Mrs. Spencer's Classroom Blog

Monday is the 100th day of school! We will be doing several activities related to reading and math throughout the day to celebrate!

Weekly Spelling Words – pattern ow, ou

Pattern words – clown, growl, found, mouse, cloud

Sight words – been, seven, together, once, time

Bonus words – artifact, people, Dearborn, photographs, Henry Ford

We will continue with the writing portion of the WIDA test this week.

Last week, we started working on our final copy of our landforms book. Here are a few pictures of our hard working class.

I hope everyone is enjoying their long weekend and finding a little time to read (you knew I had to say it)!

Our spelling pattern this week is au, aw.  Something to remember when practicing the words is that au is in the middle of the word not at the end like aw can be.

Pattern words – pause, vault, jaw, draw, yawn

Sight words – drink, only, warm, done, round

Bonus words – beautiful, wonderful, fabulous, gigantic, delicious

These spelling words can be found on Spelling City. The link is here on my blog.

This week on Wednesday and Thursday , we will be taking the WIDA English Language Proficiency test. The test will be for listening , speaking, reading, and writing skills.  Students will be taking the test on the computer.

Tuesday is Engineering/Science Night at Henry Ford School from 5:00 to 7:00.  There are many fun activities planned. Please plan on attending with your child.

The PTA is sponsoring a bake sale at Engineering/Science night. Baked goods can be brought to school on Tuesday.

We will celebrate Valentine’s Day on Thursday, February 11. Students may bring in Valentine’s to share!

Wednesday is a late start!
There is no school on Friday the 12th and Monday the 15th.

Weekly Spelling Words
Pattern words – root, chew,clue, canoe,fruit
Sight words – always, put, every, think, again
Bonus words – mountain, plain, volcano, plateau, Earth

Here are our weekly spelling words. Students can also find them on Spelling City. The link is here on my blog.
The pattern this week is the vowel pairs – oo and ou.
good, took, could, cookie, stood.
The sight words are because, many, long, full, pull.   Bonus words – community, timeline, future, history, country

We are beginning our informational writing and science unit on landforms. We will be doing research and will use the information we find to make a book of landforms. The students will be illustrating their book.

January reading logs are due on Monday, February 1.

We will be celebrating Valentine’s Day on Thursday, February 11 since we have the 12th and the 15th off for winter break.

It was a chilly week last week which means we have not been outside running around at recess. We took breaks during the day and sometimes moved around using the website GoNoodle.

Weekly Spelling Words

Pattern – R controlled vowels  – thirst, third, burn, stern, purse

Sight words – goes, about, these, never, keep

Bonus Words – ocean, glacier , conservation , liquid, solid

We are finishing up our geometry unit. We have learned about 2D and 3D shapes, how to partition rectangles into rows and columns, and we have used open number lines to solve addition problems.  One of the skills needed to solve problems with open number lines is to be able to count by 10’s. Many students need to  practice counting by tens from any number.  One of our goals in second grade is to know basic addition facts from memory by the end of the year. We have a ways to go with this goal.

We will have a short science test this week. A study guide will come home on Monday.

Several of our students enjoyed a pizza snack from Dr. Moughni for reaching the reading goal of 300 minutes over Christmas break.

Next Friday is a half day.

Next week will be a short week. There is no school on Monday in observance of Martin Luther King Day.

We have a late start on Wednesday.

Our weekly spelling pattern is r controlled vowels – ar, or.

Pattern words –  start, park, sort, short, jar

Sight words – before, those, put, give, gave

Bonus words are optional and only the correct ones count – citizen, government, mayor, city council, judge.

Our Unit 3 Social Studies test is  on Friday. The study guide is attached to the Friday note in your child’s folder.

Our spelling pattern this week is scr, str, and spr blends.
Our pattern words are spray, spring, street, scrap, scream.
Our sight words are today, walk, talk, from, going.
The bonus words are polygon, rectangle, trapezoid, pentagon, and hexagon.

The words are available on Spelling City as well.

We had a bit of fun this week in social studies and math.

In social studies, we are learning about our local government and how it works. We learned that the city council makes the laws, the mayor enforces the laws and judges interpret the law. In order to make this easier to understand, we acted out a neighborhood problem that was brought to the city council. Ask your child about it.

It is geometry time in math. We made polygons with stick pretzels and filled in a grid with the picture of the shape, the number of sides, vertices, and angles. When we were done we enjoyed a pretzel snack.

Our weekly spelling words have digraphs ch, sh, tch, and th at the end of the words.
Pattern words- each, dish, match, with, lunch
Sight words – four, around, wash, found, best

Some students are choosing to learn the optional bonus words – evaporation, condensation, precipitation, collection, and cycle. The ones they get correct on the test will count as extra credit.

We will take the NWEA/MAP Reading and Math test next week on Tuesday and Thursday. Please remind your child to take their time and do their best.

Thank you for encouraging your child to complete their homework over break!

We had a relaxing day of reading with friends, reading our Pilgrim Books to two first grade classes, and playing math games. We also visited the computer lab today.

Here are a few pictures of our visit with the first graders.