Second Grade

Focus: Whole group and small group lessons that focus on comprehension skills such as: predicting, inferring, questions, evaluating,  

Textbook: Journeys 

Reading Specialist 

• Works with small groups of students who need extra support in two 30-minute sessions per week 
• Reinforces phonemic awareness, phonics, decoding, sight words, fluency, and comprehension 
• Uses a guided reading model 
• Assesses progress and monitors students’ instructional reading level three times per year using Fountas & Pinnell Benchmark Assessment System; communicate growth & goals to parents 

Textbooks: Journeys Intervention Materials/Write-In Reader; Haggerty Phonemic Awareness; Wired For Reading curriculum on case-by-case basis

Writing 

Focus: Students work on using a variety of tools to produce, edit, and publish their writing. Throughout the year, students will have the opportunity to write a narrative, opinion, informative, poetry, and research piece. An emphasis is put on teaching command of English grammar during these projects, such as capitalization, punctuation, and spelling. In addition, students work on organizing their writing to create sentence fluency and a strong voice. 

Textbook: Journeys 

Spelling 

We test every Friday on a list of 16 words the students study throughout the week. Students who receive 100% on the Monday pre-test receive the challenge words for their test on Friday. 

Textbook: Journeys 

Grammar 

Focus: Punctuation and capitalization, Identifying parts of a sentence (noun, verb, adjectives), Suffixes and Prefixes, Inflected endings, and Figurative Language 

Textbook: Journeys 

Focus: Three-digit addition and subtraction with regrouping, fractions, money, time, graphs, problem-solving, fractions, measurement (metric and standard), beginning multiplication, and geometry. Students are asked to apply these math concepts to higher level thinking math problems and two-step word problems. Once a week, the students participate in an all boys/all girls math lesson. We also offer challenge math packets for our advanced students and a small reteaching thirty-minute class once a week with our instructional aide.  

Textbook: Math in Focus 

Focus: Plant and Animal Adaptations,Types of Habitats, Biomimicry, the Water Cycle, Matter, Force and Motion, Fossils, and the Solar System. Students plan and carry out investigations through experiments, analyze and interpret data, and construct explanations and designs solutions. Students use hands on activities, experiments, and technology to cover these concepts. 

Textbook: HMH Science Dimensions and GLAD units 

Focus: Government, maps and different locations, seasons, and climates as well as land and water resources, Study of early American heroes and holidays. We also study world cultures, producers & consumers and barter & trade.

Textbook: Hartcourt Social Studies 'People We Know'

Focus: Sacramental Preparation for First Reconciliation & First Communion 

Textbook: Family Life, Roman Missal Reconciliation and Eucharist Curriculum, Call to Faith 

Service Project; The second graders make cards for parishioners who have been baptized or have recently gone through the RCIA program

• PE (2x per week, 50 minutes) with the PE Teacher in the Gym
• Spanish (1x per week, 30 minutes) with the Primary Grade Spanish Teacher in the classroom
• Art (2x per week, 60 minutes) with the Art Teacher in the Art Room
• Music (2x per week, 60 minutes) with the Music Teacher in the Music Room
• Technology (1x per week, 30 minutes) in the classroom
• Library (1x per week, 30 minutes) with the School Librarian in the Library

• Animal Report Research Project: students research and write a report on either the snowy owl, brown bear, or gray wolf. We then visit the Woodland Park Zoo for one of our field trips that links with this project. 
• Pumpkin Book Reports: students read a book and decorate a pumpkin that looks like one of the characters in the book. These are displayed in the primary hallway the week before Halloween. 
• Masses: second graders lead either the Mass with Crowning Mary or Grandparent’s Day 
• Buddy time: second graders meet with their buddies once a month for an activity. These usually involves art projects, games, or holiday themed projects.