Mrs. Laura Varley

Welcome to Mrs. Varley’s page!

Here comes winter!

Second graders are super!

We are a busy group of students who enjoy learning! We have reading from 8:30 until 10:35 each day and then we have math from 12:20 until 1:30.

Announcements

  • Christmas concert: Monday, December 8th at 7 pm

The Partial Sums Algorithm

This method allows students to really understand that we are adding hundreds, tens, and ones. They will be very secure in place value after learning this method which helps in future grades as well.

Example: 45
+ 23

The 4 in the number 45 is in the tens place. It is worth 40.

The 5 is worth 5.

The 2 is worth 20.

The 3 is worth 3.

We start from left to right (which is different from traditional addition!).

Students start with the biggest place value, which is tens in this problem.

45

Add the tens first 40 + 20 = 60 + 23

60

Add the ones 5 + 3 = 8 8

(make sure to put this under the ones 68
column)

Now is it easy to get the total. We just add 60 and 8 to get 68.

Room 207 is an exciting place to be!

Let’s find out what the students in 2nd grade have been up to! 

You can see the spelling words for the following week in the Friday newsletter.  On Mondays we take a pretest and the students will have a list to bring home.  We take a practice test on Thursdays and then the final test is on Fridays. 

Fluency sheets come home each week.  These are stamped “homework” but do not need to be returned.  These come from a passage in our story.  Practicing these sheets will help create smooth, natural reading. 

Students need to read 250 minutes in the month of November.  Keep track of your minutes with the Reading Minute Log sheet.

We have finished up Unit 2 in reading and are now into Unit 3.  Some important things we will be working on include: 

  • long vowel sounds (with the vowels e and u)
  • diagraphs ch, sh, th, wh, ph
  • blends scr, spr, str
  • cause and effect
  • using illustrations
  • summarizing

                      To access the student version of Treasures, go to the link on the right.  The student access code is:

B64B880018

Be sure to read every night! 

Everyday Mathematics

We are now in Unit 4.  These are the things we will be working on: 

 

  • change-to-more number stories (addition)
  • parts-and-total number stories (addition)
  • explorations:  temperature, money, and shapes
  • estimating costs
  • explorations:  length, area, and attributes
  • addition strategies including partial sums addition

Keep practicing your facts for Rocket Math!