Category: We are critical thinkers.

Dear Division 6 families,

Time is flying by! I cannot believe we are moving into our last week in April! We will continue to make each day count and thoroughly enjoy learning together.

I have different opportunities to share my experiences with people in our district and around the world. One thing I absolutely love sharing is the joy I feel being your child’s teacher and the connection we share. It has been such a memorable year so far and I have been so blessed and honoured to work with you and your children. We are so very grateful for your continued support! Please always feel free to reach out should you have any positive feedback so we know what is effective for your child and we keep doing it but also any concerns so we can better support you and your child.

We are communicators and can reflect on our learning.

Last week, your child had the great opportunity to share their learning with you during their Student Led conference at home. We have thoroughly enjoyed reading the Two Stars and a Wish sheets! Thank you for your time to fill them out so thoughtfully! It was a great opportunity for your child to not just reflect on their learning but to celebrate their progress and also set some goals for the remainder of this year. If you have feedback you’d like to share  or want to elaborate on what was written on the Two Stars and a Wish sheets, please feel free to send me an email at Livia.Chan@burnabyschools.ca. We are looking forward to in-person conferences next year!

We are mathematicians.

Grade 4s are continuing to practice multiplication x 1 digit. The grade 5s had an opportunity to show what they know so far on Wednesday. It was a point of progress for me to check their understanding,  inform me on what I need to review/reteach, and an opportunity for them to see where they are at in their learning journey too. Your child should have brought home their progress sheet with specific feedback along with an answer sheet for you to compare. Most students still need to review the distributive property so we would appreciate your support, thank you! They will have another opportunity to show what they know on Friday, April 29! Please continue to have your child practice their math facts. It makes a world of a difference and helps with their confidence when children know their facts. We will be starting division very soon!

We are scientists.

We learned about the respiratory system. Please feel free to rewatch the video and talk about how the system works. I taught them a movement “dance” to remember. We have two dances so far…one for the circulatory system and one for the respiratory system! Ask them to show you!

Passion Projects

Aside from a handful of students who have yet to present (they will this coming week), most students have started on their next passion project. On Friday, they had an opportunity to formally record. Your child brought it home to work on. Feel free to review it with them this week. Most important are the questions that will drive their research. Please remind your child to return it before Friday. Click the link Passion Project proposal for a copy. It includes the progress sheet too.

We are critical and creative thinkers who design!

This past week, students were introduced to the CO2 dragsters ADST project (Applied Design, Skills, and Technologies). They had some time to investigate other people’s designs and are free to continue to do so at home. This week, they will be:

We are so looking forward to seeing their progress over time!

Swimming Update

Thank you so much for sharing your feedback so quickly on the survey! There was an overwhelming response so we will be planning two swimming sessions at Eileen Dailly pool. As soon as more details are available, we will happily share!

Some reminders:

• Grade 5s: Please sign forms and pay for Camp Jubilee.
• If your child has not returned their Student Led conference envelopes yet, please return.
• Donations for Canucks Autism Network will be closing on April 28. Go to School Cash Online if you would like to donate, thank you.

With a heart of gratitude, Ms. Chan

Dear Div. 6 families,

Wow, has it already been 3 weeks? I thoroughly enjoyed my full days with them on Wednesday and Friday. Being with them brings me such joy!

CLICK HERE to watch the video recap about our week!

This week we learned more about Truth and Reconciliation by reading a book and watching a video. We had deep conversations about residential schools too.

We also learned about Terry Fox and had a fabulous sunny afternoon for the run. Click here to make a donation. To learn more, click here.

Gr. 5 Math

We started the week by sharing how they feel about math. I was thrilled to see so many of them have positive attitudes and quite enjoy math! Math is one of my favourite things to teach because it is so much fun! I will have a series of math videos teaching you and your child some activities you can do at home to practice math facts, strategies, and various concepts. I recognize it does take time to practice and memorize them but learning them makes ALL calculations quicker with greater accuracy in their years ahead even into high school. It’s worth the time spent so your child isn’t struggling with newer concepts AND calculating facts at the same time.

We learn through play. Click here to visit our Mathematicians Play page. The strategy we learned this week:

• +1 and -1 strategy (click to watch video) – Take a piece of paper. Write numbers 1-20 randomly on the page. Point to different random numbers and say the answer out loud. Example: Point to 15. Think 15 + 1. Say 16. Repeat and watch them become quicker and quicker! Make it fun! Take turns or do it together!

If your child builds a habit of practicing 2-5 minutes every day, imagine how much quicker they can add, subtract, multiply, and divide by the end of the year! We are working on speed and accuracy for automaticity!

Looking Ahead

We will begin learning research skills with Mrs. Papapanagiotou, our Teacher-Librarian, on Mondays and Wednesdays. We will learn how to become a more effective researcher, about plagiarism, and how to cite resources properly.

We will begin to talk about Passion Projects this week. Excited to start thinking about possibilities! Feel free to start talking about possibilities at home too!

Reminders

Masks – Please pack an extra 1-2 masks in your child’s backpack. Thank you.

Planners – Please help your child take ownership and build independence by bringing their planner to school every day. Tip: Have all materials packed in backpack the night before.

Snacks & Lunch – Please send enough food to keep your child nourished throughout the day. Especially with warmer weather outside, they are more active and get hungry in the afternoon. We prefer they bring healthier choices to school. Thank you.

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

Sincerely, Ms. Chan and Mrs. Paulich

Dearest Division 6 families,

Happy Father’s Day! Hope you are enjoying your special day!

Each week I have with your children, I thoroughly enjoy! As I reflect, this has been such a fantastic year of personal growth, building relationships with each other, and stretching ourselves outside of our comfort zone because we know this is where the growth happens.

We started reading a book written by Sean Covey: The 7 Habits of Happy Kids (same author as The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People which some of you may know). It begins with a story about a character who finds himself bored and looks to others to help him find something to do; the character discovers that it is his responsibility to be proactive and not rely on others to “fix” his problem. Here are the first two habits covered so far:

1. Be Proactive – take initiative
2. Begin with the End in Mind – focus on goals

Click here to learn more about the 7 habits we will be learning about.

Public Speaking

For our speeches, we co-constructed our criteria. Click here for the PDF. All students were asked to bring home their copy of the single-point rubric. I have loved guiding their writing each week!

Guest Reader on Zoom

On Thursday, my best friend from Florida, Jillian DuBois read two of her stories to us: Road to Awesome, which was co-authored by the publisher of my book, Darrin Peppard. He wrote a book for educational leaders with the same title and Jillian felt strongly that children needed to hear a similar message so that’s why they wrote a picture book together! Students sketchnoted what resonated with them. Click here to view Sketchnotes for Road to Awesome

Thursday was an exciting day for Jillian because it was the very first day that her 3rd picture book, Look at YOU, Piper Lou! was released on Amazon! We were the very first class she read her new story to! It’s about the puppy she fostered and then adopted. It is such a heartwarming story and I loved how students were able to experience Jillian’s passion for telling her stories, reading them, and illustrating.

Division 6 Authors!

Speaking of authors, we have two newly published authors in our class! The Burnaby School District has a special writing contest every year where they ask for submissions from students from K-12. This year, we had two pieces of writing chosen to be included in the Words anthology! Congratulations to Olivia H. who wrote a story called Stranded in a Snowstorm and to Rasul who wanted to share his One Word writing about Mindset. To learn more about the writing project, click here.

On Friday, we had the privilege of learning from people’s Passion Projects! We learned about rattlesnakes from Ethan, the black panther from Princeton, and all about different species of dogs by Miles and Brodie.

Mathematicians

As Mathematicians, we learned about the difference between prisms and pyramids. We also learned about probability and statistics. We did a cool experiment where each student spun a paper clip and tallied the number of times it landed on a particular number. Then we totalled it all up to discover that the chances that it actually landed matched the probability it landed on. It was so cool to see how it all matched!

We are continually grateful for your support at home. The message for this week until the end will be that we finish off strong. Just like in a marathon, we may be tired but our mindset sets the stage for how we complete the year. They hear this message often. When they have been working away on an assignment, they are pushed to finish off that work time with the mindset that they can finish off strong. We practice perseverance and an “I can” attitude.

Gratefully, Ms. Chan and Mrs. Paulich

Dear Division 6 families,

What a wonderful week of learning! Students have been investigating whether chocolate is a natural resource. Yes, you read it correctly chocolate! Students began their inquiry with background knowledge and understanding the importance of referencing and citations when researching. We took a closer look at cocoa beans as a natural resource. Students participated in guided group work that investigated how the production of cocoa beans contributed to the economy. Students learned about working conditions in first and third world countries, fair trade, and direct trade. They particularly enjoyed their taste testing homework. Completion of this activity allowed them to participate in an interactive zoom call with the owner of Truffle Pig. This was such a powerful activity that had students asking thoughtful questions. Over the past few weeks with the support of Mrs. Papapanagioutou and myself, the inquiry process led them to the question: What are the pros and cons of cocoa beans as a natural resource? I am so proud of the research that has taken place thus far and there is more to come! Next, we look at how media is connected to our findings. – Mrs. Paulich

To echo Mrs. Paulich, it has been a great week of learning! I feel like I say this every week but as I reflect at the end of every week, I can’t help but feel proud of their accomplishments and learning!

This week, we had a deep conversation about the Tk’emlúps te Secwépemc Kamloops Indian Band Residential School where they detected the remains of 215 children. We also read the book Race Cars. From Amazon:

Race Cars is a children’s book about white privilege created to help parents and educators facilitate tough conversations about race, privilege, and oppression.

Written by a clinical social worker and child therapist with experience in anti-bias training and edited by a diversity expert, Race Cars tells the story of 2 best friends, a white car and a black car, that have different experiences and face different rules while entering the same race.

Students then had an opportunity to do a free-write to unpack their thoughts and feelings about the news. Journalling is a great form of writing to sort through emotions and events that are hard for us to understand.

Speeches

This week, we continued working on our speeches. Click here for the single-point rubric we have been using all year for personal writing. The lessons and tips to help improve our writing:

• One thing I noticed was that some students started to write one very long paragraph with many different ideas. Instead, break down ideas into separate paragraphs. One paragraph = one idea to dive into. Then dive into “magnifying glass” writing where you lean into the details by adding reasons, explanations, and examples. Here, you may also include a story. See next tip.
• Tell your story: It’s important to add personal stories to help your audience make connections. Add stories that evoke emotions or helps them understand your point better.
• Your opening sentence should introduce the audience to the topic of the paragraph. End your paragraph by restating your opening sentence. We will dive further into closing sentences next week.
• Know your central theme. Aim for paragraphs to point back to your central theme. It’s like a flagpole or target that you want to make sure you’re always headed towards. Your paragraphs should help your audience better understand your main author’s message.
• To spark your audience to think. Feel free to insert a question here and there to inspire critical thinking or reflection but don’t overuse it!
• Every time you sit down to write again, re-read everything you wrote first before you continue writing. This refreshes your memory as to what you already wrote. Read it over for different purposes. They were reminded of DYRIO (click image to view PDF):

As you support your child at home with their speeches, please review these tips. At any point, should you have any questions, please email me! I am happy to help!

Speeches are to be a minimum of 3 minutes and a maximum of 5 minutes. Next week, we will co-construct our criteria that will be specific to the delivery of these speeches. It will be similar to but not exactly the same as the single point rubric for our Passion Projects.

Passion Project presentations

We celebrated many things this week during our Passion Projects! Oscar and Kingston collaboratively presented on the video game named Battle Cats and Quinson talked about the history of video games. Both created a Kahoot game that all enjoyed! Vienna worked hard on her presentation about Italy. Gabriella and Iman came all the way from Australia to teach us about Quokkas; they had a creative idea to have me introduce them as experts from Australia and had the kids play a quiz game as review of the facts. Olivia H. enthusiastically shared How to Read the Body Language of a Dog. Maya presented an informative on Snow Leopards. Dante shared so many facts about Minecraft.

NOTE: All presenters brought home their single-point rubric assessments. Please sign and return to school. Thank you!

Oscar’s book was officially released! It is titled Fate’s Mirage, The Ultra Blade. Oscar has worked on his story since the beginning of the year. Great tenacity and perseverance. He wrote a five chapter story that classmates excitedly took turns reading to the class! I am so grateful to Oscar and his mom, Jen, who made a copy for me to keep and included me in his Acknowledgements, thank you! One thing I complimented him on what his ability to effectively use dialogue to move the story along and help us get to know the characters better. Oscar had a great blend of dialogue between characters and then a paragraph that explained what was happening. He did this throughout the story so I wanted to point out the effectiveness of this. Then Oscar shared that this was something his mom taught him! Jen is a talented writer who has published many of her own books so I thought it was so cool that we were learning how to become better writers through Oscar’s work with the support of his mom. Thank you, Jen!

Speaking of Passion Projects, one of my passion projects is writing just like Oscar and his mom! I am now a contributing author to a book called 100 No-Nonsense Things that Teachers Should STOP Doing. It was released three weeks ago. I wrote a chapter called Stop Boredom at All Costs and had the great privilege to talk about it on the Pushing Boundaries podcast. This is the second time my writing has been featured in a book. I am currently working on writing my own book with a couple of principals in the US. We signed a book contract a few months ago! It’ll be my summer passion project!

Mathematicians

This past week, students finished their patterns book using Book Creator, an app on the iPad. They had fun testing out whether they wrote their pattern description correctly. They had to describe it to a partner using only words to see if their partner can replicate it without seeing the pattern. Next week, we will begin learning about quadrilaterals.

Anyone who still needs extra review and explanations about long division, please reach out. I am happy to set up a Zoom call to work with your child.

Self-assessment for the year

Students were assigned a self-assessment to complete in Teams. If your child did not finish, it was assigned for homework to be completed this weekend. Sorry, it was not recorded in their planners. Please remind them to work on it. Thank you!

We are always so grateful for your continued support at home. We are nearing the end but not slowing down. As I preach to the kids often, I equate the end of work time and learning time to the same feelings as the end of a marathon. While I’ve never run one, I can imagine how exhausted people may feel or at least how I would feel! It is in these moments that I push them outside of their comfort zone to challenge themselves to push on and to finish off strong. We will continue to do that until the end.

Gratefully, Ms. Chan and Mrs. Paulich