Ms. Mottaz's Class: A Short but Successful Week! :)

This week may have been short but we have been working hard! We earned our 25 compliment this afternoon, so our class earned a classroom celebration. The students chose Show and Tell!! Please make sure that you look at the flyer below or in your child's backpack to see when your child is scheduled to bring in his/her item for next week (September 11 - 15).

We Are Now On Twitter!

If you have a Twitter account be sure to start following @MossRBE (get it - Mottaz & Ross combined 😄)! We are excited about our new venture out on Twitter as a classroom and hope that you follow us to see what's happening in the classroom world of Moss everyday!

Student Verification Forms

Coming home is some Friday Folders are Student Verification Forms that have not been turned in from families. It will be on the left-side of the folder ("Return to School" side). If you have one of these forms, please look it over this weekend and return it to school on Monday in your child's Friday Folder.

Homework

Next week will be our first week of homework. Our homework may look a little different than homework your children have had in the past. This year we are focusing in making sure that your child has a love of reading and is reading every night for at least 15 minutes. We will be having a small list of Word Study (spelling words) that we will be focusing on each week and we want to make sure that your child is practicing these words. In math, we are focusing on your child enjoying math through games and math fact practice.

This is an example of what your child's homework sheet will look like every week. We included explanation and arrows so that you can have this as a reference in case your child needs help filling it out.

We will be reviewing homework with the class on Monday, but we wanted to give you a heads up that homework will be starting on Monday. On Monday, your child will be coming home with a homework folder. This folder will be where each week's homework is kept.

What you will find in your child's homework folder:

In the inside pocket is where your child's homework will be kept. There in one homework sheet for the ENTIRE week, but we check homework everyday for completion. It is your child's responsibility to bring the homework folder back and forth from home to school.
A page protector that has a salmon paper called "Homework Cheat Sheet." This paper is to help you with ideas for math games, and how to access online math games.
The next page protector will be a where games that we have played at school will be kept. Inside the page protector you will find games and directions. If a game board was needed we included that also. You may need a few items from home to play (example: dice, coins, etc.). We have been sharing these games with the kids and they are super excited to be able to play these games at home with you!
Stapled on the back cover of the folder is a Ziploc bag. Inside this Ziploc bag you will find a set of Fact Triangles. These triangles can be used for fact practice (if you want to know what to do with them - check out the "Homework Cheat Sheet!"

Hurricane Harvey Relief

Many children in Texas lost their homes and belongings due to Hurrican Harvey. RBE is partnering with Wedgewood Elementary School in Friendswood Texas. RBE 2nd grade families are being asked to donate dry erase markers and 24 pack of crayons. Other items that are needed are: new children's shoes, new backpacks, new children's books. The donated items need to be brought to the classroom. Please have all items delivered to our classroom by Monday, September 18.

What's Happening in 2nd Grade?

Math

This week: We have talked about skip counting patterns for 5's and 10's and counting mixed amounts of coins of pennies, nickels & dimes). We have also been working on making number combinations to add up to a certain number.
Next week: We will introduce counting quarters when counting money. Also we will be looking at number patterns with even/odd numbers and different skip-counting patterns.

Writing

This week: We started talking about what makes a great small moment story (personal narrative). The kiddos had a chance to share a few small moment stories with a partner and then chose the BEST small moment story to write first. The students had a chance to think about the 3 BIG events that happened in his/her story and sketch a picture of these events.
Next week: We will be starting with writing the middle of our small moment story on Monday. Each of the three BIG events will be turned into a paragraph throughout next week with lots of details!

Reading

This week: We have been working on making predictions before, during and after we read. This week our predictions were centered around the book Yoda Gets a Buddy.
Next week: We will continue to work on making predictions.

Social Studies

This week: After learning all about different U.S. symbols last week, the kiddos were able to choose their favorite symbol and design a poster to share what they learned. These will be displayed in the hallway - so the next time you are at RBE - come check them out!!
Next week: We will be focusing on learning about the life cycle of a butterfly and making scientific observations of the caterpillars.

Science

This week: We had three new visitors join our classroom on Wednesday...caterpillars!! The kiddos were super excited. The caterpillars are at three different stages of development. We have a "little guy" who is currently living in a small container and two larger caterpillars living in a butterfly cage.
Next week: We will be focusing on learning about the life cycle of a butterfly and making scientific observations of our visitors.

Word Study

This week: We focused on six trick words that are now No Excuse Words and are expected to be spelled correctly in any writing. This week's words were: new, now, your, like, being & some.
Next week: We are going to continue to work on learning trick words for the next few weeks. After the students are confident in completing the Word Study activities each week, and have several more No Excuse Words under their belt, we will be starting to focus in on different word patterns within words. Next week's words are: they, I (focusing on when the word "I" is written it always is capital), were, it, was & went. These are words that the class is using in their small moment stories and we want to make sure that they are spelled correctly as we write!

Book Talks with Mrs. McKinzie

Today was our first book with Mrs. McKinzie (RBE's Media Specialist). The kiddos were SUPER excited to hear about 3 new books that are in our library!