The Nutcracker Ballet

This Friday we are all going to the Michael J. Fox Theatre to see this ballet.  The Nutcracker has long been a Christmas tradition.  The costumes are generally spectacular and the music by Tchaikovsky is magnificent.

Mrs. Schwarz has been introducing the music – one song each day – during the Music Listening programme this week.  My personal favourite song from this ballet is the “Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairies”.

Mrs. Levington will be reading the story of this ballet to our class during our regular library session on Thursday afternoon.  This will help the students understand the storyline as the story of ballet is told strictly through music and dancing – without dialogue.

As we will be leaving early on Friday via school bus we will be eating lunch earlier than normal.  Please ensure that your child brings lunch with them when they arrive in the morning.  A lunch delivery at noon will be too late for them to eat as we will be gone by then.

This trip to the ballet is a great opportunity for the students to experience.  I am looking forward to it and hope that the students also enjoy it.

Our Poppies

We created some beautiful poppies for Remembrance Day.  We began by drawing the poppies on white drawing paper.  Students then traced over their pencil lines with china grease markers.  Using tempera paint, students painted the centres green and the petals red.  They were encouraged to go ‘over the lines’ of the china markers.  A few days later, when the paint was dried, students cut out their poppies and glued them onto dark green construction paper.

I really enjoy how all the poppies are uniquely different from each other.  These 9 are only a sample of the class collection.  They are all displayed in the classroom on the back bulletin board – with two on the bulletin board outside of our door in the hallway.  Drop by to see them if you get a chance.

Recipe Book

I have just added one of my favourite recipes to the website where Rosser recipes are being collected for our community cookbook project.  It was a really easy process.  Here is the link:

www.cookbookprinter.com

Username: rosserelementary     Password: rosser8801

Please take some time to go to this website and add your child’s favourite recipe.  It would be great if all of the students could have an entry in the finished book.  I am looking forward to seeing the completed cookbook.

Hallowe’en Costumes

We had a very fun-filled and exciting Hallowe’en day.  We began with our Hallowe’en parade in the gym with the whole school.  Don’t they look great??

We had our regular morning routines through until lunchtime.  After lunch we were invited by Mr. Phelps to watch “The Great Pumpkin” cartoon with Charlie Brown.  I then read them “Froggy’s Hallowe’en” before we went up to the Haunted House put on by the Me to We club.  Our class collected a whole box of canned goods for the Food Bank!!  Well done!!

The rest of our afternoon was spent with Hallowe’en games, cupcakes (for Marco’s birthday), and Centres.  A very fun afternoon.

Pumpkin Carving with our Buddies

We had a very fun-filled afternoon as the whole school worked in the gym carving pumpkins.  Division 5 was partnered up with Division 2 for our first ‘buddy’ activity of the school year.  Everyone seemed to have a very good time getting to know their new buddy – plus, of course, cleaning and carving their pumpkin.

These great looking jack o’lanterns will be picked up from our school tomorrow and will be set up at the Confederation Park train for their display for Hallowe’en tomorrow evening.

Colour Theory with Paint

 As a follow up to our experimentation with wax crayons in primary colours (red, blue, and yellow), where we made the intermediate colours (orange, purple, and green), we had fun last Friday working with Solucryl acrylic paint and water.

We began by working on regular bond paper to get used to using this media.  Most of the students had previous experience with tempera paint but this paint has a different texture and maneuverability than regular paints.

I then gave them each a sheet of 140 lb. water colour paper to work with.  Their instructions were that they needed to: 1) only use the three primary colours given to them  2) create an abstract (not realistic) picture  3) cover the entire paper (no white showing) and  4) have all six colours represented in their finished work.

Most students managed to complete their artwork with all four criteria covered.  Come and check out the bulletin boards outside of our classroom.  I think they look great!

Stellaluna

Last week we began our bat study with the reading of this great book.  Students then did a sequencing activity which resulted in the creation of their own little booklets.  Through this story students learned a lot of valuable information about bats – and the differences between them and birds.  We will continue to explore these differences as we learn more about these flying mammals – bats.

Our Bat Cave

As part of our exploration of bats, today we did a survey of how we feel about these interesting – and sometimes scary looking – animals.  Students decorated their own bat (with whatever colours they wanted) and then we placed these in one of three columns in our bulletin board bat cave.  Students had the choice of “I like bats . . .”, “I don’t like bats . . . “, and “I am not sure how I feel (about bats) . . .”

I have been encouraging students to make up their own minds and not to choose the option that their friends – or the majority of the class – chooses.  This has been a bit of an issue with our morning sign-in graph as many students just put their ‘doodle bug’ name where they see everyone else answering – oftentimes without even reading the question.  We will continue to work on this.

Making Intermediate Colours

We have been learning about one of the elements of art – colour theory.  Students were directed to use only the three primary colours – red, yellow, and blue – to create the three intermediate colours – orange, purple, and green.  Students began by creating a design of a variety of shapes with a felt marker.  They then filled these shapes in by blending the primary colour wax crayons to create the intermediate colours.  They experimented with differing degrees of pressure (for darker and lighter hues) and different amounts of each primary to create a variety of shades and tints.

Playground Update

The final decision is in and the plan has been made.  If you are by the office in the next little while you can see the artist rendering of what our new playground will look like.  It is on a large white poster board.  The plan is to have the old playground removed and the new one installed in the next few weeks!  This will be determined by the weather, of course, so we are hoping that our dry spell will hold on for a little while longer.