Ms. Carley's Classroom Blog

It has been a very special time in Div. 11! We have been watching our caterpillars grow and change over the last few weeks. We have become experts on their life cycle, body parts, and importance for our community! We read them stories and even showed them our art. Then, earlier this week, the butterflies hatched from their chrysalis!

Today, we knew we were going to release the butterflies into the amazing sunshine. We took some time to write our beautiful butterflies some letters of gratitude and well wishes on their journey before we sent them on their way. Many of us chose to read our letters to our butterflies and lay them beside their nets.

We loved watching our butterflies fly away to their new homes.

Last week, we were reminded of Red Dress Day which led us into a wonderful conversation about the importance of the day and the need for change and equity. Kela made the connection to Lilo and Stitch – “no one left behind or forgotten.” The students asked if they could wear red on Friday May 5th in honour of the day. Thank you for your thoughtful conversation, Div. 11!

On May 11th we had Jump Rope for Heart Day! Some of our favourite Story Workshop characters reminded us about the day!

Our authors and writers in Div. 11 have been busy making new books and setting up shop!

They even bravely shared their stories with Ms. Cooper’s Grade 1 Students! The grade ones were so inspired!!

In math, we have been going on all sorts of math walks to see what measurement, geometry, addition, subtraction, estimation that we can find, and more! Tell your families where the trillium gets its name!

We have also been finding math in all our other learning! Grinder and Coola have woken up in time for our June 5 Grouse Mountain Trip! While we were reading about them, we found so much interesting numeracy! Did you know that Coola weighs approximately 1000 pounds more than Colin??

We hope you enjoy the beautiful spring sunshine this weekend as a family! Maybe you will meet one of our beautiful butterflies!

The last two weeks have been full of amazing adventures. April 22 was Earth Day, and we have truly been exploring how we can love our Earth and the creatures in it.

We got to hear one of our favourite books, Be a Good Ancestor, read by one of its authors, Leona Prince! We thought about ways we can be good ancestors.

We welcomed caterpillars into our classroom. They have already grown so big during their time with us – just one week! We love to see how they grow and change every day! How will they transform?

We finished our third and final pen pal letter and sent it to Mexico! We know that learning and teaching about birds helps us advocate for them, their habitats, and their treatment. Some of us also entered the Amigos Alados art contest!

We have been writing poems! Last week we started our opposite poems, all about nature and Earth Day!

In math, we have been exploring geometry all around us! We learned how to draw Tumus (Otter) from Indigenous artist, Andrea Fritz. She taught us how to use traditional northwest coast First Peoples shapes, such as ovoids, U, and split U in our art to represent the shapes we see reflected in the natural environment.

Can you find any shapes this weekend? We have also learned how to add more complexity to our target thinking math game! See if you can play as a family!

On Tuesday, we had a special visit from the SFU Fair Trade Amabassador, Daphne! Our school is a Fair Trade school, so we have a special connection and we learned so much! We sorted and talked about needs versus wants. Then we learned that even though farmers have a very challenging job, they are paid a very tiny proportion. Finally, we found out more about how fair trade and how it can support equity and communities! Be sure to talk with your families and hand in your Fair Trade reflection next week!

On Wednesday, we were the photographers for the Pollinator Garden planting! The grade 4/5s made mason bee tubes, painted garden signs, and planted native, pollinator plants! Our garden is ready to welcome bees, butterflies, birds, and other pollinators! Come visit our special garden!

Today was the UHE Green Team plant sale! The green team worked hard to plant the seeds in March and they were ready to sell today! Ms. Carley was busy helping the green team and we got to come help and buy some plants too! We love our new plants! All our proceeds go towards our school’s learning on the land!

Congratulations to our authors! This week, we had special sharing from Sebastian, Amelia, Mariam, and Maia! Ian, Yuha, and Niko published the next books in their series and are creating a book store! Wow! Next week, Amal and other authors will have a chance to share!

The beginning of spring is full of celebrations! Sending best wishes to everyone celebrating Ramadan this ninth month, Easter this long weekend, and Baisakhi (Vaisakhi) this April 14th!

Here are a few snapshots of Div. 11 learning from each day this week!

On Monday, we measured our pod’s potatoes! We are so excited to see how they grow and change!

On Tuesday, we had the special treat of visiting the Museum of Archaeology at SFU! We learned so much about what it means to be an archaeologist and all the amazing  things that they do! We put together the puzzle of a human skeletons by comparing our bone pictures to a skeleton model! We sorted human skulls from older to younger, learning all about interesting evolutionary characteristics such as skull size and brow bones! We also got to put pieces of a jar back together using play-doh to connect the matching pieces! We ended our field trip with an Easter Egg hunt where we got explore all the different parts of the museum, including some pole carvings, canoes, African masks, and so many more amazing exhibits! A huge thank you to Maia’s mom, Merrill for inviting us, and a huge thank you to our parent volunteers for joining us!

On Wednesday, we had another garden workshop! We learned more about pollinators, and starting creating our own bee models. We prepared our garden beds and loved all the creatures we found! We also created story stones with Niko’s mom, Kana! We are so grateful for these amazing opportunities in the garden to explore science, literacy, and art!

On Thursday, we learned about being kind to each other. We did some role-playing and read a story all about kindness with Ms. Nicyfor. We considered things that we think and things that we say. We want to say kind and helpful things to each other. We brought home an activity to talk to you about and continue our conversations of choices, strategies, and being a good friend. This learning is perfect as we prepare for International Day of Pink on April 12th!

What will our learning look like next week?

What an exciting start back from spring break!

We started our week with some Wishtree, and made our very own key necklaces, just like Samar got from Bongo. We had some amazing conversations about inclusion, discrimination, racism, standing up for others, and kindness. We also had lots of fun thinking of the names we would like if we were a baby skunk (our favourite smell).

This week, we took our math learning outside to measure everything we could find! We noticed changes throughout the week and discovered certain tools worked better than others. We are improving our estimation skills and learning about different referents. We can’t stop measuring! We even found measurement math at our SFU science workshops!!

Our first SFU science workshop was all about the food webs of kelp forests! We learned how kelp forests are homes to many interesting creatures, and that it is important to have balance in the ecosystem. Some interesting vocabulary we learned was that while trees have leaves; kelp have blades, trees have trunks and kelp have stipe; trees have roots, while kelp have holdfasts!  What interesting things can you share with your family?

One of our favourite parts of this workshop was creating Play Doh sculpures of animals that live in kelp forests! We kept creating with Ms. Carley’s loose parts and Play Doh back at school this week!

Our second SFU workshop was all about insects! We learned about how they communicate, their body parts, their senses, and other interesting facts! We also learned how we can support pollinators in our community – some ways were planting native species, not mowing lawns and keeping leaf litter.  Can you find any insects this weekend as the weather gets warmer?

Today was International Day of Trans Visibility and we loved reading Introducing Teddy to start our conversation about recognizing, celebrating, and respecting each other.

We started writing poetry this week! Here are a few of our very first poems of the year! We were inspired to write poems about our warblers and other amazing creatures we have been learning about! Can you write a poem about something that inspires you this weekend? Feel free to post it in the comments, if you’d like!

Looking forward to more fun adventures next week, including:

• April 4th – Museum of Archaeology 1-3
• April 5th – Garden workshop at 1:15

Wishing your family a wonderful, restful weekend!

We loved creating a welcoming feel in the school with our special messages! Here are just a few:

“I can show kindness by being a friend” – Felix

“I can stand up for others!” – Sophia

“We can be kind to mother earth by using less plastic and being kind to others.” – Benjamin

“I can help others when they are hurt!” – Amelia

“I can show kindness by picking up garbage and recycling bottles and cans!” – Ian

“I can take turns.” – Sebastian

“I can help animals.” – Mariam

We had some amazing learning leaders in the class these last two weeks. Maia brought in her new book, Beautiful Oops and read for our class! Thank you for reading with such expression, and sharing such an important message!

Kela and Amal were our storytellers! We had so much fun acting out their imaginative adventures!

We have been exploring measurement and using non-standard measurements this week! We had so many observations of how these strategies worked for us, and why they would be hard to communicate to our pen pals!  Tell your family some of our fun examples! What was your height?

Sophia made the connection to her art class where she used a pencil as a referent to help her measure! Then she brought in her own amazing art to teach us how! We learned so much and noticed so many great math words throughout Sophia’s lesson! We can’t wait to bring our measurement outside again next week with standard and non-standard units!

Measurement, symmetry, geometry, vertical, horizontal, circle, oval, estimate, referent… and more!

Don’t forget to keep looking for tracks in the snow! We loved examining these replicas in class this week. Can your family guess which print is which? Post your guesses in the comments!

Now… time for an even more fun! Can you guess who this scat belongs to?!

We love our dance party movement breaks! Can you dance with your family this weekend?

Wishing everyone a safe and cozy weekend!

We went on some special community walks this week! On Wednesday was our bird walk. We were listening and watching carefully for the birds in our community. We also walked to a forest we had never been to before – the Hidden Aspen Forest! It was so different from the forest behind our school! Tell your family what differences and similarities you noticed! Which birds did you see and hear along the way?

We shared love and appreciation with our classmates and teachers this week! Happy Valentine’s Day!

We had two more zoom presentations about birds – learning about the dangers of migration and also their ecological importance! We wrote thank you letters to the birds for all the amazing things they do for our community and world. Later, we wrote our second pen pal letters, sharing what we learned about our inquiry bird in English and Spanish! We can’t wait to get our pen pal letters back!

After Ms. Carley’s beaver dam story, we went outside to get inspired for our own math stories and problems! What math problems can you find this weekend?

On Friday, we went on another community walk, but this time we looked for animal prints in the snow! We liked making some of our own prints. And then at the very end we found another type of animal print!! What stories did you find on our walk?

Wishing you all a happy and restful family day long weekend! Enjoy these beautiful prints we made with Ms. McGivern, and your special family day art!

February is all about kindness, celebrating our diversity, and taking action!

We have many exciting things coming up in February!

• Tues. Feb. 14 – Valentines Day
  • if you are sending your child with Valentines day cards or treats, please send enough for everyone. Please find a photo of our names above
• Wed. Feb. 15 – please feel welcome to join us for a community science walk from approx. 9:25-10:25
  • please let me know if you can join us – we need parent volunteers!
• Fri. Feb. 17 – please feel welcome to join us for a community science walk from 9:25-10:25
  • please let me know if you can join us – we need parent volunteers!
• Mon. Feb. 20 – Family day – no school
• Wed. Feb. 22 – Pink Shirt Day! Please send your child in pink, if possible!
• Fri Feb. 24 – Pro D Day – no school

February is off to an exciting start in Div. 11! We have reconnected with our Pen Pals and our Migratory Bird Inquiry! We had two bird presentations on Zoom and went on some bird walks in our community. We found so many birds! We are learning so many things about how to identify our orange-crowned, Wilson’s and black-throated gray warblers, and many other birds. What makes a scientific drawing special?

Our storytellers and bookmakers are hard at work and play! Stay tuned for more amazing sharing!

We had a special garden day workshop last week! We learned how to make plant pots and planted cabbage seeds! Then we made our own seed packets for our favourite vegetables! Thank you, Pablo for joining us in our learning!

In math, we have been practicing, learning, and playing many addition and subtraction games!

Div. 11 has loved learning in January!

This new year and Lunar new year, we have been thinking of one word that will help us be our best selves. We chose our word and have started creating art! If you want to read the story that inspired us, it is here: One Word for Kids: A Great Way to Have Your Best Year Ever.

In numeracy, we are learning and practicing addition and subtraction! Some fun moments were when we went on addition scavenger hunt and when we played bump to help us build our fluency!

In literacy, we have been reading a novel called Wishtree! We are practicing so many strategies for understanding and sharing our thinking about books!

We have also started our storytelling sessions again – sharing, revising, and then performing! We love hearing each other’s stories and seeing them typed up on the board! We especially love being a special character in the performance! Whose story did you perform in this week? Thank you Colin, Maia, Sebastian, Celine, and Ethan! We look forward to hearing our other classmates share next week.

We have three new published books this week! Congratulations to Amelia, Felix, Benjamin, Yuha, and Ian, on your creations! Our collection is growing!

This week was literacy week and we were focused on learning about our culture and heritage. With our buddies, we explored the stories of our names. Can you have a conversation this weekend about what your name means? We hope to share with our buddies again on Tuesday.

In science, we have been connecting our learning to Wishtree! Just like Red is a home for many creatures, where can we find homes? What do homes look like? How are they different?

We have special new artifacts to explore – whose home is this? We explored bird houses, honey combs, wasp nests, shells, and more! Our magnifying glasses helped us look closely and wonder about these homes.

Next week, we will continue our bird inquiry and start to go on some bird walks! Be ready for dates you can join us!

Our next garden day is next Tuesday, Jan. 31. Please let me know if you can join us 1-2:30pm!

Looking forward to our next learning adventures!

Dear Families of Division 11,

Thank you for such a wonderful December!

Our class had an incredible performance at our winter concert! Thank you again to Maia’s family for helping us sparkle!!

We loved spending time with buddies creating our mittens and eating and dancing together at the Pancake Breakfast!

We hope you love your special holiday creations!

Thank you for all your cards, gifts and words! Our amazing class community makes my heart so full. ❤️

In math, we love exploring patterns! Can you find any patterns around you this weekend?

This week in Div. 11, we continued our amazing stories! We are publishing our books and sharing them with our classmates. We will continue to update our story board too!

How can puppets help us explore stories? We love Ms. Carley’s new puppets!

We love art with Ms. McGivern! She teaches us fun concepts. These are our monsters wearing underpants!

We love time to explore materials and solve puzzles together!

We have shown so much improvement in singing and dancing for our winter performance! See if you can find a few minutes to practice over the weekend!