It’s my last day of Spring Break… I’m in sadsville for sure! Not because I am sad about returning to school…I just loved spending some extra time with my little chunky! We’ve been working on walking…
#wherehasthetimegone?!
Any-who… tomorrow it’s back to real life and TESTING!
In second grade we’re not subject to those high stakes state tests, but we do take that “other” standardized test called SAT-10.
SAT-10 has assessments for K-12, but in my district only 2nd grade takes the Reading and Math portion of this knowledge assessment.
Before leaving to start my break last week, I readied my classroom for our version of Standardized testing by…
Covering my number-line (no cheating!)
and put the kiddos’ desks into perfectly straight testing rows
Excuse me a minute while I allow my OCD side to enjoy these perfectly aligned rows… mmmmm….
We also had to take down all our fun teaching posters… that was a sad day because you know once I put them back up, they will NEVER stay up like they did the first time. #concreteblockcurse
Now, I haven’t just readied my classroom for our upcoming testing time, my seconds and I have been hitting test prep for the past 2 weeks.
Here are a few concepts we’ve been working on (because SAT-10 is NOT common core and our curriculum is)
For Reading…
To help us prepare for the Reading and Language portion of the SAT-10, we’ve been working out of a testing booklet that my district provided through our reading series, Treasures. We’ve also been playing LOTS of synonym and multiple meaning word games. Most of which are centers that I’ve adapted to use in in whole group.
Some of the centers I’ve pulled…
This one from my Spring Days CCSS Literacy Centers Pack
We used it to help us a little bit more with contractions.
To play as a class each student got a carrot and we put the sorting baskets in the middle. As we went around the circle, each student had to read the word on their carrot, decide if it was a possessive or a contractions, then either give an example using the possessive or tell me the two words in the contractions. I recorded their answers on the chalkboard as we went.
We also used this one from that same pack.
To use this one in whole group, I laid the yellow base-word flower middles in the center of our carpet and each student got a white word petal. Then, we went through each base-word and students who had petals to make a compound word using the flower centers came to the middle and placed their petal down. After playing, I spent a few more minutes honing in on how compound words are made up of two words. Then we brainstormed more compound words as a class.
We also used this center from my Snow Days pack to help with synonyms.
We played in teams of four and five. Each group got several center pieces and had to match penguin to the mitten as a team. The kiddos loved this one!
For Math…
Games and challenges found their way into our test prep for the math portion as well. Each day before the day’s lesson, we played some sort of review game to keep those skills fresh. We pulled some games from my place value unit,
and even did some “group challenges” using some general math worksheets up on the document camera.
This upcoming week, we are in full on testing mode, but don’t think the fun and learning has stopped!
Here’s a peek at what we’ll be working on this week when we are NOT testing.
On Monday, we’re reading Author’s April Fools. You can find the video for the book here.
Then, the students are going to write about what sill joke they would play on April Fools using my LOL! Pack.
On Tuesday we’ll publish our writings and share them in triangle groups.
We will also use this other center from my Spring Days pack to practice multiple-meaning words.
I plan on playing this as a whole group game in the morning before we do the Language portion of SAT-10.
For math we’re going to continue to review, but I am also planning on a drive-by lesson for using the testing rulers for measuring. I’m pulling the measuring stations out of my Monster Mash Measurement pack
Then, we’ll work on measuring items on paper (like it will be on the test) using this quick measuring activity I made.
Click here or the pic to grab it for yourself for free!
Looking for more SAT-10 test prep ideas? My sweet friend Tamara from Mrs. Russell’s Room also administers SAT-10 to her firsties. Click here to check out her very informational post!
Also, have you cleaned out your wishlists with this Spring Cleaning Sale????
You’ve got today and tomorrow! My entire store is 20% off too!
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