Ms. France's Foot-Tapping Folk

                          We go to the library one day a week so please make sure you are reading those books daily! Math Homework is nightly, so please make sure to check your child's binder, and thank you for signing those Monday Folders weekly! Also, please remember to sign and send in the Reading Logs each Monday. Thank you!

      We are going to start the first nine weeks in ELA with plot, main story elements, central idea and relevant details, and rhyme scheme. We will also introduce similes, metaphors, and alliteration. We will also introduce compare and contrast. Poetry, which focuses on rhyme scheme and character's perspective focuses on how the character feels and changes from the beginning of the text to the end. (We will also continue to introduce theme: what is the central message/moral), always reviewing plot and story structure. Who are the characters, where is the setting, what is the problem, the solution, and main events? We will also have our weekly word application (spelling and vocabulary words to know across the curriculum) on Friday. Our UFLI Lesson Numbers can be found in your child's agenda or on the calendar below every Monday. After every cold read, we will Team Time on it in class and then it will go home in the following Monday Folder for you to review. Our next cold read will be in the beginning of September on plot structure. This will be the first official cold read of the school year. 

SKILLS WE WILL WORK ON: Comprehension: Retell a text. Review: character, setting, plot, compare and contrast and theme. Vocabulary Strategy: Context Clues.  Synonyms/Antonyms. Conventions: Plurals -y to -ies and Apostrophes to form contractions and plural possessives. We are also working on using a dictionary. Context/Connotation and Homonyms/Homophones.

 In writing we will continue to work on central ideas, strong introductions using either question, question, statement OR whether _____,  _____, and/or _______, _________ is _______ in two (ways, reasons, or qualities). And as always, we are continue to find evidence in the text that support the main idea that proves the controlling main idea. We are practicing elaboration starters: Imagine if, what if, this means, put another way. Finally, as we revise and edit our work we double check to make sure the transition words are there to connect sentences together. Some examples are: according to (cite the source), therefore, likewise, just like, and consider ___. We then wrap up with a conclusion that restates the controlling main idea.

In Math we will work on adding and subtracting within fact families, especially in word problems. We will start ten more, ten less, one hundred more, and one hundred less. As well as greater than and less than, and ordering and comparing numbers. Our first assessments will be in August on place value. We will then move onto adding and subtracting one and two digit numbers.

Please continue to review place value with hundreds, tens, and ones, ten more, ten less, hundred more, hundred less, and fact fluency. Regrouping is necessary in second grade and onward, so please continue to practice that skill all year. Practicing subtracting from a zero is an essential skill!

      We will start to spiral review two digit numbers, place value with standard form, expanded form, and word form, as well as add ten more, subtract ten less, add one hundred more, subtract one hundred less. We are also practicing facts every day to become more fluent with our adding, subtracting with numbers 0-12. Math Homework is Monday-Thursday nights, evens on the front page and all of the back practice page. Fact Fluency assessments are every Friday. Please practice multiplication facts 0-12 every night! Flashcards are a great way to practice fact fluency! Our next math tests will take place over the course of the next few weeks, once we have mastered two-digit addition and subtraction.

We are going to learn all different topics in Science and Social Studies each nine weeks. We will start with the Nature of Science: What is a scientist? What are tools scientists use? How can we be scientists and collect data? We will also learn all about the water cycle!

In Social Studies we are learning all about  being a good citizen! We will then move on to maps and globes, continents, and large bodies of water. 

 As always any questions or comments, please feel free to reach out at colleen.france@tvcs.org.