Update from Ms. R

Thanks so much to all the families that came to our end-of-the-year class party! The children were so excited and despite the rain, a good time was had by all.

A note was sent home last week regarding our "water day" on Tuesday, June 28 (weather permitting). Please send your child with a bathing suit and towel.

In the craziness of Friday, I forgot to give out the words to the song we learned (and performed) this week, "Summer Holiday". I will put the papers in the students' backpacks tomorrow (Monday). Please take the time to have your child read/sing the song to you.

Important Dates:

June 27 - Report cards go home

June 28 - Water Day (bathing suit and towel required!)

June 29 - Last day of classes for the school year

September 6 - First day of classes for 2011-2012

News for June 24

News for June 24

This was a busy week as the students and I worked hard to get ready for our class party at the end of the week.

The students watched as the Painted Lady butterflies were finally released. Our butterfly project is over but the children have learned a lot over the past three weeks. My favourite part from this experience this year was the conversation about how the butterflies "knew" that they could fly so high outside. They had lived their whole lives in the butterfly house in our classroom, but flew high above the trees and the school. I asked the children, "Did the butterfly read a book about flying?", "Did the butterfly go to school to learn how to fly?", "Did it's parents teach it how to fly?" Of course, the children answered "NO!" to all my questions. But the class did come to the realization that the information was somehow inside the butterfly and some suggested that the butterfly knew how to fly so high outside because it was in it's insect brain.

We talked about how our time together in Room 101 is coming to an end. The senior kindergarten children will be going on to Grade One in September, with school all-day, lunch in the cafeteria and morning and afternoon recesses. The junior kindergarten students will be going on to senior kindergarten with a different teacher next year. Some children will be going to the French immersion program. The students each got a large ziplock bag containing the work samples I have collected over the year, plus a magnifying glass so the children can continue to learn about their world over the summer.




Our end-of-the-year party was a great success. The children were so excited! They helped to get the classroom ready, they performed four songs and played with their families in our classroom.

Update from Ms. R

I apologize for the glitch in last week's posting. I thought I could get through the whole school year without a computer/internet problem but...

Thankfully, I have a teenage son who was willing to help me and I think everything is back on track.

The words to the poem "My Butterfly" were sent home this week. The students also know the American Sign Language signs to go with the words. Please have your child read/recite the poem to you.

Lots of things are happening in Room 101 as we get ready for the end of school. Please join us on Friday for our Class Party. The children will sing and reminisce about our year together. We will also go outside and have games and treats.

Important Dates:

June 24: Class Party (10:00 AM for the morning class and 2:00 PM for the afternoon class)

June 27: Report cards go home

June 29: Last day of classes

News for June 17

News for June 17

The class is very excited about our Painted Lady butterfly project. This week the first butterfly came out of it's chrysalis. At the end of the week there were 9 butterflies in our butterfly house. We put orange Gatorade in the house because the butterflies think it is nectar. We saw that the wings have beautiful patterns on them. The top side has bright colours like orange, white and black and the underside has softer colours like brown and beige. The chrysalis was as thin as tissue paper! We learned that the butterfly's tongue is long and hollow like a straw. It curls it up into a spiral when it is not using it. We butterflies' tongues when we watched them. We also noticed that we know when the butterfly is going to come out of the chrysalis, because the outside turns clear and we can see the pattern of the wings inside! All the students got to drink some Gatorade so that they could pretend they were butterflies and know what the "nectar" tasted like.

We read books about butterflies this week and one was a book that showed the patterns of the scales of the butterflies wings that looked like letters of the alphabet! As always, more information about the books we read in class can be found at our sister blog at:

http://planet5books.blogspot.com/

The class learned the poem "My Butterfly" this week. They also learned the American Sign Language signs to go along with the words in the poem. The words to this poem were sent home with your child on Friday.

The students worked hard to make gifts for Father's Day. They decorated frames and wrote words and drew pictures to go inside. The children also made butterflies out of paper and pipe cleaners to decorate the presents.

In math, the students are reviewing counting and number sense. We practised our skip counting and learned how to count by 5's.

The students are still fascinated by the insects in our playground. They are getting very good at applying their knowledge of insects to the new ones they see in the playground. One of their favourite activities is to watch the ants by the wood pieces surrounding the play equipment. We also have seen some bees and the children remember seeing honeycomb last week and having a chance to try eating some of the honey inside the hexagon-shaped honeycomb. Even bees can do math as they create hexagons!

The students are enjoying the nice weather as we do our daily physical activity time outside. One new activity we started this week was blowing bubbles. "It's like we are in a big bubble bath!" and "These look like rainbow bubbles!" were some of the observations of the children.

News for June 10

I apologize for the delay in the posting. I thought I would get through the whole school year without a computer glitch, but...

Please see the next posting for the 2 week update.

Update from Ms. R

A reminder that the school's Fun Fair is this Saturday, from 11:00 from 3:00. I hope to see you there!

The words to the Butterfly Life Cycle song were sent home with your child on Friday. Please had your child sing/read the words to you. The students also learned the American Sign Language signs that go with the words to the song.

News for June 3

News for June 3

This week the children watched the caterpillars grow and grow! In one week the caterpillars have grown so much bigger. Just like the caterpillar in the movie The Very Hungry Caterpillar. The students noticed that the caterpillars now have black and white spikes, white stripes and dots and their poop is also much bigger.

We read a non-fiction book about insects to learn more about this type of animal. The class learned that insects have 6 legs, many have their skeleton on the outside of their bodies (exoskeleton) and that they use their antennae to feel, smell and taste!This came in handy when a child called one of our caterpillars a "worm" and the class used what they learned to reason why a worm is not an insect.

The class learned a new song about the butterfly life cycle and learned the American Sign Language signs to go with the English words. A copy of this song was sent home on Friday.

We also read a fiction book called The Alphabet Tree. In this book a bee and a caterpillar help letters to make words and sentences. As always, more information about the books we read in class can be found at our sister blog site:

http://planet5books.blogspot.com/

In math, we talked a lot about the different ways of skip counting. The students reviewed counting by 2's and 10's and learned how to count by 5's.

The children were given a problem solving challenge this week using plastic cups. This year, the students have become very skilled at stacking plastic cups in different ways. So much so, that they easily can construct a tall structure on the floor that is so high they ask me to put the final cups on the top! So the challenge this week was to build structures, but each cup needed to have a plastic teddy bear in it. After several tries where the structure collapsed, the children persevered and began to use what they learned to create more stable structures.

This week all the children were tested on their alphabet/sound knowledge and sounding out of novel words using the strategies learned this year.

The afternoon class attended a school recognition assembly this week and saw a play by Mr. Lee's class.




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