12/2/22

12/2/22

December is here! And second grade has been busy growing their brains. Check out what we’ve been up to…

Reading: During phonics in reading, the second graders have been learning all about homophones! They figured out jokes like, What did the beach say when the tide came in? Long time no sea!  They also discovered other homophones such as to, two, too and where to use each in a sentence.

Writing: The students have been busy learning about opinion writing, specifically with reviews of their favorite books that they read in school. We don’t want to divulge too much here, otherwise it won’t be a surprise! We can’t wait to share them with you at the Publishing Party on December 6th!

Math: In math, we finished up our unit of study on subtraction with multi digit numbers. Our final lesson on regrouping involved subtracting across many zeros. This is where we practiced, “knocking on our neighbor’s doors more than once!” 

Social Studies: These last two weeks, we finished up learning about landforms, looking at the Nile River and the Everglades on Google Earth. We also began learning about communities, specifically in terms of Family, School, and Neighborhood spheres. The children made word clouds featuring words and phrases that came to mind when they heard the word “community,” and worked in groups to make lists of features and adjectives relating to each community sphere (e.g., for family, “parents” and “helpfulness”). We’ll start learning in greater detail about urban, suburban, and rural communities starting next week!

Science: Science class has been one of the most exciting parts of the week for our students. We’ve been learning about mixtures and solutions through a combination of videos, time lapses, and hands-on activities. We’ve been writing, drawing, and discussing what we’ve learned and deepening our understanding of how matter behaves in the world. Last week, we observed the properties of gravel and salt, mixed them together, and then separated them using handmade sieves. This week, we made hot and cold chocolate and talked about how chocolate powder dissolves in different temperatures of water. Our yummy treat was followed by a discussion of how heated water helps the particles in the chocolate break down more quickly because the atoms are hitting each other.

Hebrew: The students continued working on their first book “My Dictionary” discovering new words and coming up with sentences. They were practicing verbal and writing skills while writing a paragraph in their Hebrew notebook.

Judaic Studies: The 2nd graders last week noticed the Sigd holiday that was celebrated in Israel and Ethiopia on the 29th of Cheshvan. This week the students enriched their tefilot by learning new tefilot, their meanings and how they’re related to their daily life. They continued with Chumash, exploring what was created on the third day. They were excited to discover the thought behind the creation and the cycles of creation: how the trees that bear fruits and how the seeds from the fruits are responsible for so many new trees. 

Art: Second graders are using what they learned in social studies to make drawings and sculptures of landforms. The materials used include model magic, markers, pipe cleaners and tissue paper. It was fun molding the model magic and changing the color with markers. We can’t wait to share these with you at our publishing party next Tuesday!

Music: In music class, second graders have been reviewing solfège and the major, minor and pentatonic scales. They are noticing how the minor scale is used in a lot of Jewish music. This week, they sang one of those minor key songs, “Adon Olam.” They spent some time wrapping their brains and mouths around the words and rhythms of the fast part of that song. No easy task! They have also continued playing our rhythm stick call and response game.