Monthly Archives: September 2014

Week of September 29

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What fabulous weather!  I hope everyone took the opportunity to relax and enjoy the sunshine.

Reminder: Open House for our class (room 216) is Wednesday, October 1,  3:45-5:45.

This week we will be participating in our guess the baby photo contest. We will use this opportunity to start writing short phrases about the main events in our lives.  Building individual timelines of key life events is part of the social studies curriculum as well as a math concept with regard to sequencing time.  In language, we will work on the vowel sound “o” as well as completing short booklets on the different verbs we use to express actions.  Starting on Friday, I will send home the homework folders and ask that they be returned every Thursday along with library books.  I’ll post more details about the homework later in the week.

In math, we have started a new unit on number sense.  There are five strands in the math curriculum and they include the following:

Five Strands of math In number sense, we will take a closer look at recognizing numerals and the different ways they are written, estimating, adding on, take away, more, less, the same, sequencing in order and size and 1st, 2nd, 3rd etc.  (all in French).  I have lots of hands on math activities and I encourage the children to manipulate and learn in an interactive, math friendly way.

 

In visual arts we created some very cool and colorful parrot friends in clay.  You can meet them on Wednesday at the open house!  We will be learning about speech bubbles and how we can write interesting speech bubbles for our parrots!  The children are also practising and honing their scissor skills.  Cutting well with scissors is an important skill and one that often needs a little “tweaking” in grade one. Children often need extra help knowing how to hold scissors, how to hold the paper, and how to use the proper part of the scissor blades to cut effectively.  It’s not just about cutting paper, it’s also about building the muscles in the hand to help them with printing and lots of other fine motor skills.  Please feel free to ask if you want more information.

We will be starting our science studies soon by taking a close look at the season autumn as well as plants and seeds.  More details to follow.

Have a wonderful, sun filled week.  I look forward to welcoming and visiting with you at our open house.

Orma

Week of September 22

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Greetings!  Here are a few reminders for you-

Tuesday, Sept. 23- school council meeting

Unknown-58Wednesday, Sept. 24 -send in baby photos please. If you missed that email, here’s the information again:

As part of our Social Studies curriculum, we take a close look at personal timelines and discuss important life events.  One way I like to do this is by making a guess the baby photo bulletin board.  I ask that you send in a photo of your child as a baby (name written on the back please) by Wednesday, September 24.  While I will take good care of the photo and return it to you, please keep in mind that sometimes photos get crumpled in backpacks or enroute to school when choosing the photo you wish to send.Thursday, September 25 Library Starts

Unknown-59Wed. Sept. 24- Terry Fox Run– donations accepted with appreciation.  You should have received a form in your child’s note tote a while ago.

 

Wednesday, Oct. 1, Open House room 216 3:45-5:45.  School wide open house- 4:30-6:30.Unknown-60

 

Tuesday, October 7- Photo DayUnknown-61

Friday October 10 -PD day.  No school for children

Monday, October 13- Thanksgiving. Holiday.

Wednesday, November 5- photo retake

All school wide events are also noted at our school website- please check there for more details.

This week’s curriculum learning goals.

This week in math we will be finishing up our first unit on patterning and classifying objects.  We have started to learn how to keep math journals to write about our math learning and will spend more time this week working on that skill.  This is a key goal in math learning throughout school as children learn to understand and discuss concepts with the goal of a greater understanding than just memorizing how to do something.

In language, our word work will build on the sound “i” in French as found in words like “dit. gris., si.”.  I spend a lot of time modeling good reading strategies and hope that the children start to use these strategies on a regular basis.  I use the reminder that “Reading is a fun S.P.O.R. T. – La Lecture est un S.P.O.R.T. amusant! The first three strategies that I stress are “T” for touch the word (touchez), I like the children to touch the word as they read as this helps keep them focused on the task and avoid skipping words- a common problem in early reading. “O” for open your mouth, or ouvrez la bouche (O)- often children can experience success if they just start off the word by saying the first sound.  The “R” is for Regardez- or look at the picture.  Using picture clues to help decode words is an important strategy that often gets forgotten.  I will write about letters P and S next week- hope the suspense is not too challenging:)

In social studies we continue to talk about rules and responsibilities we follow at school and home. We have been watching short role play videos and acting out different ways to handle all sorts of situations on the playground and in the class.  The school wides WITS initiative is also an integral part of our study in this unit as children learn coping strategies to deal with problems (W -walk away- I- ignore T- Talk it out and S seek help).  This program is called D.I.R.E. in French and we reinforce this learning during our lessons.

I’ve attached two songs. One is a favourite this time of year. The other song is more advanced, but the photos and vocab are great for our social studies.

Have a great week everyone!

 

Ipad apps I use in class- early writing

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From time to time, parents ask what iPad apps I use in class.  These entries are just meant to let you know what I’m using to help lend an understanding of one of the ways I use technology in the class and give the information in case you wish to use the app at home.  However,  I have no expectation that parents use these apps at home.

Dictée Muette Montessori by l’escapadou   also available for android devices

This app has 240 French words and provides picture and sound clues to help the children build the words.  Vowels are blue letters, and consonants are red letters.  We talk a lot about blue and red letters in grade one.  The children are rewarded with interactive play after each word is completed. This is a great way to build and reinforce early writing skills.

Note- the text can easily be changed to printing from script.

dictee-iphone-1

Week of September 15

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Week number three already!  Hopefully routines are getting a little easier for everyone.

logo-2On Friday, we had an excellent assembly organized by Mrs. Jen Ramsay with regard to our bully prevention strategies based on the WITS program.  Members of our community came to help out with the assembly and add strength to the messages.  Officer Shields with the Ottawa police force spoke about the “W”- walk away strategy and how sometimes the best strategy is to walk away from a problem situation.  Our trustee, Mrs. Boothby, spoke about sometimes we need to ignore certain behaviors – the “I”.  Mayor Jim Watson spoke about the importance of talking out a problem with others- the “T”.  Councillor Marianne Wilkinson and Superintendent Brent Reynolds spoke about the importance of seeking help when needed- the “S”.  Principal Shirley and Vice-principal Martinez also spoke to the primary students about using their “WITS” collectively.  I will continue to model and reinforce these strategies in the classroom.  Typically, grade one is a year of great social growth as children continue to learn how to make friends, play co-operatively, and solve problems independently.

Unknown-52This week in language our word work focus will be on the vowel sound “e” as found in words such as “cheval, mer, renard”.  We will also take a close look at breaking down this vowel sound into syllables or “small words” and making comparisons with last week’s “a” sound.  This word work  becomes a starting point for early writing.  Taking a risk in the writing process can be difficult- especially in French.  I reassure the children that their writing does not have to be perfect- if I can read what they have written then they are a successful writer!  Yes, that usually means invented spelling until they start to transfer more of our focused instruction to daily practice.  After 20+ years of teaching and reading early writing, I’m pretty good at figuring out their writing and seeing how they are growing in their understanding of the sound/print connections and application of writing conventions (spacing, punctuation, capitalization, etc.).  It’s a journey.

In reading and integrated social studies, we will start to learn one song or poem a week and take a closer look at two pattern books.  These songs and pattern books become the basis of our at home reading program (which starts the first week of October).  As I introduce the songs I will post the youtube link at the blog so the children can enjoy at home if desired.  We continue to build a class big book on the rules and responsibilities we follow at school and home.

In math, we will continue to review and develop our understanding of building and growing patterns using concrete (or “hands-on”) materials.  The children are also reviewing the ability to sort objects based on one or two attributes (e.g., how should we sort our art supplies? how should we sort different types of keys? money?).

In art, we experimented with paint and oil pastels as we learn about proportion, blending, and lines.  We will continue to build on this topic with one of my favorite read aloud books by Peter Reynolds…”Un bon point pour Zoé”.

Have a great week everyone.  Please always feel free to drop me an email if you have any questions or concerns you wish to discuss.

Reminder: Open House for the school Wed., October 1- 4:30-6:30

OPEN HOUSE for our class (Room 216)- 3:45-5:45– This allows me to attend the Jack Donohue open house (where my children attend).  Thank you for your understanding.

Savez-vous plantez les choux? Fun to sing, read, and dance to!

A fun song we do for math warm ups!

 

Week of September 8th

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Greetings!  I’m so pleased with the start we have made to grade one and very proud of the children as they adjust to a new school year.  Here are some of the main learning goals we will be working on this week:

Unknown-46In language, we will be starting our working with words activities. Each Monday we focus on a sound pattern in French and build our understanding through different hands on, individual, partner, and group activities.  The children make and keep word sort containers which we add to each week.  I’ll talk more about this strategy as a building block for reading and writing development in the weeks to follow.  I also introduce a short pattern book every other day and these books will become our take home reading program for the first half of this term- you can look for them at the beginning of October.  Our daily read aloud typically draws upon one of the themes we are studying in class and is used as a discussion point to support that learning.

Unknown-47

Our integrated social studies and language theme this month will focus on Rules and Responsibilities.  We will read some great books on the subject as well as build our own books on the important rules we have at home and school and the different responsibilities we have.Unknown-49

In math, we are taking a close look at how objects around us are grouped and organized.  We will also look at building and extending patterns (une suite).fallpatterns

 

This term, I also go over proper pencil grip and introduce and reinforce proper letter formation.  Here is some information on the tripod grip, the sky grass dirt printing strategy, and the handwriting without tears program that I find very helpful for children as they learn to correctly form letters and eliminate mixing capitals and lower case letters and reversals (common challenges in grade one).

I believe it is important that children learn how to hold a pencil properly and form letters properly and efficiently- mastering these skills makes the true writing process of forming and expressing thoughts less laborious.

Correct way to hold a pencil.

Correct way to hold a pencil.

Two strategies I use include the “sky, grass, dirt” approach, and the commercial program, “handwriting without tears”. The correct pencil grip is called a tripod grip.

In the sky, grass, dirt strategy, we discuss tall letters that go up to the sky (capital letters, and the letters, b, d, f, h, k, l, t, are all sky letters), grass letters that sit in the grass such as a, c, e, i, m, n, o, r, s, u, v, w, x, z), and dirt letters that start in the grass and go down to the dirt (g, j, p, q, y). Here’s a picture of what I mean to help you see the letter placement.  To start children off, I colour the grass, sky and dirt on their page and challenge them to keep their letters in the correct place.

Correct letter placement.

Correct letter placement.

Lastly, here’s a link to the handwriting without tears instruction. Even though this is a commercial site, there’s some great information for parents here which is free to use. If your child comes home talking about “c magique” or magic c, you will know that is an important printing strategy I use in class. http://www.hwtears.com/hw

There’s lots more happening as well- but these are just some of the main points.  We will be having a special student assembly on Friday- I’ll post more information later in the week.

Have a great week everyone!

Absence and late arrival Reminders

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If your child will be absent from school, please phone the school attendance line to inform us.  If  your child arrives late to school (after the 9:15 bell) please ensure you take your child to the office to sign in for the day.  I send my attendance down to the office immediately as part of our safe arrival program.  As such, any late arrivals are marked as absent by me, Unknown-45and that child in turn needs to check in with the office so that the attendance can be adjusted.  Additionally, we sometimes are out of the class for events such as gym, library, or an assembly and the office will be aware of that information for late arriving students.  Thank you for your support.