2nd Grade Blog

Dear Parents and Caregivers,

We appreciate all your support in the first quarter and look forward to the continued collaborative efforts between school and home.

Please keep in mind that the information below is pertinent to the entire school year:
· Chicago Public Schools (CPS) uniform grading scale A = 93 – 100%, B = 85 – 92%,
C = 75 – 84%, D = 74 – 65%, F = 64% and below
· Homework: Monday through Friday, 30 minutes of assignments and 30 minutes of reading. Students are expected to complete missed assignments due to absence within two days.
· Accelerated Reader (AR): Second grade students are required to participate in the AR program beginning in January.
· Murray Language Academy follows the CPS Code of Conduct. Please read and discuss with your child our behavioral expectations in school.
· Families are expected to view our 2nd Grade Blog at the beginning of each week. Families without access to the internet can visit Murray’s library. Also, a copy of the blog is always displayed outside of rooms 103 and 106 for your convenience.
· There are numerous opportunities to be active participants in your child’s class. Share a talent, assist in class or chaperone a field trip. Please consider yourself a member of your child’s teaching team.

Language Arts: Students will engage in meaningful interactive read alouds and discussions as a foundation for listening and reading comprehension. Analysis of the texts will provide themes and writing styles of various children’s authors and illustrators. Students will use notes from these discussions to support their writing.
Through the Balanced Literacy Framework, we will explore:
- Readers’ theater
- Reader’s response
- Note taking
- Illustrations as a means to communicate
- Students as authors/illustrators
- Expanding genre study to include fairy tales, folk tales, mythologies, tall tales
- Plays

Mathematics: For the second quarter, we will continue to utilize The University of Chicago Everyday Mathematics program, which develops the students’ mathematical thinking and problem solving. Please be cognizant of the required level of proficiency and check skills listed weekly on schoolnotes to support your child’s learning:

· Find values of coin and bill combinations (Developing)
· Identify place value in 2-digit and 3-digit numbers (Secure)
· Extended math response (Developing)
· Solve Frames-and-Arrows problems having two rules. (Developing)
· Making change (Developing)
· Know more difficult subtraction and addition facts (Secure)
· Devise and use strategies for finding sums and differences of two digit numbers (Developing)
· Add and subtract multiples of ten (Secure)
· Identify 3-dimensional shapes such as rectangular prisms, cylinders, pyramids, cones and spheres (Developing)
· Identify symmetrical figures (Developing)
· Find common attributes of shapes
· Identify parallel and nonparallel line segments (Developing/Secure)
· Draw line segments (Developing/Secure)
· Identify 2-dimensional shapes (Secure)
· Solve stories about multiple of equal groups (Beginning/Developing)
· Solve equal-grouping and equal-sharing division problems (Beginning/Developing)
· Use the trade-first method to solve 2-digit subtraction problems (Developing)
· Make ballpark estimate of exact answers.

Science: We are excited to implement our science program with the highly respected curriculum from the Full Option Science System (FOSS) program. FOSS offers a variety of hands-on explorations that encourages scientific thinking. In addition, we will utilize a program entitled Harcourt School Publishers Illinois Science as a supplement. For the second quarter, we will be investigating balancing, weighing, and motion.

In this unit, students expand their understanding of the relationship between balance, weight, and motion as they explore activities in balancing, comparing, weighing, and motion. Their experiences introduce them to the following concepts, skills, and attitudes.

Concepts

§ Understand that on a beam balance, balance is dependent on the amount of mass of an object, the relative lengths of the arms of the beam, and the location of the fulcrum.
§ Understand that weighing is the process of balancing an object against a certain number of standard units.
§ Know that the weight of an object is not determined by its size.
§ Understand that equal volumes of different foods will not all have equal weights; equal weights of different foods will not all have equal volumes.
§ Understand that things move at different speed and in different paths. Classify moves as pushes or pulls and know that pushing or pulling changes the way an object is moved.
§ Know that objects may be moved by being pushed and pulled with magnets.

Skills

§ Performing simple experiments with balance and motion.
§ Applying previous experiences with balancing to build mobiles.
§ Using equal-arm balance to compare and weigh.
§ Predicting the serial order for the weights of objects and foods.
§ Applying strategies for comparing and weighing to solve problems.
§ Recording results on record sheets, bar graphs, line plots, data tables, and Venn diagrams.
§ Communicating ideas, observations, and experiences through writing, drawing and discussion.
§ Reading to learn more about balancing, weighing and motion.

Attitudes

§ Developing an interest in investigating balancing, weighing and motion.
§ Appreciating the importance of balancing, weighing, and motion in the everyday world.
§ Accepting that a range of results is valid.
§ Valuing the importance of simple scientific tools.

Social Science:
Compare and contrast cultures.
Measure and compare distances on maps.
Understand the development of United States political ideas and traditions.

Sincerely,
Anh Tuan Hoang and LuAnn Lawson