pulley, wheel and axle, inclined plane, force, work, motion, friction, gravity.

Circles

Focus: Displaying creativity especially when working with others, in the classroom, at school, at home, and in the community.