Mississippi Standards
Mississippi 2nd Grade ELA Standards
All 40 Mississippi English language arts standards for 2nd grade, each explained in plain English. The official wording is in Mississippi Department of Education's document, linked at the end of this page.
40 standards
Reading Literature
9 standardsRL.2.1
Ask and answer who, what, where, when, why and how questions about a story on your own, like why the fox tricked the hen.
RL.2.2
Retell a fable or folktale from another culture, like The Tortoise and the Hare, and say what lesson or moral it teaches.
RL.2.3
Explain how a character deals with a big event or problem in a story, like what a lost puppy does to find its way home.
RL.2.4
Find the rhymes, repeated lines, steady beats and words that start with the same sound in a poem or song, and tell how they add rhythm and meaning.
RL.2.5
Describe how a story is built, with a beginning that sets things up, a middle where the action happens and an ending that wraps it up.
RL.2.6
Notice that the characters in a story see things differently and show it by using a different voice for each one when reading their lines aloud.
RL.2.7
Use both the pictures and the words of a book or e-book to explain who the characters are, where the story happens and what goes on in it.
RL.2.9
Tell what is the same and what changes between two tellings of one story, like a Cinderella from Europe and one from China.
RL.2.10
By year’s end, read and understand stories and poems written for 2nd and 3rd graders, with some help on the hardest ones.
Reading Informational Text
10 standardsRI.2.1
Ask and answer who, what, where, when, why and how questions about a story on your own, like why the fox tricked the hen.
RI.2.2
Name what a nonfiction text with several paragraphs is mostly about and what each paragraph focuses on.
RI.2.3
Explain how the events, science ideas or steps in an informational text link up, like how each step in a recipe leads to the next.
RI.2.4
Figure out what a subject word in a 2nd grade science or social studies text means, like habitat in a book about animals.
RI.2.5
Use captions, bold words, subheadings, a glossary, an index or the menus and icons on a screen to find a fact quickly instead of rereading everything.
RI.2.6
Say why the author wrote an informational text, like to answer a question, explain how something works or describe a place.
RI.2.7
Explain what a diagram, photo or map adds to an informational text, like a labeled drawing that shows how a pulley lifts a load.
RI.2.8
Find a point the author makes, like that recycling helps the planet, and explain how each reason given backs it up.
RI.2.9
Read two informational texts on one topic, like two books about volcanoes, and tell where their most important points agree and where they differ.
RI.2.10
By the end of the year, read and understand history, science and technical texts written for grades 2 and 3, with support on the hardest ones.
Reading Foundational Skills
2 standardsRF.2.3
Say the main sound of each consonant, know the long and short sounds of a, e, i, o and u, and read common sight words like the, of and you.
RF.2.4
Read 1st-grade books aloud smoothly and accurately with expression, understand them, and reread when a word or sentence does not make sense.
Writing
7 standardsW.2.1
Write an opinion about a topic or book, give reasons for it linked with words like because and also, and finish with a closing sentence.
W.2.2
Write a short report that introduces a topic, like how plants grow, builds its points with facts and definitions, and ends with a closing sentence.
W.2.3
Write a story about one event or a few in a row, with details about what people did, thought and felt, order words like first and then, and a real ending.
W.2.5
With help from adults and classmates, stick to one topic and improve a piece of writing by revising the ideas and editing the mistakes.
W.2.6
With an adult's help, use digital tools like a tablet or classroom computer to write, polish and publish a piece, sometimes with a partner.
W.2.7
Join a class project that gathers information, like reading several books about insects to write a report together or keeping notes on a science experiment.
W.2.8
Answer a question by drawing on something you remember or by finding the facts in books or websites the teacher gives you.
Speaking and Listening
6 standardsSL.2.1
Discuss 2nd grade topics and books in small and large groups, follow the rules, build on what others say and ask when something is unclear.
SL.2.2
Ask and answer questions about the key details of a read-aloud, a talk or a video, like what the main character wanted.
SL.2.3
Ask a speaker questions to clear up a confusing part, learn more or go deeper into the topic, and answer questions about what was said.
SL.2.4
Tell a story or share something that happened, like a trip to the zoo, with the right facts and vivid details, speaking clearly in sentences that hang together.
SL.2.5
Record yourself reading a story or poem, and add drawings or other visuals to a story or recount when they help make the ideas and feelings clear.
SL.2.6
Speak in complete sentences when the situation calls for it, like adding more detail when a classmate asks a question.
Language
6 standardsL.2.1
Use second grade grammar in writing and speech, like group nouns, plurals such as mice, myself and ourselves, past tense such as told, and rearranged sentences.
L.2.2
Capitalize the first word of a sentence and the word I, name the period and question mark, and spell simple words the way they sound, like kat for cat.
L.2.3
Notice the difference between formal and casual English, like Good morning, Mrs. Lee versus Hey, and choose which fits the moment.
L.2.4
Figure out a new word in 2nd grade reading from its sentence, a prefix like un- in unhappy, a root like add in addition, its parts like birdhouse, or a dictionary.
L.2.5
Connect words to real life, like naming foods that are spicy or juicy, and tell apart close words like toss, throw and hurl or thin, slender and scrawny.
L.2.6
Put new words from talks, books and read-alouds to work, including describing words like gentle and quickly, when speaking and writing about what was read.
The official Mississippi documents
- 2025 Mississippi College- and Career-Readiness Standards for English Language Arts · adopted 2025 · required since 2025-26
The plain-English lines on this page are EMStudio's own explanations of Mississippi's standards, not the official wording, which Mississippi Department of Education publishes in the documents above. Codes and strand names identify each standard.