Daily Schedule

 

Weekly Schedule

Dear Parents and Guardians, 

As our first couple of weeks of school have started and our class is getting more organized I wanted to reach out to share with you a copy of our typical week here in Ms. DiMichele’s Grade 2 Class. 

Each day we start the class with a classroom circle as well as mindfulness; meaning the students each come in and get to interact with their peers, adjust to being back in the classroom and taking a couple of minutes to reflect on themselves. We will take this time to reflect on their emotions; the emotions they are bringing into the classroom, what they want to learn today and how they feel about that as well as how they want to leave the classroom that day. I find that this helps the students learn self-regulation and can connect with their emotions first thing in the morning so they are reminded to check in with themselves throughout the day. 

Next, we move into literacy stations or shared reading (language focused), where the students are either moving through the stations or are listening to/ participating in reading out loud. This is an important part of their ability to read and write, so completing our language activities in the morning, after mindfulness, is important when they are looking at grasping the skills they need to.  This gives the students the opportunity to work through stations, collaborate with their peers in order to learn and ask questions while moving through the material at each station. 

Following their language time, I have incorporated science where this topic is primarily experiment and problem based. The students will work through activities with their hands that are relevant to the grade 2 science curriculum to allow them to be the leader of their own learning. This allows both the visual learners and the hands-on learners to flourish in the various experiments and problems we are looking at. Another aspect of the science content would be getting outside and exploring our community wherever and whenever we can, depending on weather and the day. 

After the student’s nutrition break, we move into math where the students are going to be learning with instructions and model-based learning to obtain the necessary skills. This follows the nutrition break as it allows the students to enjoy their food, and activities outside and then come back into the classroom and focus on a crucial aspect of their education. This time will be collaborative or independent depending on the day but can be adapted to what strengths they have as a class and individuals. Music/art follows this heavier topic as it allows the students to creatively express themselves as a contrast. Putting these two topics after each other creates a contrast in their day and allows them to work hard, but then relax and switch aspects of their brain to flourish in both areas. 

Their last nutrition break is followed by daily physical activity, to get more of their energy out for the last block of the day. This last portion consists of language, but social studies/religion/ family life based. Where we can work through activities together and interact with the various topics that are relevant to them. The last aspect I wanted to touch on was their assigned tasks to clean up the classroom. Each student will be given a task a week to teach responsibility in their community/classroom in this case, to help keep our space clean. These tasks will consist of ensuring their pencils/crayons are away, ensuring books are in their baskets for their group, and chairs are away. 

If you have any questions please do not hesitate to ask, but I hope this gives you some insight as to what our daily routine looks like! 

Thank you, 

Ms. DiMichele