Essential Learning for Second Grade

• Read independent and instructional level selections fluently (90 words correct per minute).
• Include newly acquired vocabulary in language.
• Accurately apply knowledge of phonics when reading and spelling. 
• Accurately read and spell high-frequency and unfamiliar words.
• Reread sentences when meaning is not clear.
• Interpret diagrams, charts, and graphs.
• Recall facts and details from text.
• Discuss and connect information across fiction and informational text.
• Make reasonable judgments about what to include in writing tasks.
• Write for different audiences and purposes.
• Generate ideas before writing; edit first drafts of writing for publication.
• Demonstrate organization in writing assignments.
• Attend to spelling, mechanics, and presentation for final products.

• Use place value with numbers through 000.
• Compose and decompose numbers (represent numbers in multiple ways).
• Memorize and use addition and subtraction to 18.
• Model addition and subtraction and solve problems with 2-digit numbers with and without regrouping.
• Model fractional parts of whole and of a set.
• Find the value of groups of coins up to $1.00 and use cent and dollar symbols and decimal points to describe them.
• Multiply and divide with concrete objects.
• Use patterns in numbers and operations such as on 100 charts, in place value, and fact families.
• Describe relationships and make predictions as in paired numbers and patterns in repeated addition.
• Describe and compare 2-D shapes and 3-D figures such as circles, polygons, spheres, cones, cylinders, and pyramids.
• Locate numbers on a number line.
• Tell time on analog and digital clocks using five minute increments.
• Measure lengths with non-standard objects that are about 1 inch, 1 foot, etc.
• Compare attributes of length, area, weight, and capacity to solve problems.
• Read a thermometer.
• Construct and draw conclusions from picture and bar graphs.
• Solve problems using a plan and appropriate problem solving strategies, including manipulatives, and communicate about the mathematics through informal language.
• Use logical reasoning.

• Identify and explain the significance of landmarks, celebrations, and contributions of historical figures.
• Create and interpret timelines; describe and measure calendar time.
• Use symbols and find locations on maps and globes; draw maps; identify ways people depend on, adapt to, and modify the environment.
• Identify gobernment services in the community; compare roles of government officals and ways they are selected.
• Explain important American customs and symbols; give examples of good citizens, past and present.
• Identify and explain the significance of local cultural heritage.
• Describe the ways science and technology have changed transportation and communication.
• Communicate in written, oral, and visual forms.
• Understand roles of producers and consumers in a free enterprise system.

• Plan and conduct simple investigations using standard and non-standard measurement units.
• Identify components and processes of the natural world (water cycle, use of resources).
• Observe melting and evaporation, weathering, and pushing/pulling of objects as exambles of change.
• Distinguish between characteristics of living organisms and nonliving objects and compare plant/animal needs for survival.
• Describe living organizms' dependence on their environments and identify functions and parts of plants and animals.
• Describe a system as a collection of cycles, structures and processes that interact while exhibiting patterns of change and constancy which can be observed and measured for predition purposes.
• Use models of objects and events as tools to understand the natural world and systems.