August 20, 2018

Pineapples, Pencils & PLPs

 We are off to a great start!  I am so excited to get to know each one of the students.  They came to school on Wednesday ready to learn and happy to see their friends!  We took time to talk about our classroom rules and procedures.  I'm sure you heard something about pineapples...Stand Tall {be confident and try your best}; Wear a Crown {everyone is important and deserves to be treated with respect}; Be Sweet on the Inside {choose kindess and use our virtues}.  They have proven to be very "pineapple-ly" so far!

I sincerely thank you for making your child's education a priority and showing up for PLPs!  It's such a strong message that you send to your child.  I am thrilled to team up with you to make this year success.  I also want to thank you for all of the supplies you provided for our classroom...thank you for every pencil, pipe cleaner, marker and notebook!  They will be put to good use this year!

This Month in 2nd Grade

Math- We were able to log in to the new 2nd Grade ST Math last week.  This week we will start our math curriculum, which will start with basic review.  I will teach the math lesson to small group of students while the others work independently on ST Math.  We will then switch sides (with a little brain break in between) and will do the same thing as the first rotation. 

Science- Last Friday we had a fun engineering challenge based on the book The Most Magnificent Thing.  A chunk of our Fridays will be dedicated to science-based learning, including time to explore, create, design and experiment.  

Reading- We will jump right into some reading strategies as we take a further look into the book, The Most Magnificent Thing.  In the next couple of weeks we will get our online reading programs iReady and "Read Live" up and running. The students will take a diagnostic assessment to help us determine the level/program that will best serve them.   

Writing- Our writing will come in the form of response to reading.  We will also be reviewing some basic sentence structure and touch on grammar.  

Social Studies- We will build off of their prior knowledge of map elements as we do a simple unit on geography. 

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STAR Homework

I am going to start homework this week...but it will be very simple.  READ.  The students will earn a star for every 10 minutes they read this week, this will look similar to what you did in first grade.  Our entire class will be trying to meet our class goal of 150 STARS (collected and calculated on Friday).  I will explain the homework stystem in more detail at our Back to School Night.  The STAR Homework tracking sheet (as pictured on the right) can be found in their Monday folders each week.  The left side of the folders will be the student's work, book orders and other information for you.  The right side pocket will be the homework for the week.  The "Monday Folder" will then be returned with the STAR Homework tracking sheet on FRIDAY.  

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Upcoming Dates & Events

8/23 Back to School Night 5:30
9/3 Labor Day
9/4 PAC Meeting 6:30
9/5 Picture Day
9/15 March for Mia {stay tuned for more info}
9/19 ACS Board Meeting
9/28 Staff Development Day {no school}
10/15 Staff Development Day {no school} 
10/17 ACS Board Meeting
10/31 End of 1st Trimester
11/1 Staff Development Day {no school} 
11/8-9 PLP Conferences