Week 5- Second Grade

Week 5 Second Grade

The Man Who Enjoyed Grumbling (Fiction, Level 6, Stage 2)                              by Margaret Mahy

The Biggest Pool of All (Fiction, Level 6, Stage 2) by Mike Carter

Reptiles (Non-fiction, Level 6, Stage 2) by Brenda Parkes

Have you ever thought that some people actually enjoy grumbling and wouldn’t be able to live without it? Well, this week we met someone just like that in The Man Who Enjoyed Grumbling, and we had a great time talking about him and his baaaad neighbors (they’re goats). We also talked about facing fears and overcoming them in The Biggest Pool of All. But our favorite book of the week was Reptiles because of its beautiful photographs and easy to read text. We actually loved this one so much that Malachi and his big brother (a 5th grader) gathered all of their stuffed animals into a very attentive audience, dressed up as science teachers and took turns teaching the content. It was really something!

The activity I want to highlight this week is the writing portion of the IAB for The Man Who Enjoyed Grumbling. At first glance I thought these questions would be quite challenging for my little guy, but he amazed me with his enthusiasm and skill this week. (I wish I could say the same for a couple of other subject areas, but I’ll definitely take it with writing!) The questions for the writing portion of the IAB were the following: Write three sentences telling how Mr. Ratchett looked and acted in this book; Write a story about how you think Mr. Ratchett and the goats were getting along one year after the book ended; Write three sentences telling why you did like or did not like the furniture movers; List three things that real goats can do that the Goat family also did; Mr. Ratchett planted many things in his garden. Write a story about things you would plant in your garden if you had one. Also, tell how you would take care of your garden. As usual, I was impressed by how these specific questions helped Malachi comprehend and process the book in new ways, and I was thrilled to realize that I can see him growing as a talented writer right before my eyes!

For more information about the AlphaSkills Read with Sarah curriculum and our family, see the AlphaSkills Blog Introduction