Riddle of the week: What gets wetter and wetter the more it dries?

Wednesday November 23rd: I will be at UBC Wednesday morning for my BEd convocation.  There will be a TTOC in the classroom until 12:00pm

Reminder: please return all HR MacMillan Space Center field trip forms as soon as possible!

Work Charts

Grade 1: november-21-25_grade1workchart

Grade 2: november-21-25_grade2workchart-docx-1

Grade 3: november-21-25_grade3workchart-docx-1

Math:

1s: The grade 1 students will be introduced to polygons! They will be creating a polygon book out of construction paper.  This will put their knowledge of polygons and their fine motor skills (cutting using scissors) to the test!

2s: The grade 2 students will continue practicing their addition facts, but will also review polygons.  They will be creating a polygon poster as a final product.

3s: The grade 3 students are practicing their addition math facts using various materials and will move on to multiplication this week.

A grade 3 student worked hard to complete the addition bingo game this week!

A grade 1 students practices their math facts using the decanomial beads.

A grade 1 student tackles the 100 board.

A grade 1 student works with the teen board.

Language:

1s: The grade 1 students will continue practicing their word study, sight words and levelled reading books.  This week we will be talking about stories and how stories have a beginning, a middle and an end.

2s: The grade 2 students will be reviewing their knowledge of nouns, articles and adjectives using various manipulatives as well as stories! Our Catwings literature circle meeting will be on Friday November 25th during our morning work choice period.

3s: The grade 3s will be working on their usual grammar boxes and word study.  They will start plural work this week as well.  Their Lemonade War literature circle meeting will be on Friday November 25th during our morning work choice period.

We read all three hat books written by Jon Klassen. They sparked quite a great discussion about similarities and differences between the three books. We enjoyed the humor and simplicity of these books.

A grade 1 student gets their work organized for word study using the moveable alphabet.

Grade 2 students working on word study and a journal entry.

Ingrid the Scientist came into our classroom on Monday morning. We played around with balloons and made rockets. We also used a plasticene ball as an asteroid and dropped it into a bucket of flour to see what would happen. The students wrote about this experience in their journal, recounting the events, what they liked, what they didn’t like or what they found to be the most fascinating!

Culture:

The crater experiment. Students dropped a plasticene ball from height to imitate a crater hitting a planet.

The materials used to build balloon rockets!!

The data (information) we collected from our balloon rocket experiment. We created a scatterplot graph to illustrate what happens with varying amounts of weight.

The students have circled back and are now working in their space logbooks again! We are studying each planet in depth so that we are able to design our own planet in the coming weeks.

A student takes a closer look at Earth.

A group of students study the Sun.

Students studying Neptune.

Students studying Saturn.

Physical Education:

We will begin our week with Soccer as usual, but will start learning the game of badminton by the end of the week!

Classroom Community:

On Friday we had such a lovely pancake breakfast! Some students volunteered to help make a fruit salad for the breakfast.  They stayed in at lunch to prepare!

On December 1st Divisions 5 and 6 will be going on a field trip to the HR MacMillan Space Centre.  Your child should have brought home a field trip form home today with all of the information.  I’m asking that these consent forms be returned no later than November 28th.

Ms. Daphne and I are in need of some parent volunteers for the trip so please let me know if you are available and would like to help out!

I’ve attached the field trip form here: dec-1-planetarium-field-studies-consent-form

Friday November 18: Pancake Breakfast at Tyee from 8:00am-9:00am – students are asked to bring in fruit on Thursday November 17th so that we can make a fruit salad to contribute on Friday morning.

Work Charts

Grade 1: november-14-18_grade1workchart

Grade 2: november-14-18_grade2workchart-docx-1

Grade 3: november-14-18_grade3workchart-docx-1

Work Choice Reinforcements

My father is a geologist and when he was living in Alberta many years ago he found dinosaur bones. He mailed them to me last week from New Brunswick and I brought them in to share with the class! These bones have been dated back to Cretaceous period and are >64 million years old!

Math

1s: the grade 1 students are continuing their learning of numeration and addition with the various Montessori material.  Some grade 1 students have started skip counting by 2s, 3s, and 10s using the 100 board.

Using the 100 board to skip count.

2s: grade 2 students will continue to practice their dynamic addition using the stamp game and some students will be learning how to use the bead frame

3s: grade 3 students will continue to practice their dynamic addition using the stamp game, bead frame and the dot game and some students will hopefully be moving into static subtraction by the end of the week

Language

All three grades will continue working with their sight words, word study, grammar boxes, and story writing.

Grade 1 sight word ring.

Grade 2 verb grammar box.

Literature circles

The grade 2 and 3 students will continue with their literature circles this week.  We’ve gotten off track a little bit with the weeks being a tad wonky; however we will be meeting on Friday morning this week to discuss.  Hopefully this will get us back on track!

Author study

We read “I Want My Hat Back”, by Jon Klassen last Wednesday. I absolutely love these books.  We will read his two other books this week and we will be discussing his style of writing and illustrating.  The students will be introduced to the concept of comparing and contrasting and the similarities and differences between the three books.

Culture

This week we will be studying each planet in more detail and working on our space logbooks. This will give us the information and details needed for us to be able to design and create our own planets in the weeks to come!  The students will have the opportunity to be creative while also incorporating the knowledge and information gained from our in-depth solar system and planet study.

Monday November 7: there will be a school-wide Remembrance Day assembly at 10:45am on Monday morning

Thursday November 10: new curriculum implementation day- no school for students

Friday November 11: Remembrance Day – no school for teachers and students 

Work charts for this week

Grade 1: grade1workchartnov7-9

Grade 2: grade2workchart-nov-7-nov-9-docx-1

Grade 3: grade3workchart-november-7-9-docx-1

Parents of grade 1 students,

Please remember to remind your child to read their take home leveled classroom library book. There should be a new book coming home every night. They can read to you, a sibling or a pet! Also please remember to send them back to school in the zip-lock bags I provided. The bags should have your child’s name as well as Division 5 written on them. These books belong to Division 5.

Happy reading!

Math

The 100 Board

The 100 Board – skip counting by 2s

The Snake Game!

The Snake Game- the golden snake

The stamp game and finishing up some patterns.

Language

What does peace feel like to you?

On Friday we read “What does peace feel like” written by Vladimir Radunsky and children around the world.  The students were able to make many connections and felt they could relate to the children in the book who offered what peace feels, smells, tastes, sounds and looks like.  This week we will read the book again and each student will be responsible for writing and drawing what peace feels like for them.

Literature Circles

The grade 3s will continue their Lemonade War discussions this week.  We will be reading up to Chapter 8 for Wednesday morning.  The grade 2s will be starting a new book this week, “Catwings Returns” written by Ursula K. Le Guin.  We will begin on Tuesday morning.

A grade 3 using a story starter to jump start their writing.

A student filing out their self-assessment checklist for their completed metal inset booklet.

A student uses a timer as they draw in their sketch book as a break option.

Metal inset creations. This is stage 9 from a grade 3 student’s project.

Grade 1 word study work.

Hard at work.

Blingja breathing and journal writing.

Grammar boxes.

Grade 1 word study.

A grade 2 student practices their cursive penmanship.

Culture

This past week the class was divided into two very large groups and were asked to come up with a creative way to present the solar system to the other half of the class.  The students had to communicate, work together, listen and struggle through the challenge of such a large group.  They rose to the occasion on Friday afternoon when they had the opportunity to perform their solar system drama for Ms. I.

We debriefed after this activity and the students shared things like:

That was:”frustrating”, “annoying”, “fun”, “hard”, “sweaty”, “awesome”, “exciting”

“The hard parts are really worth it in the end!”- Gr. 2 student

“Now we know what your job is like Ms. Langille! It’s hard getting everyone to listen.”- Gr. 3 student

“It was inspiring watching the other group perform.” -Gr. 1 student

This week we will be studying each planet in more detail and working on our space logbooks.

Social Responsibility/Classroom Community

We have started doing guided visualization and relaxation exercises in the classroom.  The students seem to really love it and it seems to be an effective tool for bringing us back into the green zone and alert for learning.

Ask your child to guide you through the visualization we were working on last week!

Art

Last week we started our artwork for the annual Tyee calendar.  We will continue the calendar art project into this week.  The students are encouraged to use pencil crayons, pastels, felts etc.

Today was a success! We had so much fun carving our pumpkins this afternoon.  They are all so different and creative.

Thank you to all the parents who took time today to volunteer in the classroom. This activity would not have been possible without all the support. If any parents who were with us this afternoon have photos, could you please send them via email. Thank you!

Reminder!

This is a friendly reminder to bring a small/medium pumpkin to school on Monday for our pumpkin carving.  If you have any pumpkin carving tools, especially child-friendly serrated pumpkin knives, it would be helpful if you could send those along to school as well.  There will be 8 parent volunteers assisting with this activity.  Thank you to those who volunteered!

Happy Halloween!

Work charts for this week

Grade 1: grade1workchartoct31-nov4-2

Grade 2:  grade2workchartoct31-nov4-docx-1

Grade 3: grade3workchartoct31-nov4-docx-1

Classroom Library System (grade 1s)

Please remember to remind your child to read their take home levelled classroom library book. There should be a new book coming home every night.  They can read to you, a sibling or a pet! Also please remember to send them back to school in the ziplock bags I provided. The bags should have your child’s name as well as Division 5 written on them.  These books belong to Division 5.

Happy reading!

Monday October 31st: Hallowe’en

On Monday October 31st we will be celebrating Halloween.  There will be a school assembly at 9:15am and I encourage everyone to wear a costume!

We will have a class potluck.  Bring a small healthy snack (be creative with the Halloween theme: ants on a log, orange carrots…) or a treat to share with your classmates! Please also bring a healthy lunch as I’m sure there will be many treats on Monday.

We will also be carving pumpkins in the afternoon! I have 8 parent volunteers who will be helping us with this activity. I am asking that all students bring a small to medium pumpkin to school on Monday morning.  If you have any child-friendly pumpkin carving tools, please bring those as well.

Math

1s: we are still practicing our numeration and addition skills using various materials including the teen board, ten board and the snake game.

A grade 1 student who has already progressed to the stamp game. Her hard work and determination to practice math is paying off!

2s: The grade 2 students are learning the stamp game and using the golden beads and addition strip board to work through both static and dynamic addition.

3s: The grade 3 students are using the stamp game and learning how to use the bead frame to do their addition work.

Language

Metal Inset Project

All three grades are working hard on their creative metal inset projects.  Some students have finished while others are still working.  The students are required to fill out a self-assessment checklist when they are finished to see if they met the expected criteria.

Self-assessment checklist.

1s: The grade 1s will be practicing their sight words by continuing to play the sight word memory game as well as using their sight word ‘ring’ to continually learn new words.  Each time a student successfully recognizes and learns a new sight word, they will add it to their ring.

2s: The grade 2 students will be starting a new literature circle book this week.

3s: The 3s will continue their Lemonade War literature circle with one new member, the Master Observer.

2s and 3s:  This week we will be reviewing my expectations around word study and grammar box practice in the classroom.  My expectation is that grade 2 students are practicing grammar boxes at least twice, and that grade 3 students are practicing 3 times.  This work in the classroom is meant to be repetitive and meant to be practiced over and over.  I do not have a home spelling program because of the work we are doing at school during the day.

Some students have been very excitedly writing stories and identifying all parts of speech using the Montessori symbols and colours to identify nouns, adjectives, articles, verbs, prepositions, adverbs etc.

Culture

This week the students will finish up their solar system posters.  We will do some drama around the order of the solar system and at the end of the week we will be doing experiments to illustrate the science around the different properties of the rocky planets.

Making a few corrections using the criteria for success.

Spending time and being meticulous about their work.

Social Responsibility/Classroom Community

On Wednesday morning we had an impromptu peace circle.  There have been many incidents in the classroom where the students have not been as kind as they should be.  There has been teasing, physical interactions and rude tones.  This peace circle was quite successful.  Ms. I joined us and we talked about what it means to be kind, how we should treat our classmates, why we are at school and how our classroom community is a place that has the potential to be loving and supportive. Please reinforce this at home and remind your child how powerful words can be.

Hello parents of grade 1 students!

Please remember to remind your child to read their take home levelled classroom library book. There should be a new book coming home every night.  They can read to you, a sibling or a pet! Also please remember to send them back to school in the ziplock bags I provided. They should have your child’s name as well as Division 5 written on them.

Happy reading!

Parents!

On Monday October 31st Division 5 will (hopefully) be pumpkin carving to make jack-o’-lanterns.

I am also asking that each child bring a small to medium pumpkin to school on halloween.  If you are dropping your child off in the morning you can bring them straight to the classroom along with a serrated carving knife or a child-friendly pumpkin carving knife. (I will also be searching for child-friendly serrated pumpkin carving knives this week)

This pumpkin carving lesson is meant to be fun and to celebrate Halloween, but also a great lesson in learning how to plan and learning how to use a knife.

In order for us to be able to do this I need 6-9 parent volunteers to help out on Monday afternoon from 1-3pm.  Please email me at hlangille@vsb.bc.ca if you would like to help out!