Happy New School Year! We began the year thinking about where we can find math in our everyday lives and came to the conclusion that it is EVERYWHERE and such an important part of our lives! While many of the second graders know each other personally, we decided get to know each other by thinking about ways to describe ourselves mathematically. It was neat to hear all the ways numbers are attached to us and the second graders had fun sharing their Math About Me projects with their peers!
We continued our Math is Everywhere discussion by reading two funny and engaging stories, Math Curse and Neil's Numberless World. In Math Curse, the main character finds that "anything can be a math problem" when her elementary teacher puts a math curse on her. In Neil's Numberless World, Neil can't understand why numbers are so important, but then gets a magic watch for his birthday and all the numbers in his world disappear. Neil's world is turned upside down and by the end of the story, he realizes how useful numbers are after all. We had great discussions and of course some laughs about what life would be like if numbers did not exist.We've also spent time discussing the importance of building a mathematical community, and practicing what that looks and sounds like. Our community will spend each day listening respectfully to our peers, sharing ideas and strategies, communicating ideas through pictures, numbers and words and spending ample time working together as a team and learning from one another. We're off to a great start in second grade math and I look forward to all there is to come!
