Math
So So Many Things we have been learning since my last post!
Once again, I would like to highlight our class jobs and how they introduce concepts that are way beyond 2nd grade curriculum. We have been learning about place value and the names of large numbers such as trillion, quintillion, and quadrillion; we have been multiplying large numbers and using exponents; and we have been using different strategies to figure out the difference in temperature between outside the math cabin and inside the math cabin. These are group activities, thus your individual child may not be able to solve these problems independently but they are gaining familiarity with novel ideas.
Students loved celebrating Bring Your Favorite Toy To School Day in January. We found ways to categorize and graph the toys.
The 80th day of school provided a spontaneous opportunity to practice for the 100th day of school. On this day, I asked students to create 80 in multiple creative ways and provided some manipulatives, money, and whiteboards for their explorations. We even had the square root of 6400!
We then discussed all we had learned and practiced during the 81 days of math of the first semester, so much!
We continued with learning about fact families, fact triangles, and creating fact family houses. Fact families are made up of 3 numbers such as 3, 2, and 5. Thus, 3+2=5, 2+3=5, 5-2=3, 5-3=2. We continued to practice addition by chanting addition facts aloud with rattle off and roll and presently are practicing adding two digit numbers first by using base ten cubes and making exchanges and then by learning the game of Largest Sum Wins.
Meanwhile, students celebrated the 100th day of school, yummy brownies included and had a unit exploring fractions in which we read stories about fractions, each student created a fraction kit, and we played games using their fraction kits.
As I said above, so so much learning. Two weeks prior to spring break, we wove ribbons around plastic baskets and sprouted wheat grass in them. Students practiced measuring and graphing the growth of the wheat grass.
In terms of the social emotional curriculum, we have been talking about differences and all students have had times of feeling different. We read a story about a dragon that was different and effected change, Herb The Vegetarian Dragon. We did an activity from positive discipline called Charlie, about how an imaginary child is treated upon joining a new school and how words and actions can harm others and have lingering effects and also how to come back and fix things when one has made a mistake and help others to feel included. We have been reading a book called Mistakes That Worked and have been discussing Mistakes as Opportunities for Learning as well as the 3 Rs of Recovery from Mistakes: Recognize, Reconcile, Resolve.
