General Studies. May 2014 Iyar 5774 Page 1 of 8. Dear Parents,

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1 May 2014 Iyar 5774 Page 1 of 8 General Studies Dear Parents, As we spring forward in the calendar year and curriculum, I am excited to be starting new and interesting material. The students have worked diligently throughout the year and their hard work has been coming to fruition. It is hard to believe that our year together ends in two short months. Open Circle Both second grade classes have enjoyed having meaningful discussions about relevant topics that occur in our classrooms. Due to our school s motto of Derech Eretz, many of our open circle discussions have focused on recognizing the kind acts we do at Maimonides. Each student has had their chance to shine as the group shares the kind acts they witness on a daily basis. Students are complimented and recognized for their generosity, compassion, and work habits. Some of the upcoming topics we will be discussing are problem-solving steps and common causes of stress at recess time, lunch, and in the classroom. We will be using the problem-solving steps to see how we can improve time in these areas. Language Arts During Writing time, the students explored various types of poetry. Students have read many examples of poetry, recognizing its power and ability to inspire emotions. Then, using model text, students created their own versions of various types of poetry. Through reading and writing poetry, the class has become more familiar with the meaning of words and sentences, sentence structure, rhymes, and vocabulary. In Fundations, the second grade is currently working on the vowel-consonant-e syllable. Students have learned the reading and spelling procedures for two-syllable words with both closed and vowelconsonant-e syllables. Students have also applied adding suffixes to v-e syllables. The next unit will introduce students to words with the open syllable. This syllable has only one vowel, which is the last letter in the syllable. The remaining units for the year will include the r-controlled syllable and vowel teams. Math Currently, we are working on building addition and subtraction fluency. Students will be learning that addition and subtraction are inverse operations. The children have explored addition through the use of Cuisenaire rods. They recorded the relationships between the Cuisenaire rods and explored the inverse relationship between addition and subtraction in fact families. The children will also continue to explore

2 May 2014 Iyar 5774 Page 2 of 8 different ways to break apart numbers to facilitate computation. In the upcoming month, the students will spend time learning about two-dimensional figures and spatial sense, adding and subtracting larger numbers, and measuring length. Social Studies Over the past few weeks, the second grade had a thorough study of map skills. The students created books called Me on the Map, which helped them to have a better understanding of where they live in the world. It has also helped students to realize the relationships between towns, cities, states, countries, and continents. Students focused time on learning how to use a map key and compass rose to navigate through various maps. The students also used an interactive game to aid their learning of the continents and oceans. These skills are necessary for our last unit of study, Mexico. During this unit, students will be studying the geography of Mexico as well as its culture, history, and languages through fiction and non-fiction texts. Science The students have finished their unit of Lego Robotics. It was an incredible journey to see what talented engineers they have evolved into. Students were able to use the skills of teamwork, making observations, reasoning, inquiry, and investigating to program and create working models. here is a link to our amazing Lego Robotics video to see our students in action! For the remainder of the school year, science will be taking place both in and outside of the classroom as we focus on understanding the needs of living things. Students will develop a green thumb (they loved this idiom) as we plant and observe what living things need to survive. Music In music class, the students have been learning how to read notes and rhythms and play them on various instruments, including Boomwhackers. Boomwhackers are colorful pitched percussion tubes that can be used to play rhythms and songs. They can play songs such as Ode to Joy, Twinkle, Twinkle, and Mary Had a Little Lamb. The second graders have also been learning traditional American tunes and incorporating simple body movements to the music. For the rest of the year, we will listen to Prokofiev s famous Peter and the Wolf and learn about all the different instruments found in the orchestra. Physical Education As spring is in the air, and baseball season has started, in physical education we are also preparing for

3 May 2014 Iyar 5774 Page 3 of 8 baseball by learning the necessary skills to play the game. Over the last few weeks our students focused on improving their eye - hand coordination. Students used rackets and practiced hitting tennis balls with control. We also practiced throwing, catching, and hitting wiffle balls. The next few weeks will be spent reviewing the rules and skills of the games involved in Color War. We will also continue to discuss good sportsmanship and fair play. Art In art we have been working on spring. Students viewed the work of Georgia O Keefe. We discussed the fact that she painted her flowers huge so that people would notice them. The students drew with pencil, filling the paper with the whole flower. They are learning to mix colors. The students are now finishing their paintings with tempera paint. They will then do the details with chalk. We took a week off from painting to make large paper flowers for Mother s Day. As always, if you have any questions or comments, please feel free to me at alongo@maimonides.org or call (617) Limudei Kodesh Dear Parents, It s hard to believe that Pesach has already come and gone! As we near the end of the year, it s exciting to see how much the second graders have learned. The students are now speaking full sentences in Hebrew, learning Torah out of their new Chumashim, and writing their own Hebrew books! Here is an update on some of our activities in Limudei Kodesh over the past few months. Chumash In Chumash, we have completed our study of Parshat Noah and have begun Parshat Lech Lecha. As you had the opportunity to witness firsthand at our Chagiga, in Parshat Noah we learned about Tevat Noah (Noah s ark), its construction, the people and animals on it, and the waters of the flood. Since then, we have learned about Noah s exit from the ark, the mitzvot Hashem gave him upon exiting, and the rainbow Hashem put in the sky as a sign of the brit (promise) not to send another flood again. We learned about the spread of Noah s descendants the children of Shem, Ham, and Japheth all over the world, and ended our parasha by learning about all the generations from Noah to Avram.

4 May 2014 Iyar 5774 Page 4 of 8 In Parshat Lech Lecha, we learned of Avram s journey to Canaan and the brachot (blessings) that Hashem promised him: That he would begin a great nation and that he would inherit the land. As we study Torah, we continue to focus on key Chumash vocabulary, building students knowledge of sfat ha- Torah (Torah language). When we learn from our new Chumashim, we also practice locating psukim according to a given perek (chapter) and pasuk (verse). Students are becoming increasingly comfortable with finding psukim as we practice this new and important skill, and are showing their increasing ability to identify the location of each perek as well as the beginning and end of each pasuk. Chagim Our Purim unit introduced children to the concept of v nahafoch hu, or opposites, both in the megillah and in our own world. Each child wrote and illustrated his or her own v nahafoch hu, demonstrating their understanding of the concept. In addition, as we read the story of the megillah, we focused on the characters feelings, learning the Hebrew words for their emotions: happiness, anger, fear, and love. We also learned a song about the mitzvot of Purim that begin with the letter mem and learned to identify and describe key characters in the story of the megillah. Our learning about Pesach (Passover) centered on three parallel strands: the story of Yetziat Mitzrayim (the exodus from Egypt); the mitzvot of the holiday; and, of course, the haggadah itself. We learned the story of Yetziat Mitzrayim through the Tal Am play Avadim Hayinu, which we performed for the first grade complete with songs, costumes, and props. It was wonderful to see the students engagement and excitement as we performed the story, acting and feeling as if we ourselves had truly left Egypt. Below are a few pictures from our in-class performance.

5 May 2014 Iyar 5774 Page 5 of 8

May 2014 Iyar 5774 Page 6 of 8 As we studied the haggadah, we learned that the three most

6 May 2014 Iyar 5774 Page 6 of 8 As we studied the haggadah, we learned that the three most important elements of the seder are Pesach, Matzah, and Maror, and talked about the reasons for mentioning each one. We learned about the items on the seder table and decorated our own seder tables with the appropriate items. We also focused on the concept of slavery and freedom, and talked about what slaves do as compared to free people. Children wrote and drew pictures of themselves, imagining what their lives would be like if they were slaves.

7 May 2014 Iyar 5774 Page 7 of 8 In honor of Yom Ha Atzmaut (Israeli Independence Day), we learned about the meaning of the holiday as well as what we do to celebrate it. We learned that just as each one of us has a birthday, Israel has a birthday on the 5 th of Iyar, which we celebrate with singing, dancing, and festivities. We are continuing to study the meaning of the flag and symbol of Israel, and are in the midst of reading a book about the history of Israel from the days of our ancestors until today. Students have been particularly excited to learn authentic Israeli songs about the country, its colors, and its flag, and have been singing these songs with energy and gusto. In the coming weeks, we will be learning about Yerushalayim, Israel s capital, in preparation for the upcoming holiday of Yom Yerushalayim, as well as about the giving of the Torah that we celebrate on Shavuot. Ivrit In Ivrit, we have been working on our Tov BaBayit unit about life at home, focusing on our daily routines. First, we learned vocabulary words about food and, in conjunction with our Tefillah unit, learned the brachot for different food groups. Then, using a wheel with the schedule of the day, we learned Hebrew words for different times of the day (morning, afternoon, evening, and night), and read a book called Seder HaYom Sheli about the different things we do each day. The students have been learning to describe their routines throughout the day, from how they wake up in the morning to what they eat for lunch to what their favorite after-school activities are. Each child is writing a book about what he or she does each day, building vocabulary and developing Hebrew writing skills. Our final unit of the year will focus on identifying and describing the clothes we wear. We will be reading books, singing songs, and making our own mini-closets to learn the Hebrew vocabulary for all of our many different outfits. Tefillah Over the past few months, we have been gradually learning different tefilot (prayers) and adding them into our daily prayers. Students are now familiar with the second bracha (blessing) of the Shema, V haya im Shamo a, and we have almost finished learning it in its entirety. We have also begun to learn the Shmoneh Esrei or Amidah. Together, we practiced taking three steps backward and then three steps forward, and bowing as we recite the first bracha of the Amidah. We learned that in the Amidah, we have the opportunity to talk directly to Hashem, and that this forms the basis of our daily prayers. At the end of Shmoneh Esrei we have also been practicing taking three steps back and bowing to the left, center, and right as we say Oseh Shalom, and we will continue to learn more of the Amidah in the coming weeks.

8 May 2014 Iyar 5774 Page 8 of 8 In our tefillah study unit, we have been focusing on the birkot ha-shachar, the blessings that we say in the morning. In these brachot, we thank Hashem for our many abilities which we experience anew each morning. As we learn each bracha, we discuss its meaning, and each child has the opportunity to share why he or she is grateful to Hashem for the things we do each morning. Reminders Please check at home to see if you have any Tal Am Hebrew reading books that belong to our class, and send any that you find to school with your child. Also, if your child has a picture or small object from Israel that he or she would like to bring to class, please feel free to send it in! It has been a pleasure teaching your children this year. I am so proud of all their growth and learning and look forward to a wonderful last few weeks together! As always, please feel free to contact me with any questions, concerns, or thoughts at nlibman@maimonides.org. Thank you, HaMorah Nehama

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