Category: Classroom

“A medicine wheel is a foundation of teaching and learning that shows how different parts of life are connected and balanced. The symbol of four colours in a circle represents the interconnectivity of all aspects of a person’s relationship with themselves, others, and the natural and spiritual world”

Words by Joyce Perrault from “All Creation Represented: A Child’s Guide to the Medicine Wheels”

How do you make slime with glue, water and Borax? Slime is made after a chemical reaction occurs between two main ingredients; polyvinyl alcohol and borate ion. Glue contains polyvinyl acetates (PVAC) molecules. These are long polymers that are like long strands of spaghetti tangled together on your plate. The Borax (borate ions)hook these together so they don’t flow so well and begin to act more like a solid and their viscosity increases.

During the slime lab students learned that increasing the amount of water in their slime mixture helped it flow better, while increasing the amount of Borax made the slime firmer.

After reading “The Great Realization” by Tomos Robert the students create a similar poem on their own global issue. They worked in pairs to create a 6 stanza poem with A, A, B, B or A, B, A, B rhyming scheme.

Below are the poems they created.
Student Poems

This week in class students have been learning about sleep hygiene and the benefits of a good nights sleep.

Without a good nights sleep school can be a real challenge. Research into sleep shows that over time, insufficient sleep impacts how a child feels, behaves and interacts with others and their world. Insufficient sleep can lead to challenges regulating their emotions and bodies, including increased hyperactivity and stress. Moreover, research has shown that an inability to regularly get the recommended sleep can lead to a decrease in one’s overall mental health.

Did you know?

• 1 in 4 children do not get the recommended sleep at night.
• 1 in 3 children have trouble going to sleep or staying asleep
• 1 in 5 children have difficulty staying awake during waking hours

So, how much sleep should our children be getting? Well, it depends on their age. For school aged children the recommended sleep time is 9-11 hours for children aged 5-13 years old and 8-10 hours for adolescents aged 14-17 years of age.

Tips to help your child increase the quality and quantity of their sleep:

Establish a regular bedtime routine…..even on weekends

A child’s internal clock helps them to get sleepy and feel awake at specific times during the day.  If you allow your child to sleep in on the weekends, that will make it more difficult for your child to wake up at the regular time during the school week.  Similarly, if you allow your child to stay up late at night on weekends, they will have a harder time falling asleep at the regular bed time on school nights.

Don’t do Anything Energizing Close to Bed

You want the child to relax, not get energized right before bed. So, wrestling, watching movies, and other high stimulation activities close to bedtime may make falling asleep more difficult.

Screen time 

Research has shown that screen time immediately before bed can result in sleep difficulties. Too much screen use (i.e. television, computer, mobile phone, video gaming device) in children has consistently been shown to delay bedtime and result in a shorter total sleep time. Exposure to bright light from television or computer screens close to bedtime may interfere with the body’s normal sleep-wake cycle by suppressing the production of the hormone melatonin. Using screens near bedtime (1 hour before) is also associated with poor sleep quality and daytime sleepiness.

Daily Physical Exercise 

Regular physical activity has a positive effect on sleep quality, including improving the time spent asleep versus awake in bed, decreasing the number of times children wake up each night, and increasing how rested they feel the next day. So make sure your child’s day includes lots of opportunities for them to be physically active

Healthy Food and Beverages

Drinking caffeinated beverages can negatively affect children and adolescents’ sleep by increasing the time it takes them to fall asleep and decreasing the amount and quality of sleep they do get. Caffeine-containing drinks commonly consumed by children include pop, iced tea, and energy drinks.

Student Sleep Challenge

For the next two weeks student have been asked to keep a sleep log and try to make some minor changes to their sleep routine (ie. no tech an hour before bed or same bedtime/wake-up time each day) to see what impact minor changes may have on their mood, energy levels, focus, daytime sleepiness etc.  Students will be graded on their ability to self-reflect on their sleep routines and identify ways they can individually improve their own sleep hygiene. Ask your child what they think might help improve their sleep hygiene and help them test out some of these tips at home to see if it gives them a better nights sleep.

ATTENTION FAMILIES – FREE SOCIAL MEDIA AND DIGITAL CITIZENSHIP SESSION: February 3rd at 6:30pm PT for 60 minutes.

Student Session on Social Media Awareness:
“Establishing Safe, Caring and Respectful Digital Communities” for students Gr 8-12 (Also, open to Grade 6/7 Students).

Typically these sessions are during school hours and are meant for students to watch in their classrooms with their teachers. However, this session is during the evening but still intended for students.

This is not a parent/guardian/caregiver session, but it is an opportunity for parents to learn alongside their high school / middle school students.

Link to register: https://event-wizard.com/SocialMediaAwarenessStudentFeb32022pm/0/register/

The Zoom link will be sent out 2 days prior to the session for everyone who is registered.

Please note that there will be early dismissals on Wednesday, Feb 2nd and Thursday, Feb 3rd.  French classes will be dismissed at 1:45pm and English classes at 2:00pm.  Teachers will be using this time to contact parents regarding their child’s progress.

Student Absence & Functional Closure Information

A functional closure will occur when we do not have sufficient staffing levels to adequately supervise or instruct children within a school. This situation could arise due to staff illness as COVID cases increase in the community. If this happens, students will begin learning remotely from home with materials and support provided by myself or a substitute if I happen to be away.

As much notice as possible will be given in the event of a functional closure before making the shift to remote learning. We recognize that any closure is stressful for the school community and that sudden changes in routine will cause disruption and inconvenience for many families but we hope that such situations will be infrequent. With everyone taking additional safety precautions the hope is to avoid functional closures but need to be prepared just in case we do experience staffing shortages.

Please continue to follow all the preventative measures, self-monitor for symptoms, and keep your child home if they are sick or displaying any symptoms of COVID-19.

If your child is away sick or there is a shift to remote learning please have your child check Microsoft Teams and our classroom blog for any missed work and important deadlines.

If you are choosing to keep your child home as a precaution you should access additional learning materials on the Continuing Learning website:

If you have any questions regarding this information please do not hesitate to contact me. Thank you again for your continued support. We will get through this new wave together as we have with previous waves.

Ms. Smith