Moving Along In Our Community

The Room 14 community is moving along and continues to be very busy learning new things. Beginning Monday, second graders will move to their new reading classes for guided groups and Daily CAFE strategies at their level. It has been exciting watching and listening to all the reading discussions and recommendations that transpire amongst the kiddos each day. All are enjoying their reading successes. Please continue to encourage your kiddos to read at home. I will be sending home a reading log this week. It should have the book read, minutes read and parent initials logged in. Please keep the log sheet in their homework folder and I will check it on Fridays. Your child should be reading "good fit" books or listening to higher level text. Ask your child questions while they are reading and not just at the end. They too, should be asking themselves good questions while they are reading. This helps them check for understanding and comprehension. Your child should continue to practice spelling words whenever possible. Put them on index cards and on a ring so that they can review them often. Also, Fundations words should be practiced and reviewed. New glued sounds of: ost, old, ild, ind and olt have already been introduced. Next week we will review two syllables words and continue to explore vowel teams. Vowel teams (ai, ay, ea, ee)at this junture are only for reading. New vowel teams are oi and oy in words like spoil, boil, boy and toy. Unit 4 also focused on suffixes; s, es and er and est when comparing things. The children worked on a great class book about comparisons after listening to a couple of read alouds on the subject. Unit 5 will introduce suffixes like: _ness, _less, _ment, _ful, _able, _ish and _en. Some words for building and learning are: kindness, limitless, thankful, shipment, childish, expandable, and freshen. These will include multisyllabic (expandable, commitment)words which can be very challenging.

Thank you for sending in the permission slips for the community field trip in a timely manner. All parents who signed the chaperone sheet can come. It will be great to have so many parents along the route.

On Tuesday, October 23, we are walking up Charles Street to the fire station, then to the police station, town hall and finally the cable station. Some of you may know that the town manager is retiring after this year so it will be the last time he will e speaking to our Killam second graders. Please remember to send your kidos with a disposable nut/tree nut free lunch that day.

This week the children will be researching a community helper along with a partner. The children will read and discuss the community helper with partners and record three learned facts from their reading. Next, they will type their work in a project in the computer lab. We will print them out (publish) and compile them into a book.

Finally, in math, fact strategies through 20 remains the focus. Math Fever has taken over the class and there is no cure! Remember any math practice counts. You can retrieve more slips on EDLINE. Also, math homework will be given by math teachers on Thursday nights and will be given to math teachers on Friday. All teachers are covering the material and common core standards. Friday we will assess this unit and move on to place value.

Halloween will be fast approaching. Room parents should be contacting you for supplies very soon. We will be celebrating with special activities on Wednesday, October 31 from 8:30-10. In order to help activities run smoothly, I would like to have 5 volunteers. Thank you in advance for your support. Have fun celebrating at home as well. Happy Haunting!

October Is Here Already

Good Morning! I hope you all are enjoying the weekend even though it has been a damp one. My husband and I took a drive up to the the new outlets in Merrimack, New Hampshire yesterday and the trees are changing color. It should be a beautiful fall. Our class is buzzing and very busy! In Fundations, your kiddos have learned five new glued sounds with the closed syllable exception. They have started to learn their second grade trick words. The children should be on Spelling City several times a week. I came across a new vocabulary site called Vocabulary.co.il which has many activities as well. Remember, your children need to know how to spell all the first grade trick words and the second grade words. They have a spelling bag in their desk to practice all new second grade words daily by rainbow writing them. All new trick words are introduced on Tuesdays. So, look for additional spelling homework on Tuesday night.

In grammar, the children are learning about sentence structure. They should know that every sentence is a group of words that makes sense and is a complete thought. It should also have two parts; a subject (someone or something) and a predicate or verb (what the subject is doing. Ask your child to tell you about Mr. Morton. Last week we touched upon compound sentences (two sentences connected by and). This week the emphasis will be on nouns in a sentence.

October will begin with our children switching classes for math. The children have been grouped according to their needs and where the fit best with students with similar needs. All groups will be covering the same material but doing so in away that best fits their learning. Math fact practice continues to be so important. Students need to be able to fluently add and subtract to twenty. Keep that Math Fever going with fact practice daily using games, flash cards and work on Xtramath.com. Also go to FunBrain for more fun and activities. Please engage your children in mathematical conversations that solve real world math problems each day. These will be accessed and explored daily with a problem of the day.

Daily Cafe is in place and your children have 35 minutes of stamina when they READ TO SELF. Children are experimenting with selecting GOOD FIT books and books of interest to them. When children have control in book selection, they will have more stamina. I am still monitoring some with this selection. Second Grade will be ready to switch by next week. Finally, Community has been the main focus in social studies. The community of Room 14 is a friendly, fun-loving, hard working group of kiddos who love school and are helping each other grow and learn together. The Killam community is a group of TRRFCC staff and students who work together to keep everyone happy and safe each day. The second grade community is learning about the community of Reading and communities in general. There will be information soon about our field trip downtown to explore the important town buildings; fire station, police station, town hall and cable studio. We will have the date to your shortly, we are justing waiting to hear back from all these groups to coordinate the days events. If you can, clear your calendar to join us. It would be helpful to have you to assist us as we WALK uptown.

Happy Fall and enjoy the cooler days ahead. I am sad to see the warm weather fleeting but such is life. -Deb Dellovo

We Are Happily On Our Way!

I am happy to report that Room 14 is happily on the way to a successful school year. We have established classroom rules, routines, and procedures to help keep us moving forward safely and comfortably. Everyone seems excited to learn new things and share their learning experiences with families and friends. Hopefully you have heard from your children what we have in store.

Photos will be posted here on the blog as well as special websites for spelling, reading and math practice. Spellingcity.com and Xtramath.org will be regular sites for nightly practice. You can explore these sites here but I will send home more information this week in homework folders. Also, please feel free to check out The Daily Cafe website for articles and strategies for helping your youngsters with their reading. It is so important that your children are reading good fit books each night. Ask your child about "the five finger rule" for selecting a good fit book. Remember reading to your child is just as important. Children need to hear what good reading sounds like. I am in the process of assessing their reading to find their instructional and independent reading levels so that we can begin grouping students for our TIM TIME (Tiered Instructional Model).

For those of you who attended Open House, you heard me discuss our tiered model for math as well. We are assessing students in math as well and grouping kiddos who would work best together according to their skill set. Hopefully all assessments will be completed and groups for reading and math will be established by the end of the month. Remember these groups are flexible and students maybe moving in and out according to their skill needs. We will keep you informed when this will happen. All classes are building stamina for reading daily, building math routines and practicing fact strategies. On Wednesday, the PTO has planned our annual WALK FOR CHARACTER. I hope the weather cooperates. I think the committee is still looking for volunteers so please let them know if you would like to help out. Enjoy your week and the last few days of summer!

Summer Time Fun

Hello old and new friends! I hope everyone has enjoyed a summer filled with lots of rest, relaxation and fun. I have been been working a lot on the new common core standards for mathematics but I managed to fit in lots of fun too. In July, I was in New Hampshire, Maine, Connecticut and even spent time on the Charles River for the 4th of July. I also went to the beach and did some reading as well. Saturday, July 14, I left for Disney World with my family for 12 days to celebrate my birthday. It is my "happy place" next to school of course. In August, I went to Cape Cod, Ogunquit and Portland Maine, and to Rye Beach, New Hampshire. I visited with friends and spent more time with my family. Though the summer went too fast, I did have a wonderful time working and playing. I hope Clifford has taken some interesting travels. Here are the pictures I have received so far. See if you can guess where our friends are.

Please continue to email photos and I will post them throughout the month of September. I am so happy for school to be opening this week. I can't wait to see you all, I have missed you so much. We will have a fabulous year together in Grade 2. Enjoy your last couple of days and I will be at the back door to greet you Wednesday morning bright and early. Hugs to you all!! Love, Mrs. Dellovo

Common Core Standards, Report Cards, and Conferences

The last month has been so hectic! Your children have been so busy with learning new concepts in math, immersed in reading "good fit" and instructional text, participating in centers, book talks, exploring the symbols of US and enjoying their Thanksgiving feast with family and friends. You and I have read, internalized and discussed common core standards and your child's progress. Though it has been a lot to absorb, these standards determine where the students are heading and where they stand in this progression. I enjoyed meeting with all of you and can tell you that I so love working with children. It is a privilege and an honor to work with them each day!

Check out these pictures of the Halloween Centers thanks to Mrs. Meyers (Wyatt's mom) who thankfully had her camara that day. Our first grade Weebly will have pictures from the Harvest Centers. I want to thank all the moms who came into assist for these activities. Stay tuned for Holiday Centers that will be happening later in December. As you will see, everyone is having a fabulous time!


























I have many things I am thankful for this year. I am thankful for a wonderful family. I am thankful for a terrifc class of students. I am thankful for supportive parents and families at the Killam School. Finally, I am thankful for living in a country where I feel safe and comfortable to live a "good life" as one of my students wrote this week. May all my Killam families enjoy a pleasant holiday break with family friends. Happy Thanksgiving!