Second Grade Weekly Update
Week of 4/8 - 4/12
Upcoming Dates
- Monday, April 8: Solar Eclipse Celebration
- Wednesday, April 10: No School (Eid al-Fitr)
- Friday, April 12: School Improvement Day, Early Dismissal 10:55 am
Solar Eclipse
We are celebrating the Solar Eclipse this Monday, April 8. We will be going outside in the afternoon to watch the solar eclipse! Please emphasize to students that they must wear the special glasses we provide at school the whole time we are outside. It is not safe for students to look up at the sky during the solar eclipse without the glasses. If you have any concerns about your student going outside and if you would rather them stay inside, please let me know.
Summer Program Offerings
We have amazing summer program offerings in our school district! Highlights:
All currently registered PreK-8th grade students can enroll in our afternoon Summer Quest program. There are many fun and engaging classes for all grade levels - click here to view them all.
Additionally, any student who currently qualifies for dual language classes or English language/bilingual services in grades K-7th is invited to attend our Multilingual Learners Summer Scholars Program. Families of qualifying students have received an invitation via email and students received a paper copy the day before spring break.
D63 Charity Basketball Game
The 44th Annual Charity Basketball Game will take place on Friday, May 10th at Gemini Middle School. It's an exciting event where staff from all elementary schools in District 63 play against Gemini staff. The game raises money for local organizations, and this year, all proceeds will benefit NorthWest Compass. We'd love to have as many students, families, and staff attend as possible! Tickets cost $5.00 each and can be bought at any school using cash, check, or Pushcoin until May 1st. We hope to see you at the game!
Annual Plastic Bag Drive
FRC Updates
- From youth development classes, to adult education, to family events, there are many options available for students and families this spring at the D63 Family Resource Center. Visit www.emsd63.org and select Family Resource Center from the drop down menu to learn more about these opportunities and to register for classes.
We are getting ready to open Summer Camp Academy registration! Families can now register their child for summer programs at the FRC. Visit www.emsd63.org and select Expanded Learning to learn more.
Mystery Readers
Our Mystery Reader sign up sheet is full - thank you to everyone that volunteered to come in and read to our class! If you would like to still participate in being a Mystery Reader, please email me and let me know.
Specials Schedule
Below is our specials schedule for this week:
Monday: "E day" = PE / Music
Tuesday: "A day" = Art
Thursday: "B day" = SEL
Friday: "C day" = PE / Music
Math Homework
Monday: Lesson 4
Tuesday: Lesson 5
Thursday: Lesson 6
Friday: Lesson 7
Academic Update
Reading Workshop
Students will begin their intensive research as entomologists! Each student will be studying a specific insect with a partner, continuing to ask themselves, "What did this part teach me?". Students will learn what subtopics are and understand that each subtopic will have a different main idea in one nonfiction text. They will also practice pausing their reading and retelling it to their classmates to slow down and really absorb the key details of their text.
Writing Workshop
Students will begin a research project learning about insects! They will study insects of their choice and create an informational book about them, similar to their plant book a few weeks ago. Students know to add key details and facts that they researched online. They will publish their books by adding a front and back cover, a table of contents, glossary, and many chapters about their insects.
Word Work
Phonics Professors will shift their focus from prefixes to suffixes this week. We will understand how word endings can also change the meaning of a word. Students will study suffixes like -ing, -ly, -ed, and -est. We will continue to fill out a "prefixes and suffixes" chart together as a class.
Math
Students will engage in a real-world application of place value strategies and properties of operations to solve problems with coins and bills. After organizing, counting, and representing a collection of coins, students manipulate different combinations of coins to make the same total value. Students use the fewest number of coins to make a given value, seeing that just as they exchange 10 ones for 1 ten in Module 1, they can exchange coins of a lesser value for coins of a greater value.
Students find the total value of a group of coins or bills in the context of word problems. They use models and drawings to represent part–total relationships and apply place value strategies and skip-counting skills to find an unknown value. Students also make 1 dollar or make change from 1 dollar by using various simplifying strategies, such as counting on to a benchmark number or using related addition to solve a subtraction problem.
Science
Students will continue to investigate healthy and unhealthy plants and determine what steps they should take to maintain a healthy plant. Additionally, we will review what we learned at the Chicago Botanic Gardens and discuss parts of a flower.
SEL (Social-Emotional Learning)
Students will revisit the Blueprint Reflection we used last time as we discuss what conflict looks like as a class. Students will reflect on a past conflict and ask themselves questions like, "How did you feel?" and "How did you express or regulate these feelings?". Also, students will think about the other person's perspective in the situation and ask themselves, "How might the other person have felt?" and "How did they express or regulate their feelings?". Students will fill out a reflection sheet answering these questions.