Grade 2 Community News
EMP (Explicit Maths Program)
Grade 2 students have been working hard on three-digit addition problems. They have enjoyed adding even bigger numbers together! They have been using the “More than 9? Regrouping time!” strategy and realised that sometimes they need to regroup more than once to solve addition problems.
Students have been learning about Mass. They have been using informal units to measure the mass of objects using an equal-arm balance. They have also enjoyed learning about statistics. They collected data using questions and sorted the information.
Students have also had fun learning about fractions. They completed an activity where they had to find the shapes that show halves or quarters and then shade them so that they equalled the fraction.
Fact Fluency Practice
As part of our EMP Maths program, Grade 2 students practise fact fluency every day. Students have begun building their automatic recall of multiplication facts. Each day we rehearse these facts orally as a class, and students are then given two minutes to answer as many facts as they can correctly. This quick daily practice helps students develop confidence, speed, and accuracy with their basic number facts.
It has been fantastic to see the progress students are making. We also encourage students to jump onto Numbots and Times Tables Rock Stars at home to get some extra practice and strengthen their recall of number facts!
InitiaLit (Literacy)
Spelling! Students have been learning new spelling rules. Recently, we have been focusing on the different ways we can spell words that contain a ‘c’ but make the sound /s/. Students learnt that the letter ‘c’ only makes the sound /s/ when the next letter is the vowel ‘e’, ‘i’ or ‘y’.
They enjoyed learning the soft ‘c’ song.
Comprehension and Fluency!
During our comprehension and fluency lessons, students have been introduced to different types of texts. Over the past two weeks, we have been learning about comprehension strategies. These strategies are like tools that help us understand what we are reading. We have recently learnt about summarising the main idea. We read the text ‘The Robot Planet’’. We thought about what the text is mostly about and then used our own words to summarise the story.
As part of our comprehension and fluency lessons, students also revisited the importance of punctuation in both reading and writing. They discussed capital letters, full stops, commas, exclamation marks and ellipses.
Growing Grammar!
In our grammar lessons, we have been focusing on conjunctions. Students have learnt what a conjunction is and when and how to use them in writing. We have discovered that conjunctions are joining words that stick sentences together.
This growing understanding is helping students make their writing clearer and more fluent, and we will continue to build on these skills in more complex writing activities.
Storybook - ‘The True Story Of The 3 Little Pigs!’
Our most recent storybook has been The True Story Of The 3 Little Pigs. This story follows Alexander Wolf who claims that the story of The 3 Little Pigs is not real. The wolf claims that he has been framed as the ‘Big Bad Wolf’ and hopes to share THE REAL STORY.
After reading and discussing the story, students used their imagination to write a letter to the police trying to convince them that the wolf in the story is bad. There were many excellent and creative ideas! It is wonderful to see students using their imagination and creativity to grow their love of writing.
Handwriting
Grade 2 students have continued to develop their handwriting during our explicit handwriting lessons. Over the past two weeks, each class focused on a handwriting letter/s to practise. Each week, students are also reminded how to sit correctly on their chairs and hold their pencils properly to support neat and accurate handwriting.
Humanities
Students have continued learning about our new history topic: Otzi the Iceman. Students have been learning about the past and how scientists have been able to use artifacts as clues about our understanding of the way people lived in the past.
Respectful Relationships
Grade 2 students have recently started their new Respectful Relationships topic: Help Seeking. We have begun discussing and identifying what tools we can use to help our friends and also ask for help for different scenarios. Our activities focused on how to help our friends when they have a problem. Students had fun completing a life raft game and using role play to solve different problems.
Melbourne Museum Excursion
Grade 2 recently had the opportunity to attend an exciting excursion to Melbourne Museum. During this excursion, students explored the museum and its exhibits. They loved the dugs, dinosaur and Melbourne exhibits. They also attended an exhibition which linked to our history unit on Technological Developments, students investigated the people, places and stories that have shaped Melbourne into the city it is today.
Reminders
- Please ensure you are reading with your child every night. Students can borrow take-home books from their classroom libraries on their designated library days.
- We encourage families to work together to get students to school on time. Classes start the day with morning circle time, and we would love all students to be at school by 8:45am so they don’t miss out.
Thank you to all our wonderful Grade 2 parents and families for your ongoing support and dedication to your child’s learning and wellbeing. We are so proud of how well our Grade 2 students have settled in Term 1 and all the learning they completed! Keep it up!
Warm regards PLC 2,
Ms. Broskie, Mr. Watkins, Ms. Cope, Ms. Emily, Ms. Madigan, Ms. Anastasi,
Ms. Cadzow, Ms. Hanson, Ms. Elliot, and Ms. Claire