Today we started learning about a problem solving strategy called SOLVE. It stands for Strategy, Organize, Label, Verify, Explain. We focused on the first 2 steps today: choosing a strategy like drawing or finding a pattern, and organizing our work so that it is easy to see what steps we took to solve the problem. We worked on a math problem today about finding out how many eyes were in our classroom. Students worked to find a strategy that counted all the students in the classroom, then added up their eyes (either counting by 1s or by 2s). We will continue problem solving throughout the year using SOLVE.
We read the book It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown by Charles M. Schulz. After reading the book we summarized it as a whole class. Then students drew their favorite part using labels and describing what part they chose to draw. Tomorrow we will be watching It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, the short movie, to compare the two mediums of the same text. Students will take particular focus on their favorite part of the book and discuss the similarities and differences between the book and the same scene from the movie. Tomorrow students may wear Halloween costumes during the afternoon - no masks. I can't wait to see all of your great costumes!
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We have been setting goals in room 8. Each student has thought of 1 academic goal and 1 social goal. We continued working on our goals today by thinking about what strategies are going to help us achieve those goals. Ask your child about their goal and try to brainstorm some strategies together. This sheet will also be coming home later this week for parent/guardian input.
We tried a new thing in writing today! We had a picture prompt of a carved pumpkin with the writing prompt: after you finish carving your pumpkin it starts speaking to you. What do you do? Students were very creative in their writing and it was interesting finding out what their reaction would be! Each week we talk a lot about kindness and doing nice things to help fill someone's bucket. Today we read a book called "Try a Little Kindness" by Henry Cole. This helped remind students that simple things like telling someone they did a good job, or asking someone to play with you will help others feel cared for and fill their bucket. It was very cold today so we had to stay in for recess and lunch. Please make sure you dress warmly for the weather, as we only have indoor recess when temperatures drop below -20°C. We had such an amazing time on our adventure to Nose Hill today! The wind was a bit chilly but students persevered and had a blast! We took many pictures of plants that are native to Nose Hill and chose each student chose a plant that they want to know more information about. Tomorrow we will start our plant research by identifying the plant we chose and describing its physical appearance. We continued our art today by painting over our crayon drawings from yesterday. Students were excited by the watercolor technique and worked carefully to make their backgrounds look even. Please remember to bring library books back to school We are excited to welcome Zam from SoundKreations to our school from October 21-25 to teach us about the performing art of hip hop dance. Physical Literacy is the motivation, confidence, competence, and understanding to value AND take responsibility for your engagement in physical activities. SoundKreations is an in-school program provider that breathes life and relevance into dance and poetry curriculum. Facilitated by the top professional dancers and artists in Western Canada, they offer an engaging method of developing student's physical literacy and appreciation for the creative process. They are dancers, teachers, mentors, big brothers, and big sisters who have been trained specifically for the school environment, and share a responsibility to support today's youth and provide opportunities for success. Through dance and poetry instruction, they encourage students to explore possibilities in a safe environment with people who believe in them. Please join us for an informal performance on Friday from 10:45-11:45. We started some Halloween water colour art today using 2D geometric shapes. Students traced different shapes onto paper then coloured the shapes with crayons. Tomorrow we will paint over the crayon with watercolour paints, creating an interesting background while leaving the crayon coloured shapes fully intact.
We also continued working on patterns today, increasing the difficulty of what students had to create. Students demonstrated their knowledge of patterns by independently creating 8 different patterns in their visual journals. We started a new word sort in Words Their Way. Students worked hard to sort categories of words together, such as long vowels vs. short vowels or consonant blends at the start of words (sh vs. ch). In music, students continued learning the recorder. They started recorder karate and several students were able to earn their white belt! Our plan is to head out to Nose Hill tomorrow morning so please dress for being outside for about an hour. Today we started talking about the seasonal changes that happen to plants. We started making a KWL chart - what we already Know, what we Want to know, and what we Learned. We had a great discussion of changes we see in plants in the fall, and came up with a few questions that we will find the answers to. We will be going to Nose Hill again on Wednesday (weather permitting) to look at the plants there. We will each take pictures of a plant of our choice and research the different seasonal changes that it goes through.
We continued patterns today in math. Students were challenged with creating more difficult patterns like AABBCC and trading with another student so that they could continue the repeating core. We also read a book about patterns all around us in cities. Students are really starting to notice patterns in the world all around them! We started a dance residency today in gym: Sound Kreations. Zam will be our instructor this week and is teaching us hip hop dance and how to make a beat with our movements. There will be a performance on Friday to show all the great dance moves we learned! To find out more information about this residency, visit their website at https://soundkreations.com Today the students in room 8 made a 4 star drawing. We folded a piece of paper into quarters, then in each of the boxes we drew a house. The students were only given 10 seconds to draw the first one. The next one they had 30 seconds, then a minute, then 15 minutes. Each house got progressively neater and more detailed. This was to show them that it takes time and effort to show their best work and make a four star drawing. We will continue to use this language throughout all activities we do, reminding students of their four star drawings to ensure that they are taking their time and showing their best work. We read a book today about patterns in the world around us. It talked about different animals with patterns on them so that we can distinguish them from other animals. We then talked about repeating patterns and made our own AB, AAB, and ABC patterns with stamps.
On Tuesday we started a new literacy program called Words Their Way. We continued working on this today by creating sentences with a list of words provided by the program. Students will be put into groups based on their spelling readiness and complete activities to help them progress in their literacy development. Today room 8 got to go listen to a guest speaker: Ashley Spires. She is a Canadian children's book author and illustrator, known for her popular books "The Most Magnificent Thing" and "Binky the Space Cat". She spoke to us about her various inspiration for writing her books as well as the process she goes through while writing and illustrating them. In reading we are focusing on summarizing a story. Today we talked about the "who" and the "what" of a story. Using the example of the 3 little pigs, we talked about who the characters are and what they are doing in the story. We also started learning about patterns today. I asked students to show me what they know about patterns by creating different patterns using colored blocks, letters, shapes, and other manipulatives. I was amazed with the amount of information they already knew and we will begin to make some more detailed patterns as well as looking for patterns in the world around us. A reminder to please send library books back to school. Also a new scholastic order form went home today. You can sign up online and make orders through the website, or submit your order to me. Today we started learning about temperature and how to measure it. We looked at thermometers and talked about degrees and Celsius. We each got a thermometer and measured the temperature of 4 differently heated bowls of water. We got snow from outside, we had room temperature water, cold tap water, and hot tap water. We also tried to use boiling water but discovered that the thermometers we were using weren't able to measure water that hot! We recorded our results and discussed what really hot and low temperatures are. You can check the temperature daily with your child and talk about what weather appropriate clothing they should wear.
We will be going to Nose Hill tomorrow morning so dress very warmly! We will be outside for about an hour so be prepared with snow pants, a hat, and mitts. Today we learned about the abstract artist Kandinsky and his use of shapes in his artwork. To learn more about different shapes in our environment we went around the classroom and found objects that we could trace to make 2D shapes. Like Kandinsky, we overlapped our shapes to make an interesting design. Tomorrow we will color in the shapes, choosing complementary colors where the shapes overlap. We are hoping to go to Nose Hill Park on Wednesday (weather permitting). Depending on temperature and the snow we may postpone our walk until Thursday but I will keep everyone updated.
Today students showed me how much they knew about shapes by drawing and labeling as many as they could think of. We will be working on 2D, focusing on their sides and gaining some foundational skills surrounding them. We started writing a poem about saying goodbye to summer and welcoming in fall. Students came up with season specific activities of summer and fall and wrote about the changes that take place each year. Another reminder to please sign up online for Parent Teacher Conferences for this Thursday and Friday. If you are having trouble signing up, please send me an email or a note in your child's agenda with what time works best for you and I will sign you up. North Haven School is designated as a polling station for the upcoming federal election on October 21st. As a result we’ve moved our School Council and Association meetings to Tuesday October 22nd at 6pm in the school Learning Commons. We will be discussing past and upcoming events, fundraisers and have a chance to ask questions of our Principal and guest teacher presenters. Hope you can join us! For September’s meeting minutes please see our home page (Get Involved / School Council) http://school.cbe.ab.ca/school/northhaven/get-involved/school-council/pages/default.aspx |
AuthorI am originally from Saskatchewan but now call Calgary home. My background is in inclusive education and I am passionate about supporting students who are exceptionally abled. I love getting out to the mountains, hiking, and taking in all the beautiful sights. I also love traveling which took me to Vietnam last fall to teach English for 3 months. Archives
March 2020
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