Category: We are mathematicians.

Finally, our class is complete with our last two students joining us this week. Welcome to our class, twins!

Here were the daily tweets for the week with additional information:

Click on image to learn more about the book.

MONDAY: Staff had a great day diving into our new school goal of writing. We started our day reviewing our social emotional goal with Jillian. There was excitement about maintaining an existing goal and taking on a new one.

TUESDAY: Read The Orange Shirt Story. During our discussion, students quickly came to realize how fortunate they are. It seemed to hit them when thinking about what it might be like to be away from their families for 300 consecutive days during the school year. Although Phyllis only spent one year in a residential school, many other children spent many more years away from their families. It was really quite difficult for them to fathom but I believe they understood why it is important to acknowledge Orange Shirt Day. To learn a little more, click here to read recent CBC article.

Click here to read reflections written by Kiana and Lucas C.

WEDNESDAY: Theme of the day – Trust. Started day with car and driver team building game. In partners, students in front were cars with eyes closed. Students in back drove car around room being careful and mindful not to drive too fast or to crash their vehicles! Great discussion about trust. End of day, learning about solids and matter. Ultimate trust to hold nail while partner hammers!

In Science, we continued our learning about matter to include the three states: solid, liquid, and gas. We all tried hammering a nail, comparing a bottle with air and then a bottle with water in it. Students were amazed at the enormous number of atoms or molecules in just one drop of water. Can you guess how many? Answer is at the bottom of this post.

THURSDAY: Being friendly can be taught. Team building activity: practiced just waving at our partner, then waving & smiling, then waving, smiling & saying hi, then waving, smiling, saying hi & their name. Last bit, created a special handshake. Move to new partner to do the same. Smiles and fun had by all! All smiling was good practice for our individual photos later in the morning!

FRIDAY: Partners used a deck of cards to make random numbers to compare smaller/larger numbers (like war but with 3-4 cards each). Same practice on a worksheet? Yes but so much more engaging and fun to learn together to practice not just a number sense concept but communication and social skills. Students recorded their number comparisons in their Math notebooks. To learn more about our new Math unit on Number Sense, the learning outcomes, and ways to support at home, click here.

We met with our buddy class for the first time in Mr. Jung’s grade 6/7 class. Students enjoyed getting to know their buddies by playing card games and reading with them.

Important Dates:

• Friday, October 11 – Young People’s Concert – bus leaves for Michael J. Fox Theatre at 9:00am
• Friday, October 11 – Scholastic and Revs Bowling permission slips are due
• Monday, October 14 – Thanksgiving; school closed

Answer: It turns out there are over 1.5 sextillion molecules in a drop of water and more than 5 sextillion atoms per droplet. That’s 1 500 000 000 000 000 000 000 or 5 000 000 000 000 000 000 000, respectively in one single drop of water!

We have continued to enjoy ourselves by learning about and learning with each other. Here are some tweets from the week plus more!

MONDAY: Loving how students are accepting challenges to push themselves into growth zone. In writing after conferencing, I point out strengths and area(s) of opportunity. They walk away to work on challenge to improve writing and come back feeling so proud. Then we set new goal on next blank page.

TUESDAY: We looked at Terry Fox as an incredible example of perseverance and determination. Need to have positive self-talk especially when we find ourselves struggling; be own cheerleader. Recognize there is value in the struggle as we push through. Means we are in our growth zone. Believe in yourself.

In Math, we started learning about telling time. To find out more about the learning outcomes for each grade and how concepts can be reinforced through games on websites at home and school, click here. As mentioned previously, my goal is to help students change their mindset about Math. Here’s a short video about believing in yourself; click here to view.

WEDNESDAY: Students thoroughly enjoyed exercising their creative play and collaboration skills with green screen app by @DoInkTweets. Classroom noise not a problem! We say, “Quiet on the set!” And everyone goes silent to support the group recording their video. Class teamwork in action! #GreatKids

We continued to talk about perseverance (stick-with-itness) and determination (never give up attitude). We wrote about what it means, why it is important, and what statements we could say to ourselves. Click here to read reflections written by Alex, Sophia, and Zia.

In Science, we also started learning about matter and atoms. Students were asked to share what they know. If you take a look at the class brainstorm, students don’t know much yet. I can’t wait to see their learning grow! Click here to learn more about the learning outcomes or to watch the Bill Nye video with your child at home to reinforce learning.

THURSDAY: Such perseverance and determination was shown by students in our Terry Fox Run. During our reflection, many expressed how they told themselves, “You can do it!” and recognized that positive self-talk and believing they can actually made a difference. Lessons are paying off!

During our Terry Fox assembly, we shared a short video of Terry Fox with students holding signs cheering him on. We used the green screen set up in our classroom and an app called Green Screen by DoInk to make this happen.

FRIDAY: Great opportunity to discuss climate change and what we can do to make a difference. We all can have a voice and take action. Students were given an opportunity to march together in the afternoon.

To round off the week, students were asked to write me a letter telling me how they are feeling about being in this class so far, what they have enjoyed or not enjoyed, what they have learned about themselves, and one thing they are looking forward to. I thoroughly enjoyed reading their honest thoughts and feelings. It’s great feedback for me and it gave me a great opportunity to connect with each child about what was shared.

Important dates:

• Monday, September 30 – Pro-D day; school not in session
• Tuesday, October 1 – Scholastic orders are due
• Tuesday, October 1 – Orange Shirt Day; wear orange
• Thursday, October 3 – Individual photos will be taken

Notices sent home this week:

• Field trip: Bowling – Click here to learn more.
• Home Literacy Club  – Click here to learn more. If you did not receive the recording sheet, please write a note in the planner or email me.

Reminder to bring in earbuds with a microphone/volume control in a small labelled Ziploc bag. Students who have them at school have already taken advantage of them. Thank you!

Cities in the Snow

If you haven’t had a chance yet, please check out our cities in the snow display in our hallway by the cloakroom area. Students used their creative minds to draw their buildings. We just love how each one of them are quite different as they made it their very own! 

Students recently made beautiful rainbows. They are hanging in our classroom and really brighten up the room! Feel free to come take a peek!

Mathematicians at Work

Both grades have been working hard while having fun as mathematicians. To find out more about what your child is learning about, please go to our We are Learners > Mathematicians page. Here is where you can find what your child is expected to know and some suggestions on how you can support learning at home. A deck of cards is really all you need to reinforce learning at home. A digital option that students have enjoyed is Math Tappers; it can be downloaded onto an iPad for free. Children can choose different sums to 20 and up to 100 to practice their addition fluency and accuracy. We are aiming for 100% accuracy and to improve on their timed score each time.

Scientists 

We have been learning a lot about water, the water cycle, sources, and conservation. To find out more about what your child learned in Term 2, please go to our We are Learners > Scientists page. Students have been really engaged in sharing their knowledge by recording their own re-creation of the water cycle using an app called Puppet Pals HD Director’s Pass. You can download Puppet Pals for free (limited characters and scenes). Students will be showing you their projects during our Family Read time tomorrow. Please join us to celebrate their hard work! Projects will be uploaded to our blog soon for everyone to enjoy.

Symbaloo

The other day, we introduced Symbaloo to the students. This is a visual bookmarking site where we have posted some fun websites to visit. To access, look to the right-hand sidebar under Links and click on Symbaloo. Some students really enjoyed Free Rice. There are online flashcards to practice sight words or Math fluency strategies. 

Primary Days of Music

Students sang beautifully today. Thank you to Mr. Douglas for teaching them such wonderful songs about diversity and taking care of our earth. 

Report Card Envelopes

A reminder to sign the report card envelope and return it to school as soon as possible. If it is not returned before spring break, may we suggest that you place the envelope inside your child’s planner; that way, the two will stay together. Thank you.

After Spring Break

We look forward to seeing your child back on April 1st refreshed and ready for an exciting week of Hip Hop dancing! Please dress appropriately each day for movement in the gym. There will be a whole school performance on Friday, April 5 in the afternoon.

If we don’t see you at the end of the day on Friday, we hope you all have a wonderful spring break! Keep up with your enjoyment of reading during the break!

Gung Hei Fat Choi! Happy Lunar New Year! We started the day learning about some of the common traditions that are followed during the Lunar New Year like cleaning the house, eating certain lucky foods, leisees (lucky money), lion dances with loud music and ones that even dance on tall poles! Please ask your child about that!

Our story about Sam and the Lucky Money [click on link to listen to the story] taught us about using the strategy of making predictions. As students listened, they were stopped at four different points in the story to make their predictions. This strategy helps us to think ahead, to revise and verify predictions, and make connections to prior knowledge and the text. Feel free to encourage your child to make predictions when reading at home. We also learned about looking for an author’s message. Often, the author has a message or a “big idea” they are trying to tell the reader. After reading a story at home, encourage your child to tell you what the author’s message is. Here, one strong message was to be grateful for what we have.

During Math, we learned how to count and write from one to ten in Cantonese. Students have been practicing their numbers before and after, ten more, and ten less but writing numbers in Chinese was a tricky challenge for some because of the extra “ten” they had to write to represent how many tens there are. This was a great way to reinforce what they have been learning about. They had so much fun and thoroughly enjoyed this!

Math – How you can support at home: Give your child a random number up to 99 (for grade 2’s). You can use a deck of cards and use 1-9 as digits; draw two random cards as the number to use. Ask the following:

• What is the number before and the number after?
• What is the number that is ten less and ten more?
• What is the number that is two more and two less?
• For extra challenge, what is five more and five less?

Core Competency connection:

• I can be open to learning about cultures.
• I can try my best at learning new things and show determination.