• English Language Arts and Literacy: K-5

    The North Salem Central School District curricula are based on the current New York State Next Generation Learning Standards.

    Under Construction

    Second Grade Overview

     

    Reading, Writing, Speaking and Listening

    • Under Construction

    Mathematics

    Pequenakonck Elementary School has adopted the hands-on and minds-on K-5 Math Curriculum, enVisionmath2.0, as the instructional resource to use within our math workshop model. Students explore grade level concepts with engaging materials, manipulatives, videos, online access and interdisciplinary activities that support student learning. The program is organized to promote focus and coherence each day. Assessments provide meaningful feedback to support student learning. The comprehensive program focuses on Common Core Clusters, develops understanding, and most importantly, connects mathematical content and processes. Learning is also supported through small group and collaborative activities. 

    We use enVisionmath2.0 as the instructional resource to use within our math workshop model. The program focuses on developing understanding, and connects mathematical content and process. Students learn through investigation, small group instruction and class discourse around problem solving and mathematical concepts. The four major domains include: Operations and Algebraic Thinking, Numbers and Operations in Base Ten, Measurement and Data, and Geometry.

    Guiding Principles:

    Make sense of problems and persevere in solving them 

    Reason abstractly and quantitatively

    Construct viable arguments and critique the reasoning of others

    Model with mathematics

    Use appropriate tools strategically

    Attend to precision

    Look for and make use of structure

    Look for and express regularity in repeated reasoning

     

    Some of what your second grader will be learning include:

    • To fluently add and subtract within 20
    • How to use place value understanding and properties of operations to add and subtract
    • To represent and solve problems involving addition and subtraction
    • To measure, compare and estimate lengths in standard units
    • To represent and interpret data
    • To reason about shapes and their attributes
    • To tell time to the five minutes and to identify and count coins

    Social Studies

    Second graders study these for major units: Active Citizenship; Rural, Urban, and Suburban Communities; Geography of Communities, and Changes and Interdependence.

    • Develop questions about the community.
    • Recognize different forms of evidence used to make meaning in social studies (including sources such as art and photographs, artifacts, oral histories, maps, and graphs).
    • Identify and explain creation and/or authorship, purpose, and format for evidence.
    • Identify the arguments of others.
    • Recognize arguments and identify evidence.
    • Participate in collaborative conversations with diverse partners about grade 2 topics and texts with peers and adults in small and larger groups.
    • Build on others’ talk in conversations by linking their comments to the remarks of others.
    • Ask for clarification and further explanation as needed about the topics and texts under discussion.
    • Seek to understand and communicate with individuals from different cultural backgrounds.
    • Recount or describe key ideas or details from a text read aloud or information presented orally or through other media.
    • Ask and answer questions about what a speaker says in order to clarify comprehension, gather additional information, or deepen understanding of a topic or issue.

    Science

    We use Science 21 as our instructional resource for teaching science. The science program is an inquiry based program. Second graders use critical and creative thinking skills as well as problem solving skills to learn about the following topics of study: Structure and Properties of Matter; Earth’s Systems: Processes that Shape the Earth; and Interdependent Relationships in Ecosystems.

    The Framework in which your second grader learns about science concepts is by:

    • Asking Questions and Defining Problems
    • Developing and Using Models
    • Planning and Carrying Out Investigations
    • Analyzing and Interpreting Data
    •  Using Math, Computer Tech, and Computation
    •  Constructing Explanations and Designing Solutions
    •  Engaging in Argument Using Evidence 
    • Obtaining, Evaluating, and Communicating Information

    Health

    The health program, The Great Body Shop, is designed to promote decision-making and behaviors that foster better health. Though students study similar topics at each grade, the depth of content and complexity of ideas builds from grade to grade. All students study growth and development, nutrition, safety, illness prevention, substance abuse prevention, personal safety, family life, and community health.

     Second Grade Topics include:

    •  Let’s Stay Safe
    •  How You Think 
    • The Wide World of Food
    • Your Heart, Small But Strong 
    • When I Feel Afraid 
    • Babies … and How You Grew
    • Drugs Are Dangerous
    • Germs! They Make You Sick 
    • Me and My Skin
    • Muscles in Motion