Wednesday, 26 February 2014

FYI

Tomorrow the grades 1-8 will be hosting a concert at Winston Churchill in celebration of African Heritage month. Although our class will not be participating, please feel welcome to attend :)


Also, please remember, the $5 for Nit Wits is due THIS FRIDAY. There are still lots of children who have not brought in the money- please make sure you have it in. Merci!

Friday, 21 February 2014

Nit Wits

Dear Clairlea Families,

We have recently decided to bring the services of Nit Wits to our school community.  Nit Wits is a private company that works within many different schools and organizations to conduct lice checks throughout the year.  Nit Wits will be coming to Clairlea on the following dates to check our students for head lice:

                    Friday, March 21 and
                    Thursday, May 22.

The cost of this service is $5.00 per child and this fee includes two lice checks, education and any necessary follow-up and support for families.  Normally, we would have volunteers from our immediate community that were able to provide this service to our school.  This year, however, we had limited response and as such, felt that Nit Wits was the best viable option. 

We ask that you kindly send in the $5.00 to your child’s classroom teacher by Friday, February 28th.  If you have questions or concerns, please contact us at the office at your earliest convenience.  Thank you in advance for your cooperation and continued support.

Thursday, 20 February 2014

Les Sentiments

It has been a busy and fun couple of weeks in Room 109! In math we have continued to talk about numbers, practiced writing them as well as measurement and have been measuring different objects throughout the classroom. We've also been talking about love, family, Valentine's Day and different feelings! This week some of the new vocabulary we have learned is:
Les émotions               Emotions
Je suis…                        I am…
Heureux (euse)               Happy
Fâché (e)                       Angry
Méchant (e)                   Silly/mean
Curieux (euse)               Curious
Triste                           Sad
Peureux (euse)              Scared
Excité (e)                      Excited
Ennuyé (e)                    Bored

In language, the students have begun to learn how to retell a story using words and pictures. Their work is very creative and rather clever! In this endeavour, I have been encouraging the students to make sure they are considering the beginning, the middle, and the end of the story so their audience can understand the plot. Please encourage your child to do a short retell of what happens in the stories at home. It's great practice and is a great reading strategy for the future! Some of the students are still struggling with the idea of middle and end so work extra hard on those ones :) We also have some students who are well on their way to becoming good spellers! As much as possible, I have been asking the children to try and sound out their own words. Encourage them to do this at home as well.
Here's a quick look at what we've been up to:
Building a Master Piece in the Block Centre

Retelling 'Sans Toi!' in the Writing Centre

Measuring the Carpet with our Feet in the Math Centre

We have also started a little experiment in the Science Centre. As a school-wide eco-initiative, we are talking a look at the negative effect of road salt on our environment. One day, we found a whole bunch of salt on our carpet and we got into a discussion of what it does to snow, us, and plants. Many of us weren't really sure, so we decided to do an experiment. We got two of the same plant and put road salt in the soil of one and left the other salt free. Each day we give it what plants need to grow- water and sunshine- and we have been watching what effect the salt will have. Here is the 'Before' picture of our plants on Day 1.

Friday, 7 February 2014

Je sais mesurer!

I will start off by saying: Sorry there are no library books this week! The library has been closed due to workshops and we were unable to sign out books. Next week we will :)
It has been a fun but busy week. We continued to talk about measurement, counting and writing words. The children also had lots of fun weighing playdough and putting together puzzles. And, we did a great experiment with temperature, seeing the difference between hot water, cold water, and snow!
Here's a look:
















Don't forget! Monday is our 100th Day of School! Please try to send in a collection of 100 things so we can practice more counting.
Have a great weekend!