Category: We are readers.

Dear families,

Every time I sit down to reflect on the past week, I can’t help but have a heart full of gratitude for the blessing to be your child’s teacher. The love and joy we share along with the enjoyable time we have as we learn together is truly priceless.

Sports Day

Friday was a fun day of teamwork and cooperation through physical activities. For those who were able to see some of the fun, thank you for joining us. We hope your child went home talking about how much they enjoyed their day!

We are readers.

Students have been enjoying reading books on our iPads using EPIC. This is a website that has over 40,000 high interest books to read. Just a reminder that if your child is sick or at home, they can access their account anytime from 7AM to 3PM. Our class code is ycr9510 and their passcode is the first four digits of their pupil number. That’s the same number they use to login to laptops.

We are mathematicians.

We continued to solidify our understanding of perimeter. This week, we were introduced to the concept of how to measure area and how it differs from perimeter.

How to support at home if your child needs extra support for perimeter. Watch this video together and measure the perimeter of some items around the house.

We are researchers.

We started our research on an animal we saw at the Vancouver Aquarium. We were given a partner and everyone worked so hard during their first work period!

We are artists.

From Ms. Kapusta: This week, we finished our Norval Morrisseau art. We painted our copper thunderbirds (last week we learned that Norval’s artwork always involved animals and nature and his Indigenous name, which he received during a healing ceremony, was “copper thunderbird”). We painted with tempura paint and used bright, bold colours, thick black lines, and left no white space – just like Norval’s style. As we painted small details and focused on doing our best job, the class was reminded that learning involves patience and time. No one was born painting like Norval Morrisseau or Pablo Picasso. I’m proud of how they all turned out and the passion the kids bring into making their art continues to bring me joy!

Sorry, with all of the Sports Day fun, we forgot to take a picture of the new bulletin board but we can share next week!

Last Field Trip 

We will have our last field trip on Friday, June 21. We will be going bowling at Revs (5502 Lougheed Highway by Holdom skytrain station) at 10 AM. We will leave the school at 9:40 AM.

After bowling, we will be heading to Burnaby Lake Park (behind Bill Copeland Sports Complex) for lunch and until the end of the day. We will return to school before 3 PM.

We will need parent drivers to bowling, to the park, and back to school, please. All families are welcome to join us for the day to watch them bowl and socialize at the park! We will be joined by Ms. Tai’s and Ms. Santorelli’s class. More details will be listed on the field trip notice when it is sent home.

This Weekend! Family Opportunities at Rosemary Brown Recreation Centre (7789 18th Street, Burnaby)

The City of Burnaby is offering some programming this weekend! Rosemary Brown Drop-in Schedules

Toonie Skate

• • Monday, May 20th at 11:45 AM to 1:15 PM

Family Ringette & Hockey Drop-in (4 – 12 years + adult)

Families can enjoy the sport of ringette together! Space is provided for shoot & score and participants are welcome to play small area games. The maximum ratio of children to adults (16rs+) is 3:1.  All participants must wear a helmet with a face cage and protective gloves. Additional safety equipment is encouraged. Hockey helmets with cages are available to borrow at no cost from our skate shop. Participants may wear hockey face masks to this program.

• • Sunday, May 19th at 3:00-4:00pm
  • Monday, May 20^th at 9:15-10:15am

Family Lacrosse (4-12 years with adult)

• • Monday, May 20^th at 9:45-10:45 am

Family Ball Hockey (4-12 years with adult)

• • Monday, May 20^th at 11 am-12 pm

Community Events

• Wed. May 22 at 6 PM – Kitchener Community Dinner (potluck). All families are welcome! Please RSVP using this link. I am looking forward to seeing you and your family there! The intermediate choir will be performing and we have an art activity for children to enjoy.
• Fri. May 24 from 4:30 to 7:30 PM – Burnaby North Secondary. Free carnival games, face painting, etc. Click here to learn more.
• Sat. June 1 from 9:30 AM to 4 PM – Hats Off Day. Click here to learn more about this great annual event that happens along Hastings street.

I am savouring all the moments with your children. They make me smile and fill my heart with so much joy. I appreciate how each one contributes their gifts and their heart to our community. I can’t help but light up when I see them or share with others about how much I love them anytime I have an opportunity. Thank you for sharing your beautiful children with me this year. 🙂

Grateful to be a part of your child’s learning and development at school, Ms. Chan

Dear families,

I could use this blog title every week because every week feels like a fond week! 🙂

I am so grateful to end a lovely week at the Vancouver Aquarium on a beautiful day on our field trip. Deep gratitude to our parents who generously offered their gift of time and effort to supervise a group. We are grateful to Maissa’s mom, Enma’s mom, James L.’s dad, and Senara’s dad for your help! Check out the images of some of the animals and creatures we saw there!

Thank you to the fundraising efforts of our PAC Executive, more than half of the cost of this field trip was covered.

Our next steps will be choosing an animal or creature we would like to learn more about through research.

Happy Mother’s Day to all of our lovely mothers!

We hope you enjoyed your special day!

From Ms. Kapusta: This week, we worked on a special art project: cards for Mother’s Day! We challenged ourselves by making 3D pop up cards using paper, recycled scraps, cardboard, and sharpie. We also challenged ourselves to draw different kinds of flowers. We ended off by writing a special message to our mothers. We also talked about the importance of all caregivers in our lives, including fathers, grandparents, aunts and uncles, siblings, etc. as every family is different and unique. We couldn’t be happier with how our cards turned out! You can tell that students put a lot of time and effort into their work and wanted to their best jobs. I hope you all have had a happy Mother’s Day this weekend! Mothers and caregivers, thank you for all that you do for your children.

We are artists. From Ms. Kapusta

April 30:

The students learned about a new Canadian Indigenous artist this week: Norval Morisseau! Norval was also called “Copper Thunderbird” and he was part of the Bingwi Neyaashi Anishinaabek First Nation. We observed some of his different artworks and discussed what we noticed, like his depiction of nature and animals and use of thick black outlines and abstract style. We also compared and contrasted this contemporary Canadian Indigenous artist’s work to some of the Coast Salish art we looked at last week. You can look at some of his work here and ask your child what they learned. We then began our very own Norval Morisseau art! We drew a copper thunderbird in sharpie and tried to emulate Norval’s abstract style through the use of soft shapes, curved lines, and symbols of nature. Next week we will be painting our work! The students were really excited about their copper thunderbirds and we can’t wait to see how they turn out once we add some bright, solid colours!

Butterflies are free!

We had a great opportunity to join Ms. Rinaldo’s class on their butterfly release at Willingdon Park on Wednesday. These were painted lady butterflies.

One of the butterflies was not able to survive because the wings did not expand to dry properly so their wings did not develop the way they should have. We did a farewell to honour its life.

On the Trapline

We read a picture book that celebrate Indigenous culture and traditions. Then we had an opportunity to write our own connections to the story.

This is taken from Amazon: The Governor General Award shares a story that honors our connections to our past and our grandfathers and fathers.

A boy and Moshom, his grandpa, take a trip together to visit a place of great meaning to Moshom. A trapline is where people hunt and live off the land, and it was where Moshom grew up. As they embark on their northern journey, the child repeatedly asks his grandfather, “Is this your trapline?” Along the way, the boy finds himself imagining what life was like two generations ago — a life that appears to be both different from and similar to his life now. This is a heartfelt story about memory, imagination and intergenerational connection that perfectly captures the experience of a young child’s wonder as he is introduced to places and stories that hold meaning for his family.

How to support at home: What were some of your stories of spending time with your grandfather or grandmother? Share some fond memories with your child.

“Fond” was one of our new words this week. Many didn’t know what the adjective meant so using this word in your vocabulary this week can help solidify their understanding of the word fond.

We are mathematicians.

This week, we learned about measurement and the relation between centimetres and millimetres. They learned how to convert a measurement from cm to mm.

Then we extended this by learning about perimeter and how to measure it. Please feel free to review perimeter with your child at home. We will continue this week and move into learning about area as well. You are welcome to look for videos on YouTube that can help your child review this new concept.

Word Work

For our work work last week, we practiced past tense and learned that with regular past tense verbs, they ALL end with “ed” even though they have the /d/, /id/, or /t/ sounds.

Wondering Wednesday

We joined Ms. Santorelli’s class and Ms. Tai’s class on our shape search walk. They had so much fun looking and tallying all sorts of shapes in our environment.

This upcoming week

We have Sports Day on Friday! We will be telling students more about what to expect this week. There will be an early dismissal at 12:30 pm. Students on the hot lunch program will receive their hot lunch on this day. Your child is welcome to bring a lunch as well or eat at home after sports day is over. Families are welcome to attend and cheer students on!

Thank you so much for your continued support at home. You are an essential part of our learning and we appreciate you!

With much gratitude, Ms. Chan

Dear families,

I am the luckiest teacher ever to get to work with your children! Every week seems like a busy week full of learning but that’s not the best part. The best part is that we get to do it TOGETHER! What a blessing and pure joy to spend my time with them! Of course, you already know how much joy your children bring. I am always so grateful for their love, joy, and the fun we have as a classroom community.

The 7 Habits of Happy Kids

This is the picture book version of The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey. I recommend this popular book if you haven’t read it yet.

Habit #5: Seek first to understand. Then to be understood. The lesson this time was about the importance of listening. Take a look at the image for the I statements, in particular: “I don’t interrupt whenever someone is talking.”

This has been an area that needs improvement so one thing we have been working on is being more patient by not interrupting my teaching or conversations. For example, when I am in the middle of a conversation with another adult or classmate. If you experience this at home, please remind them to be patient and to wait their turn to speak. We are working on doing this independently without reminders. Thank you!

The other thing we have been working on is responsibility for our belongings by picking up after themselves. We have many people who are willing to help clean up our classroom but if everyone did their part to begin with, there would be less to tidy up. Any opportunities at home to independently pick up after themselves will be great practice. Thank you!

Jump Rope for Heart

We started the week with Jump Rope for Heart. There is still time to donate. Please click here to learn more. Thank you if you choose to donate.

Thanks to our organizing committee, students had an opportunity to try six different stations with their big buddies and Ms. Allocca’s class. They had so much fun and were sweaty when it was all done!

We are mathematicians.

We continued to solidify our understanding of division and as it relates to multiplication. Further learning this week had us practicing the concept that we can do division by subtraction. After the lesson, we almost always practice the new concept with a partner first. Here it gives them an opportunity to practice their core competencies of communication and collaboration skills. I appreciate how quickly they set themselves up, how well they work together, and how engaged they ALL were in their learning! So proud of them!

It is also a fantastic opportunity for children who don’t know each other well yet or have had differences to learn together. This was what happened last week. A partnership between two people who had preconceived notions about each other ended up asking if they can be partners again in the future. This warmed my heart. This is one of many reasons why we explore new concepts together and with partners chosen randomly. Students have an opportunity to develop relationships and learn with others while developing their personal identities and social competencies.

How to support at home: Please review this video and ask your child to explain this concept to you. When learners can teach you, they demonstrate proficient understanding.

We were also introduced to measurement (mm and cm) and measured things around the room.

How to support at home: Take out a ruler and have fun measuring things around the home! Have your child estimate the length and then measure the items.

We are scientists.

Each week, we continue to check on the growing chum salmon in the library. This past week, we were blessed and grateful to have Ms. Reid give us a lesson on the life cycle of the salmon and to answer our many questions! I really enjoyed how curious they were by asking so many interesting questions.

They went from the egg to alevin to fry stage which is the current stage they will stay in at Kitchener until they are released in a few weeks.

The book We Are a Community was a great way to mesh science with Social Studies and learn more vocabulary about landforms and water sources. Here is an excerpt from Strong Nations website:

This book is about a river. Most rivers start high up in the mountains. As the water comes downhill, it makes little pathways in the rocks and gravel. As the pathways get bigger, they join to make streams. When several streams join, they make a river. Some rivers have waterfalls and deep pools. In some places, fast moving water tumbles over rocks forming rapids. When a river leaves the mountain for flatter ground it starts to slow down. Eventually, a river ends when it flows into the sea. Where the fresh water and the salt water meet is an estuary. 

The area in and around an estuary is a good place for plants, animals and people to live because we can all find food and water there. The salmon is an important food for many of us. 

People have paid attention to the life cycle of salmon for thousands of years. We have learned that sometimes we can help salmon survive by building a salmon hatchery along a river. Some hatcheries are huge while others are quite small. 

There are many sizes of rivers in the world. Some are wide. Some are narrow. Some are deep. Some are shallow. 

We are readers, listeners, and writers.

We read a story called A Simon for Salmon about a boy who saves a salmon by helping it get free.

If you would like to listen to the story with your child, click here.

We reviewed the three different ways we can make connections to the stories we read: text to self (a personal connection or something that reminds them of a personal experience), text to text (something that reminds them of another book or movie), and text to world (a connection that reminds them of something that happened in the world).

The Two Sisters is another book we read that is a story about the twin mountain peaks we see to the west of our school. We actually have quite a beautiful view of it from our classroom. Here is a synopsis from Amazon:

For the first time, Pauline Johnson’s “The Two Sisters,” a First Nations legend, is accompanied by sumptuous illustrations that showcase the splendour of the Salish Sea. The universal themes of Creation, courage, and peace run through this legend of two little girls who grow up to be courageous young women who help to bring lasting peace to their world. The story is supplemented by a reference section that will enable a reader, parent, teacher, or visitor to the coast to immerse themselves in the rich history of Coast Salish cultures.

Feel free to learn more here: https://www.legendsofvancouver.net/two-sisters-vancouver-bc

Big Buddies

The last few weeks, we have enjoyed our time with big buddies at Willingdon Park. This past week because of the rain, we visited their classroom. After helping them with their entrepreneur project, we played two games of Kahoot! We reviewed questions that tested our understanding of various life cycles and practiced multiplication with arrays. They have SO much fun playing as a team against each other!

Vancouver Aquarium Field Trip

So far, we have more than enough parent volunteers to help supervise. We are so grateful to those who have offered to spend the day with us! We can only take four parents on our trip because of our field trip funds and the number of free chaperones based on the number of students we have. If you have your own membership, please let me know. I know that some of you will need to take time off work so if you indicated you can volunteer but would like to change your mind knowing that we have more than enough adult supervisors, please let me know. Thank you!

Prior to our visit, we will be learning about some of the sea creatures we will see. This week, we started with learning about the sea otter. They really enjoyed viewing the live cam! Click here to watch them live!

Enjoy the long weekend! I am excited for our Pro-D day on Monday! One of the greatest joys this year was working alongside fellow colleagues like Ms. Hardie, Ms. Forbes, Ms. Chung, and Mr. Hunter on the Pro-D Committee to plan our learning days. We have worked hard this year in moving the school forward in terms of our two school goals of social emotional learning and reading comprehension. I love collaborating with others, using creativity, and connecting to improve the learning that happens at Kitchener!

We continue to have fun so time is flying by way too fast! It’s hard to believe it’s May this week! I am deeply grateful for your continued support at home. I love and appreciate you all!

Dates to add to your calendar

• Monday, April 29 – Pro-D Day; students do not attend
• Friday, May 17 – Sports Day & early dismissal
• Friday, May 31 – 2 PM Early dismissal

Dear families,

I bring up the word joy often in our class. I truly believe we can not only find joy when we look for it, we can take action to cultivate it too on a regular basis. Sometimes, it’s about being mindful and truly present to notice our blessings and to feel grateful for them.

Daily, they are encouraged to thank the people who brought them joy during our Heart Time every morning. We regularly share what brings us joy and different things we feel grateful for during our Community Connection time too. My hope is that with consistent practice at school and with your encouragement at home too, this mindset becomes a habit so in their teenage years and into adulthood, they regularly scan for blessings, feel gratitude, and learn to find and cultivate their own joy. Leaning into gratitude and joy can lead to a much happier life filled with positivity for overall well-being.

We believe in inclusion.

We read the book Love Monster by Rachel Bright. We had a great discussion at the end of the story about the Love Monster and how even though he took initiative to find a friend, in the end, the friend he found looked like him. What we try to teach is to accept others who are different from us, to value diversity, and foster inclusivity.

We are athletes.

We started the week with our exciting skating adventure at Bill Copeland! Thank you so much to the parents of Seb, Evelyn, James, James, Layla, Maissa, Adrian, Dali, Satvika who drove and helped supervise and to Dhruv, Senara, Haruka, and Lydia’s parents offered as well but we just had too many graciously volunteer!

Our skating time is at 9:30 to 10:30 AM. I believe we can all be on the ice at 9:30 am when everyone comes to school on time. I am requesting that everyone arrives at 8:55 AM on Monday, February 26, please, so we can leave right away.

I noticed that some students did not bring gloves or mittens. For added safety, it is highly recommended they bring along to protect their hands when they fall to the ice.

We are communicators.

We had an opportunity to practice our paragraph writing again as we reflected on our skating field trip. Students were reminded to start with an opening sentence, write details that include thoughts and feelings, and end with a closing paragraph. I enjoyed reading their recount of our field trip to the rink.

We are artists.

From Ms. Kapusta: This week students experimented with making Valentine’s Day hearts using white wax crayons and watercolour paint. We talked about the importance of planning beforehand, especially when your “ink” (the white crayon) is invisible. We made rough drafts of designs on scrap paper and then we got to painting. It was fun watching the class experiment with different shades of crayons and pencil crayons and different weights of paint to see what kind of effect they would have. Not every heart showed up, but every student had a fun time painting! Afterwards, we decorated Valentine’s Day themed bingo cards and played bingo together as a class as a special treat.

We are mathematicians.

We explored our understanding of 2-D and 3-D shapes and will dive further next week. Please check out our Math page for the curriculum covered this term.

We are readers.

Since your child will be at home on Friday and Monday, they will have access to Epic books (online library of high interest books) from 7 AM to 3 PM. Our class code is ycr9510. Your child’s passcode is the first four digits of their username. If your child is sick at home, this is a great option on those days too if they are up to reading.

Applied Design, Skills, and Technology

Thank you for your fruit contribution to our Friendship Fruit Salad on Valentine’s Day. We appreciate the time that parents of Maissa, Sonya, Lydia, Jason, and Haruka spent to support us in preparing the fruit salad. Everyone was careful and did well with cutting. We made so much that we enjoyed some more today! May I encourage you to have your child help with food preparation for home meals. I learned too late that I should have encouraged my son to help more with meal preparations when he was younger.

On Wednesday, we also made small Valentine cards for every adult in the school. This was to spread some joy, share appreciation, and to brighten their day! They discovered that in doing so, it actually brightened their own day too! I often have shared this: Kindness to others is like kindness to ourselves. It’s like a boomerang. When you intentionally share kindness, while uplifting others, you are uplifted too.

We have continued to work on our Passion Projects. If your child would like to spend some time at home to work on it, please allow them to work on the slides. You can support them by helping them find facts. One thing we are working on is putting facts into our own words so we are not plagiarizing.

Save the Dates

• Friday, February 16 – District Professional Day. No school for students.
• Monday, February 19 – Family Day. School is closed.
• Monday, March 4 to 8 – Hip Hop lessons
• Monday, March 11 – Whole school performance (AM)
• Thursday, March 14 – Primary Days of Music for all grade 2/3s at Kitchener
• Monday, March 18 to Monday, April 1 – Spring break, school closure, and Easter Monday
• Thursday, April 11 – Student Led Conferences from 3 to 6 PM (Families are invited to celebrate learning. Your child will lead the conversation and show you what they’ve learned so far.)
• Friday, April 12 – Early dismissal at 2 PM
• Monday, April 29 – Pro-D day. No school for students.
• Friday, May 10 – We will be going to the Vancouver Aquarium by school bus with Ms. Santorelli and Ms. Tai’s classes. We will need parent volunteers to help supervise. Thank you!

Every day, I feel truly blessed to be your child’s teacher and to work alongside you as partners. We bring each other much love and joy throughout our day. My heart was warmed today when some students said they were going to miss me because of the extra long weekend. I feel the same way! ❤️

Thank you for your continued support at home. I am grateful for you.

Sincerely, Ms. Chan