Well Done

 It has been a busy week! Thanks so much to all families who worked sooooo hard to support the kids this week. Tons of technology learning for all! I very much appreciate all you have done and look forward to seeing your children back in class!

Teach your monster to read can continue to be used at home to support student learning. We only have access to ipads in class so we cannot use it at school. It is a fantastic tool for learning all letter sounds and phonemes. You can also use Raz kids. There is never too much reading. It is intended as a home reading program but we use it here in class as well.  The class library in the Google classroom is always open for use too.

We will be using Mathletics and Boom cards here at the school to work on Math, Science and Social studies. These should be only used at school unless using Live Mathletics which is a basic facts learning application.

Our word work words for next week will be: 

1. be

2. are

3. for 

4. by

5. as

Patroler are Back on Duty!

Parents – just a reminder that our patrollers are on duty each morning in rain, snow, and fine weather (We do not patrol on blue days).  Could you please wait until they call, ‘Point, double-check, and proceed,’ before making your way between the pylons and safely across the street.   

Patroller schedules were sent home today! Please ensure your children are familiar with their day and time. We are only doing morning patrols for now. Please arrive at 7:45 am, get ready, be on the crosswalk with your team at 7:50 am. Shifts end just after 8:00 then students will head to class. Subs should also be on time in case they are needed! 

 

Please also be aware of our parking guidelines. 

They are: 

-no parking for any length of time in the bus zone!  

-no parking within 5 metres of a stop sign or crosswalk or corner of 2 streets (Tell them they should be able to take 5 large steps between their vehicle and any of these)  

-stay out of the staff parking lot 

 

Thank you as well to our Patrol parents who ensure our students arrive on time to volunteer.  It’s greatly appreciated! 

 

Mr Lancée & Mr Shackelton 

Your BHS Patrol Supervisors 

No Valentines exchange...

💔 

I am sorry all! If you read the message that came home from the school you will already know that we will not be exchanging valentines this year in consideration of the ongoing covid challenges.

An additional note in regards to home reading books, I will be isolating folders for a day before exchanging books to ensure all our friends are kept safe. Please know that when books are returned it will be a full 24hrs before I send a new one. Please use epic books (level 'A') books to fill the off days. If you need help with accessing this please let me know. I can set up a teams meeting to show you how to use and access these books.

Once your child has memorized the sight words on the ring that has been sent home, please have your child tell me so that I can test them and give them five new words to work on. Many of these words cannot be sounded out. We call them rule breaker words. They make up approximately 75% of what we read. 

Please make sure you are connecting to the Google Classroom Please email me asap if you need assistance! aediduch@cbe.ab.ca

 

Lunar New Year and Groundhog Day

 What a busy two first days of the week! Tuesday was Lunar New Year. We learned all about the celebration and how many friends are celebrating and welcoming in the year of the tiger. We watched dragon dances and made our very own dragons to make dance.

Today was Groundhog day. We learned about the folklore behind this day, watched the groundhog day celebration in Nova Scotia and built our very own groundhog puppets. We added a song and a poem to our poem and song books to practice reading as a large group.

I have seen amazing growth in our little learners since the beginning of January! We are starting to be able to use our letter sounds to sound out to read and write!  Our ability read read sight words is also improving! We are starting to talk about how stories have a beginning, middle and end and continue to work on story retelling.

In Math we are working hard to understand addition and subtraction we are learning to use counters (manipulatives), drawings, and number lines to understand the concept of more/less and bigger/smaller when working on equations.

In Social studies we have begun to talk about the concept of citizenship. We have talked about how groups make decisions and how we can be kind.

In Science, we are working on mixing paint and will be applying paint various surfaces to see the effect. I suggest students don't wear their very favourite clothes for the next two weeks. There is always a risk of getting paint on clothes. 

I have had a couple of friend ask about Valentines day. I will allow the exchange of Valentines this year as long as there is one for everyone. We have 17 friends in our class. And that they come early so that we can isolate them for a couple days before handing out in consideration of Covid.

This weeks word work words are:

she

are

book

name

little

We will use these words for the next two weeks because it is a short week. There will be a quiz next week.

Word work for Jan 24-28

 This week's word work words are :

1. they

2. yes

3. big

4. no

5. maybe

In math we learned a game with cards that will help us memorize our basic facts. 

Materials: Deck of cards with the face cards removed. Aces can stay and be used as 1’s.

 How to Play The object of the game is to get two cards that total 10. 

1. Each player is dealt five cards. The rest of the cards are placed in a “pond” in the center of the table. 

2. If you have any pairs of cards that total 10 (or you have a number “10” card), put them down in front of you and replace those cards with cards from the “pond”. 

3. Take turns. On a turn, ask one other player for a card that will go with a card in your hand to make 10. 4. If you get a card that makes 10, put the pair of cards down. Take one card from the “pond”. Your turn is over. If you do not get a card that makes 10, take a card from the “pond” after your partner says, “Go Fish”. Your turn is over. If the card you take from the pond makes 10 with a card in your hand, put the pair down and take another card. 

5. If there are no cards left in your hand, but still cards in the pond, you take two cards. 

6. The game is over when there are no more cards. 

7. At the end of the game, make a list of the number pairs you made.

Guest Teachers

 We have had some lovely guest teachers in our room this last week when I was away. The student have had the opportunity to get to know Mr. Hebert our principal. He also got to know your children and he mentioned how fun it was to be in our class spending time with your kids. What a great group! 💜 

He spent some time working on short 'i' words, and building understanding of the concept of more and less with the students. This is an area we will be continuing to work on for the next little while as we build understanding of addition and subtraction. 

The students watched a wonderful performance put on by the Calgary Public Library and the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra called Napi and the Rock. It is a 25 minute story of how the Big Rock in Okotoks came to be. Then we talked about  how we can take care of our world. Students came up with ideas like: planting trees, picking up garbage, not feeding animals, walking on paths,  not pickin flowers and saying thank-you to the land!

Such kind kids!

January 17-21

 It was a busy day in room four! Students are getting the hang of using letter sounds to sound out new three letter words! Super proud of their growth!

We started off learning a new routine called number of the day. We are learning to write digits, number words, and represent a number on a place value chart as well as using tally marks and on a number line.

After that the W.O.W words were introduced. This weeks words are as follows:

1. had

2. was

3. up

4. will

5.have

Increasing patterns is a concept the grade twos are covering during their small group instruction time with Ms. B. The whole class looked at the increasing patterns found in the story/song "There was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly".

In Math we have begun using number lines and counting on as a strategy for addition and will look at this concept tomorrow during a lesson on subtraction.

We are learning about Walking Stories and how they have a repeating phrase that is used. We have read all the Snowmen at night stories and brainstormed what we would like to so with a snowman if it were alive. Wh then used the sentence frame, "If my snowman was alive we would..." to write four sentences about our snowmen.

Today the Rapid testing kits and mask arrived at school.  You should find both along with a letter in your child's backpack. Fingers crossed everyone is health and I see all back tomorrow.

Be well! 

Mrs. Diduch