For school-wide information, including special days (e.g., purple shirt day, PA Day, Pride Assembly), and special events (e.g., food drive etc.) please remember to check your weekly E-Blast from RHPS in your email on Fridays. I will try to keep our class blog specific to learning in our classroom so that information isn't repeated.
If you are not receiving the weekly E-Blast from the school, please contact the school or Mrs. Gibbs.
Portfolios
Yesterday students set up their portfolios. These folders will travel between home and school so that families are aware of their child's learning and progress in Grade 2. Portfolios are red folders. When you see the Portfolio in your child's BEE Bag please review it together, sign it, and return it to school.
Math
Over the next few weeks in math, students will be learning about sorting and patterning. We will begin by learning about sorting using two attributes.
An attribute is a way of describing, or sorting objects. Here are some attributes that we used to sort objects in our classroom:
Depending on what we are sorting or describing there are many possible attributes! If we are sorting the students in our class we might look at shoe size, birthday month hair colour, etc. If we are sorting food we might look at the colour, size, shape, or even "type" of food (fruit, vegetable) as our attributes. Yesterday we sorted apples, here are some examples of attributes that students used to create their sorting rules:
Today students were introduced to the concept of sorting objects using two attributes at the same time. We can organize our sort using a Venn Diagram. The most challenging part about learning how to sort by two attributes is....choosing two different attributes! Some students will sort objects by "small and big" but here we are only looking at one attribute (size). Instead we need to sort using two different attributes (e.g., size AND colour....or size AND shape). Below see an example of how we used objects found in nature to sort using two different attributes. We will continue to work on these through a series of activities this week.
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| Here our attributes were "seed" and "green". Just seeds are on the left, and just green is on the right. In the middle there is a green seed! (well....we think it's a seed anyway!) |
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| Here the attributes are "soft" and "small". They are different because one attribute is about the texture, and the other is about the size. There are feathers in the middle because feathers are soft and small! |
Reading
Students now have a "reading goal" that they are working on. Some of the reading goals are:
Checking for Understanding- asking ourselves who and what after we have read a page, or paragraph, if we don't know we need to back up and re-read
Decoding Strategies- like chunking the letter sounds together, and looking for blends.Cross-Checking- asking ourselves if a word looks right, sounds right, and makes sense
As a class we have been learning about how visualizing while reading (making a picture in our heads) helps us to understand the text deeper. We have been learning how authors help readers visualize by including many details and "painting a picture" for the reader. These descriptive words used are called adjectives.
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| Looking at words that have blends |
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| Our poem of the week was fun to visualize |
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| Making a list of adjectives |
Writing
Writing Project:
We continue to work on our Small Moment Personal Narratives. This week we will be learning about how we can bring our stories to life by making our characters move, think, and speak.
Family Journals:
Many students enjoy writing their Family Journal on Fridays. Thank you for making time to read these at home. Last week students received some written feedback in their journals. The feedback identified a goal that they are working on in their journal writing.
Work on Writing:
During literacy centres students have time to "work on writing" independently each week. This type of writing is different than our writing project. In work on writing time students write in their Writer's Notebooks. They can use their brainstorm or heart map, do free writing, or use a prompt to help generate ideas. After their work on writing time, students have the opportunity to share their writing with the class and receive feedback. Feedback is provided in the form of a star and a wish. Mrs. Gibbs records feedback given to the students into their writing folder so that they can use this feedback the next time they work on writing.
Social Studies
Today we finished our Family Heart Map presentations and they were wonderful! It was great to learn about our families and celebrate our similarities and differences. We had many interesting conversations about the family heart maps. Next up in social studies, students are working to share about the traditions for a celebration that they know about. Later, students will learn to gather information about a celebration that they would like to learn more about.
We are excited that a number of families have offered to come in a speak to our class! Mrs. Gibbs will be working on a schedule soon. If you would like to share about your family celebrations or traditions with our class we would love to have you, please let Mrs. Gibbs know!
social studies- family heart maps, next project students sharing the traditions about a celebration they know a lot about
