End of October

Wow!  The last week of October is already here.  We have learned a lot so far this year, but there is still a lot of ground left to cover.

We have spent a lot of time working on Science goals.  We have focused a lot on the change in season and the way that it affects plants, animals, weather, temperature and people.   We have also been learning cycles of time; days of the week, months of the year and seasons.

Grade 1s have been working hard to represent numbers to 10 with digits, words, pictures, ten frames and tally marks.

Grade 2s have almost mastered even/odd to 100.  We have already started skip counting by 2s, 5s, and 10s starting from any point on the number line.  This is a lot easier with manipulatives.

Important Events this week:

Monday - Star Student - Rowan

Tuesday - Spelling Test

Wednesday - Costume can be brought to school to be worn in the afternoon.  A party food sign up is posted outside the classroom

Thursday - Orange Reading Log Calendar is due...a new one will be sent home

Friday -

Saturday - Fall Supper!  See you there!

In the swing of things...

I hope you had a good long weekend (if you were lucky enough to get one).  The kids had loads of great stories to share this morning.

This week will be a full regular week.  We have almost mastered the first three portions of The Daily Five; Read to Self, Read to Someone, and Work on Writing.  We will be learning how to Listen to Reading, and do Word Work in more detail over the next couple of weeks.

We also started Story Mapping this past week.  Here's a visual of some of the elements we have been working on.

In Science we are working at learning the months of the year.  Here are a couple pictures from our books.

Math lessons are going well for both grade ones and twos.  Grade 1s are focusing on learning to represent numbers with pictures, numbers and words.  Grade 2s are working with numbers to 100, with a focus on odd and even right now.

Next week is Halloween!  We will be having a Halloween party in the classroom.  Students are welcome to bring a costume along to school to wear for the school parade in the afternoon.  Please send a costume that students can easily put on themselves.  Also, please do not send masks to school, we would like to be able to see their faces.  I will put together a sign up sheet for party food/drinks and post it outside the classroom in the next couple of days.

The latest Scholastic flyer is full of Christmas Gift ideas.  If you ever place an order as a gift and need me to deliver it to you directly please just put a note with the order and I will make sure I don't put it in the hands of your child.

As always, if you have any questions or concerns please let me know!

Wild Things

We had a fabulous time at MTYP today.  We saw the play Where the Wild Things Are.  It was an interactive play where the students played the part of the Wild Things!!!  Can you figure out who each Wild Thing really is?  Look closely...

Big Thanks to everyone that drove us there today!  Your time is appreciated.

Thank you to everyone who remembered to send a booster seat.  I appreciate your diligence and attention to detail.  Everything went smoothly because of your help!

Short Week

Monday

Star Student: Kirsi

Tuesday

Field Trip: Please remember to send a booster seat if you indicated that you would be sending one
Watch for pictures of our masks on the blog this week!


Wednesday

Lulu and the Tom Cats performance at 1:30 at the school, everyone is welcome to attend.

Thursday

Last day of the school week!

Friday


No School: I will be learning about current Math trends in education

Notes Home This Week
Today you will see a number of items coming home with your child:

Reading/Writing: I have prepared a handout for you with tips for helping your child with reading/writing skills at home.  The students are familiar with the strategies and ideas suggested on these pages.  The only thing that I want to draw your attention to is the suggestion of reading for 30 minutes a day.  Thirty minutes a day should be a goal.  Not all students are ready for that amount of time.  Start with a small time fram, like 3 minutes.  Students are familiar with the concept of building reading/writing stamina.  If you have any questions about this page please let me know.  I would like to help you and your child build successful homework routines.

Volunteers: I know so many of you want to help.  I've prepared a list of the things that I could use your help with.  If you're interested sign it and send it back to school.  Thank you.

Scholastic Sea Creature Contest: Scholastic is running a contest that fits nicely together with our creative lessons on Where The Wild Things Are.  If you are interested complete the page and mail it in, or send it back to school and I will mail it in.

CLWR
This month the school is collecting notebooks for our CLWR project. 

Fall Supper
The Fall Supper is coming up!  Be sure to get your tickets, and drop off donation items in the office hallway.

Happy Thanksgiving!

God's Blessings!  I hope that your family had a chance to celebrate Thanksgiving in whatever way was meaningful to you.  We spent a fair amount of time discussing God's gifts to us this past week.  The students made turkeys and pumpkin pies to show the things they are thankful for.

 In our classroom we have a place to keep track of the objectives that we are currently working on.  I will post a pic of them periodically so that you have a snapshot of what it is we are learning and working on.  These boards do change often, sometimes daily depending on which objectives we are focusing on. 

 One of the things we have been talking about in Social Studies is the diversity in our classroom community.  We continue to work at filling each others buckets with love and respect.  Here is an artwork display that we created together to show "The colours of us", based on a childrens picture book call, The Colors of Us.

A couple more youtube videos that we have been using in the classroom:

Alphablocks!  These episodes help students learn the sounds of the alphabet, and how to put words together.  

Counting to 100.