Category: Core Competencies

Dear families,

I apologize for not having this blog post ready for you to read over the weekend. My Masters ringette team and my daughter’s Open team that I coach was in a tournament. After playing ringette for 15 years, it was my team’s first time winning a gold medal!

We are grateful and at peace.

Last week, we talked about gratitude and what brings us peace. We often share what we are grateful for in our Community Circle.

We watched a part of a Tedx Talk by Louie Schwartzberg on Gratitude. Click here to watch from the part we started watching.

“Nature’s beauty can be easily missed — but not through Louie Schwartzberg’s lens. His stunning time-lapse photography, accompanied by powerful words from Benedictine monk Brother David Steindl-Rast, serves as a meditation on being grateful for every day.” READ MORE !

Hello Division 6 families!

I hope you had a great week like we did at school! I feel like a broken record but the love and joy we share is so appreciated. Today during our Community Circle, we shared something grateful we are looking forward to on the weekend and something we appreciate about our class. Such heartwarming responses with thankfulness for classmates and me. Our daily gratitude practices are a part of our being together as a community. Just yesterday, I had the greatest honour to have my writing published by one of the biggest education websites in the world! Edutopia shared my article about how gratitude is embedded in our classroom. I’d LOVE for you to read it so you can get a glimpse into our day – Click here!

Practicing gratitude is an important part of our social emotional learning! It improves mindset, builds a positive classroom culture, and fosters social awareness. How can you naturally embed gratitude into your daily routine at home?

We are creative.

The theme at Gilmore this month is creativity so we are fully embracing ours with our dragster cars and poetry! This week, we continued to work on our affirmations and CREATIVITY acrostic poems. Today, a student shared that she was feeling a little on the grumpy side when she woke up. Then she read her affirmations and it turned her day to a positive start! I even noticed she came in this morning with big smiles and I was truly thrilled to learn why! As your child is finishing up their affirmations, they will have two copies – one for home to read in the morning and at night for 30 days and one at school. May I suggest that you write affirmations too? Share it with your child and read it as a way to connect. Perhaps you can do the 30 day challenge together! I am excited to see how that changes your child’s belief in themselves and how it builds their personal inner strength.

We are mathematicians.

So far, the grade 5s have learned about division: sets, sharing, how division and multiplication is related, knowing when to multiply and divide, and dividing with remainders. Today, we had such a great lesson in working collaboratively, communicating our mathematical thinking, and using our critical thinking skills as our first discovery lesson on long division. We were placed in three groups to practice our math discourse by explaining, reasoning, and justifying our process and answer.

It warmed my heart how well they worked together and how engaged they were! I may have been smiling the whole time! I loved and appreciated how once they gained a certain level of understanding, I was able to push them a little more to stretch their thinking and build connections to what they already know about addition and multiplication. They got to come to their own discovery and understanding of how they are all related!

Next week, we will break down the algorithm of long division. Please continue to work with your child to practice their math facts. I had a student today feel SO proud of herself because she now knows all of her x6 facts! All it takes is some dedication, commitment, and time. Eventually, with practice, they will learn them all! Thank you for your support!

ADST

This week, we had our sanding party! Many of the cars are much smoother than when they brought them back in. Next week, we will paint. I am so looking forward to seeing their creativity shine through! If your child still has their cars at home, please ensure they are brought back to school on Monday. Thank you!

Outdoor Education

What an awesome day we had with the grade 5s at Camp Jubilee! They had an opportunity to do archery, low ropes, and kayaking. We ended our day with a campfire and of course, silly campfire songs! We are already looking into the possibility of booking for the grade 5s next year (that’s this year’s grade 4s)! Thank you to the fundraising efforts of parents who covered half of your cost. We appreciate you!

It sounds like the grade 4s enjoyed their day too with the others in Mr. Anchor’s class. 🙂

We are swimmers.

On Tuesday, May 17, we have our first of two swimming sessions! We will be leaving the school shortly after lunch. We will walk to Eileen Dailey pool so please have your child dress appropriately for the weather. Children were encouraged to prepare by writing a list of what they need and packing their own swim items the night before so they are not rushing around on Tuesday morning. This teaches them responsibility and organization.

Grade 5s – If your child has a Be Active pass, please bring it to school on Monday. That way, if they forget, they still have a second opportunity to bring it on Tuesday. If your child does not have one yet, please print and fill it out and return to school on Monday. That way, there will be no cost for them. Thank you so much for your cooperation! Click here to learn more and get access to the registration form.

Please review the safety expectations. Click on the image or click here to read.

Reminder: Students will not be making any purchases so please do not send money.

Reminder: Class Photo Day will be this Friday, May 20!

As always, we appreciate you for your support at home and for sharing your wonderful children with us this year. It has been such a phenomenal year so far! Have an awesome weekend!

Grateful for you, Ms. Chan

Dear Division 6 families,

We have had another great week together! During our community circle, we always begin with sharing our feelings. This week, we learned synonyms for happy. There is a growing understanding that we can build our emotional intelligence by building our emotional vocabulary. (Read a Forbes article about a podcast interview with Brene Brown and Marc Brackett to learn more about how children can understand themselves and others better.) Challenge your children to share how they are feeling by using different words beyond: happy, mad, sad. Model it by choosing to use different words to describe your emotions.

We are mathematicians.

Thank you for supporting your child’s learning about geometry at home. I am reviewing the Show What You Know assessments and am just so proud of how far they have come since our first assessment before we started. Remember this is not the same as a test. A “test” feels final…only ONE opportunity to show what they know. Learning is a journey so this is just a snapshot of their learning for right now. Children who need more time to learn the same concepts will continue to have opportunities to learn. Math is so foundational. My goal is for them to become proficient in their understanding because if they know it well enough to teach someone, their depth of knowledge is greater.

On Monday, your child will come home with both the pre-assessment and the one they just did. Please compare and celebrate their growth by writing a positive note on their paper, sign it, and return to school. Thank you for your support! We will be learning about measurement next.

We are scientists.

This past week, we worked with a partner to create a demonstration of our understanding of the rock cycle. They were given a choice of using the Book Creator app or Puppet Pals on the iPad. I love finding different ways for students to show what they know especially when they can use their creative and critical thinking! I am also so proud of how well they work with each other. I am looking forward to sharing their projects with you! Music to a teacher’s ears is when students say, “This is so much fun!”

We can reflect and self-assess.

Students completed a self-assessment on their attitude, work habits, strengths, and goals. They even worked on writing a report card for Ms. Chan as a midway point to provide feedback on how the year is going so far. It gives them a voice to share their views on our classroom community and how we can further improve it. I always learn so much about how they feel and I love reading about how much they enjoy coming to school!

What to do at home

If you or your child are looking for what to do at home, here’s a list:

• Read daily and talk about what they just read. Talk about what you’re reading too!
• Write daily (because reading and writing are both skills, it requires practice, practice, and practice).
• Passion Project
• Writer’s Workshop (story)
• All the Right Type
• Practice Math facts (addition, subtraction, multiplication, division). We will be starting multiplication after spring break so it will be SOOO helpful if they knew their math facts before then. You can use the same games I showed you in our Math games night to practice multiplication.

Thank you for your continued support at home. We appreciate you immensely!

Gratefully, Ms. Chan (and Ms. Paulich)

Dear Division 6 families,

We accomplished a lot this week!

Click on image to view the video update.

SPECIAL REQUEST: Please limit the number of sweet treats your child brings to school for a snack. We prefer they bring healthier snacks to school that will help them learn and focus better. We appreciate your cooperation.

HOMEWORK: Library Research Skills – Complete the sheet and put the cited sources in alphabetical order. On Monday, they will be working in a Word document to record these resources in alphabetical order. Please ensure all papers are returned to school on Monday. Thank you! This resource may help!

Gr. 5 MATH HOMEWORK: Complete work on equivalent fractions. Due Monday.

REVIEW: Please have your child memorize their email address and password if they have not done so yet. Thank you! We will be logging into O365 on Monday.

E-Portfolios

On Thursday, we started adding posts to our e-Portfolios. We use the same email and password to log in. We are using FreshGrade Connect to upload and reflect on our learning. Here are the reflection questions they will need to answer for each post this year:

1. What was the task? Explain. Provide enough details so your parents can understand what you did.
2. What are you proud of? What are your strengths shown through this work?
   • I can…
   • I can…
3. What are 1-2 things you can improve for next time?
4. What did you learn about yourself?

So far, they have just added artwork. They felt so proud! In the future, they will be adding their writing and other projects too. Soon, I will be adding your emails to your child’s accounts so that you will receive notifications when they publish a new post.

We are readers and writers.

The whole school Dropped Everything And Read on Wednesday. Everyone in this class looks like they love to just read. While finding joy in reading for a sustained period of time is important, just as important is having the opportunity to speak to others about what they just read. We had an opportunity to do just that this week as we practiced our Say Something strategy to make connections or share personal stories as it relates to what they read. They practiced taking a deeper dive into what they shared by thinking about looking through a magnifying glass, going deeper when partners asked them more clarifying questions.

After that, they took their ideas, thoughts, and feelings and wrote a response to what they just read in a paragraph. Based on the last couple of writing pieces, each child was given a personal goal to meet for this writing. I believe personalized and timely feedback is so important to their continued growth along with an attainable “next steps” goal.

We are scientists. We were encouraged to be curious! Students were grouped to dive into various books on rocks and minerals. Their job was to come up with many questions.

All students went home with their Passion Project proposal sheets. Please feel free to do the proposal with your child. Once you have reviewed it, please initial the top of the page. Click on Passion Project Proposal to see the sheet. This is due on Wednesday, November 3rd.

Friday was a lot of fun with the parades in the morning and some fun social time with classmates in the afternoon. Have a safe and fun rest of your weekend!

Always grateful for your support at home,

Ms. Chan and Mrs. Paulich