Second Grade, Grammar, Set Five

• Mechanics & Sentence Structure
• Punctuation / Capitalization / Types of Sentences -- we read and did the activities in Child's Own, pages 150 - 153a. This has you learning about "stop" and "go" signs in sentences, then capitalizing words and putting punctuation in a story.
• I downloaded a supplemental curriculum called Punctuation Theater. It teaches the use of periods, exclamation marks, question marks, and commas by using percussion instruments when the punctuation should appear in sentences. It has a lot of sample sentences to work through (because it is made for a classroom) so I was only going to do some of them, but K. wanted to do all of them.
• I found a story in an old book that had plenty of opening phrases and extra information. I read the story and K. underlined the opening phrases and extra information.
• Writing Projects
• I let K. pick an envelope (the information she gathered about penguins). Then we work together to write a paragraph.
• All the paragraphs are written. We will do the editing and publishing during our week off.
• Book Report
• K. picked the book A Bear Called Paddington by Michael Bond. I am having her make a book jacket as her book report. I took the jackets off about six books and we looked at what was on them -- illustration, author, illustrator, a paragraph to interest a person in reading the book, etc.
• Writing Skills
• Step-by-Step Chart -- K. wrote the five steps for getting cereal ready in the morning
• Story Map -- K. filled out the form -- the characters, where the story takes place, the beginning, middle, and end of the story.
• Speaking Tips
• We talked about speaking in front of a group
• Look at the audience
• Smile before you start, and while you are speaking
• Talk to the person in the back row so you speak loud enough
• It is important to speak clearly
• Here are a couple books you might want to look at:
• Speaking Up, Speaking Out by Steven Otfinoski
• Speak Up! by Patricia Sternberg