Category: Indigenous Education

Dear families,

We definitely had a fun and fantastic second week of getting to know each other better. We are getting to know each other better and they are settling in very nicely into our classroom routines. Last Tuesday, my friend from my previous school was our TOC during my Head Teacher time. Ms. Kapusta commented on how they already knew our routines well! She introduced doodle art to them. They are almost all finished. Once we put them up on the bulletin board, I will share an image with you.

We thoroughly enjoyed our All About Me Bag presentations throughout the week! Children did so well for their first presentation! Thank you for your support in helping them prepare.

Families as Partners

I am ever so grateful for your time to have rich conversation about your child during our conferences. It was such valuable information which added to the form you so thoughtfully filled out prior to our meeting. I appreciated your openness. We are very fortunate and appreciate having such supportive parents. I am very excited about this upcoming year as we work together to support your child’s overall development and education. Thank you for your part in being my partner! Please feel free to connect with me anytime if you have any questions or concerns.

One of the questions brought up was your curiosity about the curriculum. If you are interested, please check out the Page on our class blog called “We Are Learners”

Here, you will find the curricular areas and what we are currently learning about. If you would like to check out our full BC curriculum, click here. Click on the curriculum and then choose the grade level.

Be sure to click on “Elaborations” for more details.

Core Competencies Development

We played some different games to practice the skills of communication, cooperation, and collaboration as we developed our teamwork skills.

One of our games was “Basketball”. They were placed into teams. They had to use the backboard to try to get as many balls into the basket. Each player took turns to be the backboard. Click here to see my X/Twitter post. You will see a short video of what the activity looked like. So many smiles and so much laughter was shared! I loved the reflection time afterwards when we unpacked all of the skills we practiced and the importance of teamwork!

The other game we played was “Keep up”. Using a happy face balloon, each team of 3-4 people had to take turns keeping the balloon up in the air for as long as they can. They tried to beat their personal team best. Again, the smiles and laughter with cooperation was such a happy sight to see! Great communication and teamwork skills too!

Terry Fox

We learned about Terry Fox’s life and dream to run across Canada to raise awareness and money for cancer research. We read a story written from the perspective on his best friend called Terry and Me and wrote our reflection in our writing books.

On Friday, we went to Willingdon Heights Park as a school to participate in the Terry Fox Run. It’s not too late to make a donation to the Terry Fox Foundation if you wish. Please click here.

We are Mathematicians.

This week, we played around with making patterns. We made a class patterns book with all of our examples! The main learning was around repeating patterns, identifying the core pattern, and describing the pattern as AB, ABB, ABC, etc. We also practiced action patterns with our bodies too! They really enjoyed that!

How you can support at home: Look for patterns around your home and in the neighbourhood. There are a lot of patterns out in nature too! Encourage them to find them in their natural surroundings! Use items in your home to create patterns together! Ask them to identify the core pattern and describe the pattern like AB, ABC. That is the core pattern that repeats.

We also used ten frames to practice ways to make ten. This means learning the combinations that equal 10 when we add two numbers together:

0 + 10 = 10
1 + 9 = 10
2 + 8 = 10
3 + 7 = 10
4 + 6 = 10
5 + 5 = 10

We practiced our accuracy and speed using a new iPad app named MathTappers: Find Sums. Click here to learn more. They had so much fun learning and practicing their facts! So many personal bests were reached with each turn!

How you can support at home: Click here to download this FREE app on your Apple device. Tap on the little blue i in the top right hand corner to change the sum to 10. This week, I will teach them a game using cards to practice the same concepts so you will have a new game to play with your child at home!

Orange Shirt Day

This week, our learning will be centered around Truth and Reconciliation. This Thursday, we will have an assembly in the morning before recess. Students are encouraged to wear orange on Thursday. Our class will be doing a little presentation to share our thoughts and feelings.

Reminders

• Friday, September 29: Pro-D Day; school not in session
• Saturday, September 30: National Day for Truth and Reconciliation – commemorate the history and legacy of the residential school system
• Monday, October 2: Truth and Reconciliation; school closed
• Wednesday, October 4: Individual Photo Day

Gratitude

Every day, I am so grateful to be your child’s teacher. There are so many moments in each day that bring us joy. Thank you for your sharing your children with us and for working with me to see them thrive and flourish!

Please feel free to leave a comment on this post or to email me with your thoughts or theirs on our past week! I’d love to hear about it! Thank you! 🙂

With much gratitude, Ms. Chan

Dear families,

Passion Project presentations are well underway! Addie started us off with her amazing presentation on foxes on Monday. Later that afternoon, we did a directed drawing on foxes that you would have seen come home that day. I loved seeing their creativity!

Here are other projects we enjoyed:

• Ramen by Chloe and Katelyn – Students even got a taste of ramen after their presentation!
• Space is So Cool! by Nassi and Kiran
• Monkeys by Cooper and Jeremy H.
• Axolotls by Lilly and Chiara
• Kangaroos by Alessandra
• Italian by Cristina

Here are a few more to come next:

• Blob fish
• Swans
• French

This is the first year I taught grade 2s (and second time teaching grade 3s) how to use PowerPoint, Word, and email. Honestly, I am extremely impressed with how quickly they learned! The way they put together slides with titles and information, their creativity and choice in images that match the slide topic, and their overall presentation skills will set them up well for future presentations. One thing they are learning to do better is to reference the resources they used.

Students have provided valuable feedback to help presenters know what they did well and how they can improve for next time. It’s impressive what they notice and how well they articulate this to their classmate in a positive and supportive way. Learning how to give feedback and constructive criticism is an important skill! Please feel free to ask your child about what they have enjoyed about the Passion Project presentations so far!

I also appreciate how they apply their new skills and how they support each other. We have little leaders who act as mentors, and it’s so heartwarming to watch how helpful so many are. I really believe that every child has leadership potential in them. They just need the right mix of opportunity, confidence, courage, plus a hint of coaching and maybe some nudging in order to shine. Once we notice and name it, this leadership trait is nurtured. Soon enough, we have more and more learners feeling like they are supportive leaders. I can often be found saying, “Thank you for being a leader by contributing to our classroom environment.”

Story Workshop
Students practiced oral storytelling with Ms. Lee. I reminded them that the tradition of oral storytelling is an important one in Indigenous families as many valuable stories are passed down from generation to generation. Every day, we share a part of our story with each other during our Community Circle to help us connect with one another. On Wednesday, they all had an opportunity to create a story based on their experiences and stories they have in them.

“Learning is embedded in memory, history, and story.” – First Peoples Principles of Learning

Grizzly Games
On Wednesday, we had our first Grizzly Games house meeting to decide on team names. How exciting! Students are encouraged to wear their team colour on Friday. Their colour was written in their planners. We have our next house meeting this Wednesday where we will practice the team cheer!

We are mathematicians.
For grade 3’s, there is a Math test coming up. Please check your child’s planner for more information. Also, continue to practice addition and subtraction with regrouping to 1000. For example: 567 + 255 = ____ and 231 – 188 = _____.

For grade 2’s, continue to review regrouping with subtraction to 100 at home. For example: 67 + 25 = _____ and 31 – 18 = _____. We have also been creating and solving real-world word problems and having fun doing it!

How you can support at home: Have fun coming up with different scenarios for your child to solve! Maybe you can have fun taking turns creating and solving each other’s word problems! For example: There are 65 ice cream cones to sell at the carnival. You sold 47. How many do you have left to sell? Grade 3’s can do this too except your numbers have 3-digits! Enjoy!

What Pride Means to Me
Reflections are a BIG part of our learning and a part of developing our core competencies like critical thinking. Last week, we discussed what “pride” means to us. Our conversation helped us better understand our upcoming Pride day on Wednesday. We reflected on how we can feel proud of who we are, how hard we work, what we have, and how we can feel proud of others. We talked about what we think and how we feel pride, the emotions that come along with it, and how we celebrate this pride with humility.

We followed this up with writing reflections on how we feel proud of our growth this year in various areas of our learning.

“Learning is holistic, reflexive, reflective, experiential, and relational (focused on connectedness, on reciprocal relationships, and a sense of place).” – First Peoples Principles of Learning

I also believe that it’s important to regularly celebrate what we feel proud of like our daily small wins. We can often be found giving ourselves a high five and each other high fives. We know that when children are made aware that they are being challenged in their stretch zones and can see their own growth, their level of happiness is increased.

As a result, these increased levels of joy and happiness further activate the learning centres in their brains making it even easier to learn more. We also know that being happy makes an impact on overall well-being and how they interact with others which leads to improved social connections. I do believe that all of these factors play a role in building the positive, safe, and joyful environment we get to enjoy every single day.

“Learning ultimately supports the well-being of the self, the family, the community, the land, the spirits, and the ancestors.” – First Peoples Principles of Learning

It is by intentional design that Mrs. Paulich and I create and cultivate a nurturing, playful, loving, and joyful culture where your children thrive and love to come to school. Being with your children brings us both SO much joy, and it’s evident that your children feel the same way! Of course, we cannot do this without your full support at home. With a few short weeks left, our hearts are truly full of deep gratitude for your continued support all year as our partners in your child’s learning.

As I will be leaving Gilmore at the end of this year and heading to Kitchener as their new Head Teacher, I am savouring and appreciating every last bit with your children and this community. They hold such a special place in my heart. I will share more appreciations in my last post at the end of June but for now, please know how much I have loved and appreciated you and your child in our class. I tell them this every single day! I love them so much! 🙂

With deep sincerity and gratitude, Ms. Chan

Upcoming dates:

• Monday, June 5: Pro-D Day; school not in session
• Tuesday, June 6: Wear one colour day of the rainbow. We will be taking a whole school photo first thing after attendance.
• Wednesday, June 7: Gilmore Pride day. Wear something that makes you feel proud like a Gilmore shirt, rainbow colours, or team jersey, for example.
• Thursday, June 8: Business Fair. If you wish, bring money to buy items made by our grade 6/7’s.
• Friday, June 9: Grizzly Games. Wear your team colour. Early dismissal at 12:15pm.
• Thursday, June 15: Confederation Park with our pen pals from Brentwood Park.
• Friday, June 23: Science World field trip. We will need 5 parent volunteers wiling to supervise. Notice will come home on Tuesday.

Dear families,

We had a fun week returning from spring break! We hope you all had a lovely time off with your family! This past week, students started learning their Hip Hop routine. Please have your child wear black and/or white on Tuesday, April 4th. Entrance to the performance will be through the Dundas/Gilmore door to the gymnasium. The doors will open at 1:00 p.m. and seating will be first-come, first-served. We are looking forward to showing you our dance moves!

We are story creators.

Students listened to the story A Salmon for Simon but first, they had an opportunity to work in small groups to collaborate on creating their own story based on 6 images from the book. They put the pictures in the order that made sense to them. Then they wrote sentences to tell their story. It was great fun to have each group go up to read their version!

We received our pen pal letters!

It was exciting to receive our pen pal letters from our buddy class at Brentwood Park! We are in the process of brainstorming ideas with details to write back to them this week.

We are scientists.

Thank you to Ms. Kim, we continue to be immersed in our learning about life cycles. We had a special guest speaker, Ms. Barndt, share her knowledge about salmon in BC.

Students created a lilypad filled with the 4 stages of the frog’s life cycle based on their research. They also researched the life cycle of humans.

Web of Life activity

Ms. Kim showed them a video called “Everything is Connected” as an introduction to the Indigenous Peoples’ perspectives on nature. Each student had a role. As they listened to the story, when they heard their role mentioned, they received the ball of yarn. At the end, this created a beautiful web so students got to see that every action no matter how small is connected to others and causes a ripple effect on the whole ecosystem. This was a powerful way for students to learn about environmental stewardship to help them understand the interconnectedness of all living things and the importance of taking care of our planet.

This is Ms. Kim’s last week with us. We are so grateful for her dedication to planning engaging lessons for us! We wish you all the best in your teacher education!

ADST

We continued to develop our skills in O365 using Word. We learned how to create text boxes. This practice prepares us for learning how to add text boxes in PowerPoint. Very soon, I am SO excited that we will be diving in to Passion Projects! Please begin to have conversations with your child about what interests them most. What would they LOVE to learn more about? They will be doing research and then preparing a PowerPoint presentation. I believe that communication and presentation skills are important skills to develop plus a passion for learning!

Here’s what we learned so far in Word:

• bold, italicize, underline
• changing fonts, sizes and colour
• alignment: left, center, right
• adding images and text boxes

Please feel free to have your child login to O365 at home to practice using these tools. If you wish, you can introduce them to PowerPoint to get a head start! I’m sure some of them would love to become mentors when we start using PowerPoint!

Spring is almost here!

We practiced drawing tulips and then created our own with white pencil crayon. We traced over our image with white liquid glue and made them come alive with chalk pastels. I hope you enjoy what you see! Students added a new post to their SpaceEDU account. Please login to view their reflection on learning and feel free to leave a comment for your child to enjoy!

April is Autism Acceptance Month (also shared from the Community Office email shared on Friday)

April is Autism Acceptance Month and Gilmore will be celebrating and recognizing this important topic all month long! Students will be provided with facts about autism and other disabilities in the morning announcements and with a variety of in-class and school-wide activities throughout the month. For example, all classes will be participating in a sensory day so students can experience the feelings of challenge that individuals with a disability may feel on an everyday basis. Students will also be doing pointillism art using their non-dominant hand. It is our hope that these activities will help our students to gain valuable perspective taking, understanding and empathy!

As a way of giving back to the community, we will also be raising money for the Canucks Autism Network through an ice-cream sandwich sale on April 14 ($2 each at recess and lunch) and by selling paper fan hands on School Cash Online throughout April. For every $5 paper hand purchased, your name will go into a draw for some prizes at the end of the month. (Prize winners will be announced on Monday, May 1). Prizes will include Canucks memorabilia, 3 EA Sports video games of your choice and a FIFA 23 ultimate team jersey.

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

With a heart full of gratitude, Ms. Chan

Dear families,

I hope you are having a great weekend so far! Tomorrow, February 13 is Jump Rope for Heart. CLICK HERE to learn more and here to donate. A reminder to wear RED tomorrow and runners. If your child doesn’t have red, then Grizzly gear is great too!

We are authors and storytellers.
I read the story Ralph Tells a Story by Abby Hanlon. He discovered he not only had many stories to tell, but they had value and are worth telling. It taught us that stories are everywhere. We are story. Each day, we have an opportunity to share a part of our story with each other during Community Circle time to develop our connections and understanding of our similarities and differences.

Students have continued to enjoy working on their stories. This week, they had an opportunity to read it to a classmate to receive feedback on how well they described the characters, setting, problem, and solution. Some took their feedback to make improvements in their story right away! We now have some ready to begin publishing!

“All that we are is story. From the moment we are born to the time we continue on our spirit journey, we are involved in the creation of the story of our time here. It is what we arrive with. It is all we leave behind,” 

-Richard Wagamese 
Ojibway author from Kamloops B.C.

Speaking of story, I wrote an article for SFU that was just published recently on their education page – a first for their Share Your Story series. CLICK HERE for the link to the article. I’d love to hear what resonated with you. Please feel free to share in the comments or send me an email. Thank you!

We are mathematicians.
Grade 2s continued to work on our addition and subtraction math facts using our random numbers chart. If your child no longer has theirs at home, simply take an 8.5 x 11″ paper and randomly write 0-9 on one side and 10-20 on the other side. You can choose to have another sheet with all the numbers from 0-20 to practice. Here are the facts we covered thus far:

• Commutative property: a+b=c and b+a=c. You can switch the addends and the sum is the same.
• +0 & – 0
• +1 & – 1
• +2 & – 2
• +10 & – 10
• Making tens (combinations that equal 10 like 0+10, 1+9, 2+8, 3+7, 4+6, 5+5)
• +/- 9 NEW this week! Students loved learning the +9 and -9 strategy for addition/subtraction in math! It was like magic using the power of digital roots! They liked my magic wand I used for the effect. Please add these to your child’s skill practice. Thank you!

Look at the Addition Facts Chart below. If your child memorized the strategies so far (listed above), they would have learned 105 facts with only 45 left because of the commutative property! We still have some strategies up our sleeve, so let’s keep practicing with our random numbers chart at home! Thank you for your support! I practiced these with my kids at home and over the years, they have thanked me to “forcing” them to practice and memorize them. It just gives them more confidence in math overall especially when they move into the intermediate grades. Grade 3’s can  use these strategies to practice this too!

Next up: Doubles and Doubles +1. Then we’ll only have 35 facts left!

We also started learning how to add two-digits together with regrouping through play. Each person had a partner. They rolled two dice to create random numbers to solve the equation together. They were so engaged and worked well with each other!

We are communicators.
We had our second session of emailing on Friday. I am grateful that almost everyone memorized their login credentials to make the login process so smooth for us all. They are definitely reaping the benefits of being able to login efficiently! Thank you for your support! Students also are learning the basic parts of an email and are becoming better communicators by adding:

To: [Email address]
Subject line: [Short description of the email]
Salutation or greeting phrase: [Dear Ms. Chan,]
Body: [Message]
Closing: [Gratefully,]
Signature: [Ms. Chan]

We can reflect. 
It has been a while since we visited our eportfolios in SpacesEDU but last Thursday, we worked on two posts: Art and a reading.

The expectation is they share all of these in their reflection:  

• Describe what we did
• What I am proud of  
• Two “I can” statements  
• What I would do differently next time  
• What I learned about myself

We are artists.
Students thoughtfully considered and wrote what love means to them around Valentine’s Day. They also had fun hiding their name in and amongst all of the words! Here is a sample of a reflection and an image of our bulletin board.

Valentine’s Day
Thank you to parents who already communicated what your child will be contributing to our Friendship Fruit salad on Tuesday. If you wish, they can bring in their fruit on Monday, and I will keep it in the fridge for Tuesday. So far, we have contributions of raspberries, oranges, grapes, apples, kiwi, and a banana. Repeats are ok! Thank you! We will have bowls and spoons for them.

Your child should have brought home a list of classmate names on Thursday. If they are preparing Valentines, we would like all children to be included, please. Thank you for fostering inclusion.

As always, we appreciate your support at home. Should you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to ask. Your children are working so hard every day to improve. We are so very proud of them!

Don’t always have time to read our blog posts? Looking for a real reason for your child to read? Here’s a tip: Have them read our weekly blog posts TO you as you cook OR instead of something else they are reading OR read it together so you can talk about what they are learning in school.

Grateful for you all and loving being their teacher because they bring me such joy, Ms. Chan