2nd Grade ELA (Massachusetts Curriculum Frameworks)

Reading: Literature (RL)

• RL.2.1 Ask and answer who, what, where, when, why and how questions to show understanding of key details in a story.
• RL.2.2 Retell stories, including fables and folktales from many cultures, and work out their message, lesson or moral.
• RL.2.3 Describe how story characters react to big events and challenges.
• RL.2.4 Describe how beats, alliteration, rhyme and repeated lines give rhythm and meaning to stories, poems or songs.
• RL.2.5 Describe how a story is built, including how the beginning opens it and the ending wraps up the action.
• RL.2.6 Explain what dialogue is and how it shows characters' thoughts and points of view.
• RL.2.7 Use pictures and words in print or digital texts to show understanding of characters, setting or plot.
• RL.2.9 Compare different versions of one story (e.g. Cinderella tales) from different authors or cultures.
• RL.2.10 Read and understand grade 2 stories and poems from many genres, cultures and perspectives on your own.

Reading: Informational Text (RI)

• RI.2.1 Ask and answer who, what, where, when, why and how questions to show understanding of key details in a text.
• RI.2.2 Name the main topic of a text with several paragraphs and what particular paragraphs focus on.
• RI.2.3 Describe how historical events, science or math ideas, or steps in a procedure in a text are connected.
• RI.2.4 Figure out words and phrases in a text about a grade 2 topic.
• RI.2.5 Use text features (captions, bold print, subheadings, glossaries, indexes, icons) to find key facts quickly.
• RI.2.6 Say what an author mainly sets out to answer, explain or describe.
• RI.2.7 Explain how particular images, such as a labeled diagram, add to and clarify a text.
• RI.2.8 Describe how reasons back up particular points an author makes.
• RI.2.9 Compare the most important points made by two texts on the same topic.
• RI.2.10 Read and understand grade 2 informational texts, including history, science, math and technical texts, on your own.

Reading: Foundational Skills (RF)

• RF.2.3 Know and use grade 2 phonics and word analysis to read words.
  • a. Tell long from short vowels when reading regular one-syllable words.
  • b. Know the sounds of more common vowel teams.
  • c. Read regular two-syllable words with long vowels.
  • d. Read words with common prefixes and suffixes.
  • e. Spot words whose spelling-sound links are inconsistent but common.
  • f. Recognize and read grade 2 words with irregular spellings.
• RF.2.4 Read accurately and fluently enough to understand the text.
  • a. Read grade 2 texts with a purpose and with understanding.
  • b. Read aloud accurately, at a suitable pace and with expression over repeated readings.
  • c. Use context to check or self-correct word reading, rereading if needed.

Writing (W)

• W.2.1 Write opinion pieces that name the topic or book, give an opinion with reasons joined by words like because and also, and conclude.
• W.2.2 Write informative texts that introduce a topic, develop points with facts and definitions, and conclude.
• W.2.3 Write narratives in prose or poems about one or more events with details, dialogue, time words and an ending.
  • a. In poems, use sound patterns (beats, alliteration, end rhymes, repeated sounds) to give structure.
• W.2.4 Produce writing whose development and organization fit the task, purpose and reader.
• W.2.5 With help from adults and peers, stay on a topic and improve writing by revising and editing.
  • b. Choose and use suitable vocabulary up to grade 2 level.
• W.2.6 With adult help, try digital tools to make and share writing, sometimes with classmates.
• W.2.7 Join shared research and writing projects, e.g. a report drawn from several books or science observation notes.
• W.2.8 Recall experiences or gather information from given sources to answer a question.
• W.2.10 Write regularly for different tasks, purposes and readers.

Speaking and Listening (SL)

• SL.2.1 Join group conversations with different partners about grade 2 topics and texts.
  • a. Follow agreed rules such as getting the floor politely, listening with care and speaking one at a time.
  • b. Build on others' talk by linking your comments to what others said.
  • c. Ask for clarification and more explanation when needed.
• SL.2.2 Retell or describe the key ideas or details of a read-aloud or of spoken or media information.
• SL.2.3 Ask and answer questions about a speaker's words to check understanding, learn more or go deeper.
• SL.2.4 Recount an experience, tell a story or explain how you solved a math problem with facts and details, speaking audibly in clear sentences.
• SL.2.5 Make audio recordings of stories or poems and add drawings or visuals when they help show ideas and feelings.
• SL.2.6 Speak in complete sentences when the task calls for it, to give detail or clarify.

Language (L)

• L.2.1 Use standard English grammar and usage in writing and speaking, keeping earlier skills.
  • a. Write and expand simple and compound statements, questions, commands and exclamations, choosing the type for the meaning.
  • b. Use adjectives and adverbs, picking the right one for the word being described.
  • c. Use collective nouns and common irregular plurals.
  • d. Use reflexive pronouns (myself, themselves).
  • e. Form and use the past tense of common irregular verbs.
• L.2.2 Use standard English capitals, punctuation and spelling when writing.
  • a. Print capital and lowercase letters clearly and fluently.
  • b. Capitalize holidays, product names and place names.
  • c. Use commas in letter greetings and closings.
  • d. Use apostrophes for contractions and common possessives.
  • e. Apply spelling patterns already learned to new words (cage → badge).
  • f. Check and correct spellings in beginning dictionaries and other references.
  • g. Know that context decides whether to write a numeral or a number word.
• L.2.3 Apply what you know about how language works when you write, speak, read and listen.
  • a. Compare formal and informal uses of English.
• L.2.4 Figure out what unfamiliar words and words with several meanings mean, choosing from a range of strategies.
  • a. Use the sentence as a clue to a word's meaning.
  • b. Work out a new word made by adding a known prefix to a known word (happy/unhappy).
  • c. Use a known root as a clue to an unknown word with the same root.
  • d. Predict compound word meanings from their parts (birdhouse, notebook).
  • e. Use glossaries and beginning dictionaries, print or digital, to check meanings.
  • f. Recognize and use common abbreviations, such as a.m. and p.m.
  • g. Recognize and use common symbols, such as $ and ¢.
• L.2.5 Show understanding of how words relate and differ slightly in meaning.
  • a. Link words to real life (e.g. foods that are spicy or juicy).
  • b. Tell apart shades of meaning in related verbs (toss, throw, hurl) and adjectives (thin, slender, skinny).
• L.2.6 Use words learned through talk, activities, reading and being read to, including adjectives and adverbs to describe.