Second Grade Curriculum

Reading

 

The reading program in Room 112 is a mixture of whole class basal reading and flexible guided reading groups.  The basal reader is from Houghton-Mifflin and provides quality children's literature.  Each book is divided into "themes" such as nature, community and family.  Each student in Room 112 is given a reading inventory to determine an approximate reading level. Flexible guided reading groups use paperback chapter book appropriate for each child's level of instruction based on classroom themes, social studies and science curriculum.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Math

Second grade math uses the "Mathematics" series by McGraw-Hill.  The goal of this series is to help students develop proficiency in conceptual understanding, computational and procedural skills as well as problem solving ability.  The book is divided into many mathematical units.  Where appropriate the students are pre-tested before a unit to assess prior knowledge.  With some units students are put into flexible learning groups based on their pre-test results.  Other units allow for different assignments to let students learn material appropriate to their ability.

 

Second grade students also explore the basic addition and subtraction facts by studying patterns.  Some students may already know their addition and subtraction patterns.  Once these students demonstrate their knowledge or finish the math fact patterns tests they are given more advanced problem solving work during math fact quiz time each day. 

 

 

Writing

Students in Room 112 work on their own writing program.  All student writing is assessed at the beginning of the year to see what lessons are appropriate for the whole class as well as what each student needs to work on individually.  Students work on stories by themselves and sign up for teacher/student conferences to assess how they are doing.  The conferences are also used for individual lessons based on the students' learning goals for the school year in writing.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Spelling

At the beginning of the year, students in second grade in Room 112 are given a test including basic first and second grade spelling words.  The scores on this test are used to assign spelling words for each student from the weekly spelling list.  The lists are comprised of words that follow a particular spelling pattern/phonetic rule, some high utility words, words from our literature program and several challenge words.  The children bring the lists home and are expected to practice them with your guidance.  A spelling mastery test is given each Friday.  You will receive more information about your child's spelling program in an upcoming letter.

 

 

 

Projects

 

There will be two types of projects throughout the second grade school year:

 

1. There will be some individual and some cooperative projects that students will work on and finish completely during school time.
2. There will be a few individual student projects that will be assigned to your son/daughter to work on at home.  These projects will correlate to a Reading Theme or unit of study in Science and Social Studies.