Welcome to my website!     (2009-2010 school year)

My name is Ms. Hatley, and I teach 2nd grade at Koontz Elementary.   Go Koontz Panthers!

In writing,  we are working, working, working, on capitalization, punctuation, and spelling.  Much work is needed on declarative sentences (.), interrogative sentences (?), exclamatory sentences (!), and command sentences (.).  Sentences with a question mark continue to be a difficult concept .  Please work with your child by pointing out those types of sentences in books and magazines.  Read the sentence with emphasis and intonation so that your child will understand how the human voice changes when asking a question. 

   We have also been working on paragraphs.  Remember, every paragraph is indented!

We are writing small moment stories with a beginning, middle, and an ending.  What is a small moment you ask?  That's where you take one specific time from a gathering or event, and write about it. 

Example:  The Day I Made a Snowman

 This would be a small moment story about making the snowman -- not what happened before or after,  but start to finish building a snowman (with a beginning, middle, and ending).  

 In reading, we read a story every week.  We get into small groups and read from leveled readers that also go with our story of the week.  I work one-on-one with students and the students work with each other.  We are working hard in phonics on short and long vowels, blends, and sounding out words. We continue to work on common/proper nouns, adjectives, the articles A, an, and the, and pronouns.  

   We started singular possessive/plural possessive and the students are working hard to learn the differences!

In math,  we are working on many concepts, all of which you have seen coming home. 

• Addition and subtraction through 3 digits, and basic word problems are the foundational skills that have to be mastered! 
• math vocabulary  
• missing digits in subtraction and addition
• Congruency, symmetry, double and triple venn diagrams
• repeating and growing patterns
•  Time, measurement in inches/centimeters
• money - pennies, nickels, dimes, and quarters
• multi-step word problems
• temperature, geometric shapes
• rounding to the nearest ten 

      We have started:

• rounding to the nearest 100
• fractions - 1/4, 1/2, and 1/3
• estimation of sums and differences through 999
• more combinations of repeating and growing patterns
• adding and subtracting money amounts using word problems with multi-steps

  **  Please read to your child everyday, and let them read to you.  Hearing the words helps with pronunciation, which in turn helps with fluency.  If they have trouble pronouncing a word, let them watch your mouth as you pronounce it.  Praise your child when they read!

 Ask questions about the story.  This helps them to understand what they read (comprehension).   Here are some great questions.

 What is the setting of the story? 

Who are the characters?

What was the problem or conflict in the story?

How was the problem solved?

What lesson was learned in the story?

Have your child recall important events in the story, and tell you what happened from the beginning to the end!

** Buy flashcards for phonics (and math too), and work with your child at home.  Go to a website called starfall.com.  It is a fantastic website for reading.  Our Rowan-Salisbury website has many features to help parents and students!  PBSkids is another great website.

      Thank you for supporting what we do in our 2nd grade class!

If you need to contact me, drop me an email, write in your child's agenda, or leave me a message on my voice mail at school!

Sincerely,

Ms. Hatley

p.s.  Thank you to all of my parents who have helped with snacks, diaper wipes, and facial tissues.