We are readers. – Ms. Chan's Class Blog
 

Category: We are readers.

Dear Division 11 Families,

We hope everyone is having a wonderful Family Day long weekend!

Week 2: Love Others Nelson, Kadir If You Plant A Seed

This week, we read If You Plant a Seed and discussed how even one small act of kindness can create a ripple effect, inspiring others to spread kindness as well. Our students were encouraged to perform random acts of kindness throughout the week and add a heart to our “Kindness Tree” whenever they did something kind or received a random act of kindness from someone else. It was wonderful to see so many hearts added in just one week! We hope our students always remember how one small act of kindness can have a big impact.

We continued our theme of Friendship and “Love for Self”. Every Thursday is “Thankful Thursday” where they share something they are grateful for during Community Circle. This past week, we shared what we are grateful for about ourselves. We started by giving ourselves a hug to love ourselves. We talked about how the relationship we have with ourselves is the foundation for all other relationships so it is important to be kind to ourselves. What we say to choose to say to ourselves helps us anchor into our own strengths and believe in ourselves too. Last week, we continued to work on our affirmation statements. We are looking forward to sharing them with you!

It is also important to take such great care of the person we spend the most time with. That’s themselves! It’s the most important job they have in their life…to make good choices about eating well, getting enough sleep, staying positive and grateful which leads to happiness.

We Are Mathematicians!

This week, we continued practicing our addition and subtraction skills, focusing on using open number lines. With this strategy, students decide where to start their number line and how to decompose, or break down, a number to add or subtract. There are multiple ways to solve problems using open number lines, allowing students to approach problems in a way that makes sense to them. (As shown in the picture, three different students each found their own way to solve 56 + 37.)

We encouraged our students to use friendly numbers—numbers that are easy to work with when adding or subtracting, such as 20, 50, or 100. For example, in the problem 27 + 9, the student broke 9 into 3 and 6, adding 3 to 27 first to make 30, which made it easier to add the remaining 6.

This strategy connects to the next one we will be focusing on, so our students will have more time to practice and strengthen their understanding.

Here’s a helpful resource for you to learn more about this strategy and support your child at home.

Shelly Gray – Friendly Numbers: Addition Strategy

Social Studies

Our students have been exploring how humans have created inventions and innovations to meet their needs throughout history. This week, our focus was on agriculture, specifically in Ancient Egypt. Students learned about the different ways ancient Egyptians controlled water, then compared these methods to those used in ancient Mesopotamia. To deepen their understanding, they created Venn diagrams to identify connections between the two civilizations.

Writing
On Wednesday, we did a writing snapshot, and we were so impressed with the progress our students have made since the beginning of the year! We’ve been focusing on making writing more engaging, and we encourage students to use the following strategies:

  • Triple scoop words – Choosing more interesting words (e.g., instead of good, using fabulous or fantastic).
  • Similes – Comparing things using like or as (e.g., My brother is as loud as a fire truck. He is wise like an owl).
  • Adding dialogue – Making conversations more dynamic (e.g., instead of writing “How are you?” said Ms. Kim, students learn to write “How are you?” Ms. Kim called out, waving cheerfully).

When you are reading with your child at home and come across examples of these writing techniques, please take a moment to point them out and discuss how they make the writing more engaging. This will help reinforce what they are learning in class and encourage them to apply these strategies in their own writing.

Reading Groups

Students really look forward to our Reading Groups time. Last week, each group performed a script for Reader’s Theatre based on stories that focused on conflict resolution and showing kindness. They learned the importance of reading with expression and performed very well! This week, we continued to read books at our reading levels.

We love seeing how they support each other when they come across words they struggle with. We also appreciate their patience, collaboration, and kindness shown each time they read together. It’s always a great sign when they ASK when we are going to have Reading Groups again!

Friendship Fruit Salad on Valentine’s Day

We are grateful to all families for contributing fruit and to our families who came to support in the classroom.

Students were so diligent to cut the fruit. They were all so keen and worked so hard as they chopped fruit for a solid 45 minutes! No one asked for or took a break!

So what this tells us is that they can help you prepare dinner by chopping vegetables or their own fruit for recess snacks or lunch.

We love it when we hear comments like, “This is the best day ever! Can we make fruit salad every Friday? It can be Fruit Fridays! I wish this day won’t end.”

Welcome, Mr. Evoy!

On this day, we also welcomed our SFU student teacher, Mr. Evoy, to our class. He will be with us until the end of April. He dove right in and got to know the kids. Mr. Evoy is a welcome addition! Please help us welcome him to our warm classroom community.

As always, we appreciate your time and support at home. Thank you for being our partners in your child’s learning.

With much gratitude,

Ms. Kim and Ms. Chan

Dear families,

What a wonderful week full of learning! We are so very blessed to be your child’s teachers. They truly bring us SO much joy each day!

We are writers.

We read a story called If I Built a House by Chris Van Dusen. Click here to watch the animated story on YouTube. Then both Ms. Kim and I worked together to support their writing development. First, Ms. Kim demonstrated writing that had little detail. Then she showed them the same piece of writing but with lots of detail that included the five senses. We noticed there were words that came up again and again that really helped us add details and visualize to paint a picture of what we imagined in our minds. Examples: like, when, with, and, so.

Students brainstormed by creating a web of all of the things they would add to their house if there were no limits. Here are some examples:

Students worked so diligently when they described their house. We felt so proud of their imagination and how hard they worked. When they were finished, they were encouraged to DYRIO and read over their writing three times.

This one strategy really helps them look for ways to make their writing better. We have noticed that students are catching themselves to add capitals at the beginning of sentences and finding where they need to add a period to end their sentences. What we love to see are the changes they are making when they are doing their second reading: Read it over like a revision expert. They actively look for ways to add more details or improve your message. This is such an effective way of helping them become better written communicators.

Ways to support at home: When your child practices writing at home, remind them to DYRIO: Read it over three times. Each time for a different purpose.

We are athletes.

Students LOVED their skating experience at Bill Copeland! Thank you to all the parents who came out to support us!

We are mathematicians.

We continued our learning about number concepts and place value. We learned there is a difference between a digit and what makes a number. There are also different ways to represent numbers.

We worked in groups of three to practice these four ways:

(1) standard form: 235

(2) written on a place value chart with hundreds, tens, and ones

(3) represented pictorially with a hundred shown as a square, tens as a line, and ones as a dot so 928 would look like this:

Square SymbolSquare Symbol Line Symbols Copy and Paste │ ┃ ╽ ╿ ╏ ║ ╎ ┇ ︱ ┊Line Symbols Copy and Paste │ ┃ ╽ ╿ ╏ ║ ╎ ┇ ︱ ┊Line Symbols Copy and Paste │ ┃ ╽ ╿ ╏ ║ ╎ ┇ ︱ ┊Dot SymbolDot SymbolDot SymbolDot SymbolDot Symbol

(4) expanded notation: 200 + 30 + 5 + 235

Here are some of our examples when we worked diligently and cooperatively in our groups! Can your child find their examples below?

How to support at home: Use a dice or deck of cards to create random 3-digit numbers like 537, 386, 187. Ask your child to show you the 4 ways to represent these numbers.

Math Fact Fluency

We created our own random numbers chart. It looks like this:

On one side, we have the digits 0-9. On the other side, 10-20. We will be using this to help us systematically learn strategies to add and subtract quickly. These will be practiced and reinforced so that it becomes automatic. We hear from many teachers in grade 4 and above that Math would be easier for students if only they knew their facts. It does take extra time and practice at home so we appreciate your support. We will be teaching them games as well to help reinforce.

To help you understand better, I recorded a video that explains how to use this Random Numbers Chart at home. CLICK HERE to watch. The video shows 0-20 on one side but since making that video, I found it more effective to have 0-9 on one side and 10-20 on the other side. One student decided to write the odd and even numbers in different colours and I thought that was absolutely brilliant! So I will be changing that when I teach this next year! (Thanks, Lara!)

Quick recall is in the grade 3 curriculum:

  • At the end of Grade 3, most students should be able to recall addition facts to 20. We will provide opportunities to recall subtraction facts from 20 as well.

Last week, we learned about the commutative property, properties of zero, and properties of one. When adding or subtracting one, I don’t really want them calculating (adding or subtracting). To help with automaticity, I want them thinking what is the number that comes after (+1) or before (-1); in other words, counting on by 1s or backwards by 1. You will see more of these little strategy papers coming home in the future. I recommend you keep them all so your child can refer to them when needed. It’s a good reminder for you so you can remember the strategies too! 🙂

Ways to support at home: Ask your child to create one to practice at home. Then ask them to review or make it fun by doing it together.

We are scientists.

We finished our learning about thermal energy this week. We reviewed the three ways that heat is transferred: by conduction, convection, and radiation. To reinforce this learning, we watched a video. Click here to watch it at home.

We finished our Matter and Thermal Energy booklets by doing some self-reflection on our learning. We recorded (1) what we are proud of (2) what we would do differently next time (3) what we learned about matter and thermal energy OR what we learned about ourselves. They are excited to bring their booklets home to show you soon!

We are readers.

Our reading groups are well on their way now. Each group is working well together in supporting each other. We have been learning phonic rules that help us learn how to approach words that we find more challenging to sound out.

Upcoming Fun Community Opportunities

  • Friday, December 6 at 5 to 8 PM – CARNIVAL hosted by Burnaby North’s Christmas Cheer Club. This is an annual event full of games, concessions, arts & crafts and more. To learn more, click here.
    • Location: Burnaby North Secondary School
  • Sundays, December 1-22 at 10 to 11 AM – STORYTIME & CRAFTS at Brentwood Mall: Enjoy a family friendly program with festive music, games, and holiday fun!
    • Location: The TAB LAB located on Level 1 of the Interior Centre, across Telus.
  • Every Saturday & Sunday from December 7 – December 22 – MOVIES ON THE PLAZA: Showings start at 3pm. Movie Schedule: 
    • December 7 and 8: Arthur Christmas
    • December 14 and 15: Frozen
    • December 21 and 22: Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas (Live Action)
    • Location: Brentwood Plaza
As always, we so appreciate your support at home. Thank you for reading these weekly blog posts. We hope you never tire of reading about our gratitude for you. We deeply feel it!
With hearts full of appreciation, Ms. Chan and Ms. Kim

Dear Division 11 Families,

We are looking forward to our first skating field trip coming up on Tuesday! 

  • Thank you to the families who have volunteered to be our drivers. If you have not already done so, please return the volunteer driver form by Monday. Click here to download a copy.
  • Read the email that was sent on Friday from Ms. Chan about how and what to prepare for our skating field trip.
  • Family Reading will be canceled since our skating field trip will take place on Tuesday. We will resume Family Reading after our field trips. 

Here are some highlights of the exciting learning happening in our class: 

Indigenous Education
On Wednesday, we joined the district-wide Indigenous education session via Zoom. Our students listened to the story The Moccasins by Earl Einerson and had the opportunity to design their own moccasins. Click here to watch the story read to you.

We are Mathematicians.
We are demonstrating our understanding of fractions by representing them in multiple ways: as parts of a whole, parts of a set, on a number line, and in word form.  Each student is working on their own version of the image to show what they know.

We continued our learning about number concepts and place value. We learned the difference between a digit and a number. Digits are 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. Digits become a number when we give the digit a value. Using our own place value charts and a deck of cards, we worked with partners to compare who had the larger number.

How to support at home:

  • Quantities to 1 000 practice: Flip over 3 cards to make a number. Flip over 3 more cards for a second number. Flip over 3 more cards for a third number. Then ask the following:
    • Compare and order the numbers – Which number is the largest? Smallest?
    • How many hundreds, tens, ones in the first number, second number, and third number?
    • What is the value of the hundreds, tens or ones in each number?

We are writers using Triple Scoop Words.
In writing, we learned how “triple scoop words” can make our writing more engaging. Instead of using simple words like goodmad, or sad, we are choosing more vivid words like fantasticfurious, or devastated. This helps make our writing more engaging for readers and expands our vocabulary! Students will use this strategy when editing their own writing during DYRIO: Did you read it over? If you need a refresher as to what DYRIO means, click here to read a previous post that explains our system for re-reading our writing 3 times to make it better each time. Many students in the school are learning about DYRIO too!

We are readers.

We are gathering in reading groups to learn how to read better, support each other as readers, and make connections to what we read. So far, they have learned how to guide their classmate when they come across a word they mispronounced or are struggling with sounding out. They are instructed to not just tell them what the word is. This robs them of the opportunity to try sounding it out with scaffolded help. This is also such a great opportunity for the others in their group to teach, coach, and encourage the one who is trying to sound it out. I loved seeing the kind support so far!

Ways to support at home: When reading with your child and they come across a challenging word, please do not just tell them what the word is. Instead, guide them through noticing which letters are consonants/vowels, breaking up the word into syllables, reminding them that every syllable has a vowel, and figuring out whether the vowel is a short or long vowel sound, which remember the spelling rules (like when two vowels go walking, the first one does the talking and says its own name).

Feel free to review last week’s blog post for how to break up longer words into syllables.

Social Studies
This week, our students explored the topic of breakfasts around the world, thinking about similarities and differences compared to their own experiences. 

We are Scientists.

Previously, we learned that thermal energy can be transferred in 3 ways. One way is conduction. This week, we learned about convection: heat is transferred by the movement of liquids or gas (like air). After learning about this, we watched a short video to make it more visible. Click here to review with your child.

Thank you, families, and have a restful rest of your weekend! 

 Grateful for you, Ms. Kim and Ms. Chan

Dear families,

Last week, our students learned about Remembrance Day and its significance. Their understanding of the day’s importance was evident in the respect they showed during Friday’s assembly. They also did a fantastic job on our wreath art project. After reading Todd Parr’s The Peace Book, each of us wrote on a leaf to express what peace means to us.

Math

Our students have been expanding their understanding of place value by using base-ten blocks. We’ve also been practicing comparing numbers by playing a fun game called Beat the Teacher. As a class, we roll one die, and each player decides whether to place that number in the ones, tens, or hundreds place. I then reveal my combination, and if they have a larger number than mine, they get points for that round. This time, they didn’t manage to beat me, but I don’t think that will last long; they already came up with so many brilliant strategies!

We’ve also continued our lessons on fractions. On Friday, our students worked in groups on a matching activity, then challenged themselves to see how quickly and accurately they could sort the cards.

Ways to support at home: Review concepts taught at school. Ask your child to teach you what they learned so far.

Social Studies

Our students now have pen pal buddies! We’re connecting with Grade 6/7 students in North Vancouver who are inquiring into ancient civilizations with topics similar to those we’ve discussed in our classroom. Our students wrote letters sharing what they’ve learned about different cultures and some questions they have about certain ancient civilizations. They’re excited to hear back from their buddies soon!

Thank you for your continued support at home.

Sincerely, Ms. Kim

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