The Room 5 Interview Show!

Our guest this week was Mrs. Farrelly. She is the principal of our school.

Update from Ms. R

The homework for this week is to complete the homework worksheet on math and writing. This homework is due on Friday, January 31.
Important Dates: 

February 12 - Report Cards go home
February 13 (evening) - Selected parent/teacher interviews
February 17 - Family Day Holiday
February 20 - Family Fitness Night
March 7 - P.A. Day - no classes on this day
March 10 to 14 - March Break Holiday

News for January 23

News for January 23

This four-day week the students started a big project....our weekly Room 5 Interview Show! Every week, two students will interview a school staff member. The children had to think of all the parts of a TV show from the questions to the credits. This week Etienne and Lola U. interviewed the principal of our school, Mrs. Farrelly. Please look for the video in a separate posting.

In math, the children finished the unit on 3D geometry. As a connection to learning about Chinese New Year, the students reviewed shape names as they folded red envelopes (lai see) to create a 3D lantern to decorate the hallway outside of our classroom. They also had a chance to create 3D figures out of paper "nets". Finally, they finished up the unit by completing a review sheet of 2D and 3D geometry concepts.

In science, the children did some experiments to look at mixing liquids and solids. A solid plastic die does not dissolve in water but a sugar cube does. Vegetable oil did not mix with water but did when liquid soap was added. 

The class learned about how wool is processed from the sheep to knitted and woven fabric. This week we started this unit of study by dyeing the natural white sheep's wool with Kool-aid (for example, lime Kool-aid creates green). After dissolving the solid crystals into a tub of water, the students learned that vinegar is added so that the colour stays on the wool and hot water is used to speed up the process, but doesn't change what would otherwise happen (in science, this is called a "catalyst").

The class used our list of what makes a fairy tale different from other fiction stories to analyze the fairy tales, The Emperor's New Clothes and Chicken Licken. Each student was challenged to write his/her own fairy tale that has at least three fairy tale characteristics. The whole class managed to finished planning these stories and are now working on the rough copies.

We continued our vocabulary building this week by taking the cards the children made last week and choosing some every day to talk about. "Honour" and "transport" are just two examples...

The class worked on our movie about Flat Stanley and the flat students that the children made. We thought about all the different things the students did around the school and then we took photos and videos of the students doing things with their "flat" friends. Look for the video in another posting!

At the end of the week, the children began to design the covers for their new art journals. So, not only will they create art inside the journal but they will also design and make the journal itself. This week they used sharpie marker to make an abstract design and learned how to use watercolour pencil crayons to add colour to the spaces in their design.

Books read aloud this week:

The Emperor's New Clothes by Hans Christian Andersen

Pelle's New Suit by Elsa Beskow

Farmer Brown Shears His Sheep by Teri Sloat

Update from Ms. R

The homework for this week is to write a story in the homework journal based on the colourful band-aid Ms. R taped inside. The class talked about fiction ideas (e.g., a "magic" band-aid) and non-fiction ideas (e.g., who invented the band-aid?). There is also a math worksheet reviewing 2D and 3D geometry vocabulary. This homework is due on THURSDAY, January 23 (due to Friday being a P.A. Day).

     

News for January 17

News for January 17

This week  the students

In math, the class began to study three-dimensional or 3D figures. After learning the parts of a 3D figure (vertices, edges and faces) they practised finding and counting these on 3D models. For grade two the categories of 3D shapes are prisms and pyramids (plus others such as spheres, cylinders and cones). Each child had a chance to create their own 3D figures using toothpicks (the edges) and small balls of plasticine (the vertices). After making their models, the students wrote about what they learned. Finally, they made a display of their work by making a good copy of their writing and a photo of him/herself holding the 3D figures.

The students did a choral reading of the traditional fairy tale, The Elves and the Shoemaker. This was in the form of a script, so children had an opportunity to read the different character parts. The class also added to our list of things found in fairy tales (e.g., fictional characters like giants, elves and trolls).

The class did a "Mad Libs" writing activity to practice what they know about nouns, adjectives and verbs, using the framework of the story Little Red Riding Hood.

This week the students investigated the features of our classroom dictionaries. They found that the words were in alphabetical order and for each word there was a lot of information besides what the word means (e.g., how to pronounce the word). The students generated over 90 vocabulary cards listing words that they didn't know. Also at the back of the dictionaries is information about  calendars, holidays, math units and Canada. This prompted a short lesson on how Canada is divided up into smaller parts called provinces and territories. The students even learned a song to help them remember the names and order of the 10 provinces and 3 territories.

The class read a non-fiction story on the properties of liquid water. Using containers of different sizes and shapes they experimented with the idea that liquids do not have a shape and therefore take on the shape of the container it's in. The next challenge was to take a piece of plasticine and put it in the water (it sank to the bottom) and how they could change the shape of the plasticine to make it float. The children also read about icebergs and how they are like gigantic ice cubes floating in the oceans!

The children used black wax pencils ("China marker") to create drawings inside the colourful picture frames they made last week. These are now on display in our classroom.

Our class was asked by Mr. Grundy's kindergarten class to have a "gingerbread man trap" to help them with their study of the story, The Gingerbread Man. The next day, we did indeed catch a gingerbread man much to the surprise and delight of the kindergarten students!

The class started to plan for our new Internet TV show called "The Room 5 Interview Show". We brainstormed the people that the class would like to know more about and made a list. Watch for our first show starting next week!

Books read aloud this week:

Flat Stanley by Jeff Brown (chapter book - finished)
Goldilocks and Just One Bear by Leigh Hodgkinson
The King's Chessboard (a fairy tale from India) retold by David Birch
The Jolly Postman (fairy tale letters) by Janet and Allen Ahlberg
The Elves and the Shoemaker (traditional fairy tale)

Our Amaryllis

Here is our beautiful Amaryllis plant!

Unfortunately, it did not flower before the winter holidays, but Bhavya's family looked after our plant for us and sent this picture. Thanks so much for looking after our plant for us!

Update from Ms. R

Welcome back to everyone! I would like to take this opportunity to wish all the families of Room 5 a happy new year and all the best for 2014.

The homework for this week is to complete the worksheet with a geometry activity on one side and a science activity on the other side. The writing assignment is linked to our reading of the chapter book, Flat Stanley. Each child made a flat version of him/herself to take home. Each child is to write about what adventures the flat student had while at the student's home. These stories will become part of a class book for all the children to read. If possible, please take a digital photo of the figure doing something with your child and send it to me at nrawlinson@rogers.com. I'm looking forward to reading all of the stories! This homework is due on Friday, January 17.

News for January 10

News for January 10

Despite losing a day this week to the closing of the school because there was no heat in the classrooms, the students of Room 5 got back to work during this first week back at school.

In math, the students finished up the first half of our geometry unit on two-dimensional shapes. They reviewed the features of 2D shapes (vertices and sides) and the names of the shapes. The children traced around various shapes to create a drawing of a building. Then, each child counted the number of different shapes they used to draw their building and finally they wrote about what happens in their building and why it is important. Among the buildings created were a hotel, fire station, jelly factory and many more!

The students learned about the ancient Chinese puzzle called the Tangram. Tangram puzzles are made up of 7 different geometric shapes and are used to create pictures. The goal is to position the puzzle pieces to match the shape of the picture. The children had lots of practice solving these puzzles and proved to themselves that they got faster at solving the puzzles the more they practiced. Then each child created his/her own tangram puzzle and the students got to solve each other's puzzles. Finally, we had a fun "contest" to see who was the fastest tangram puzzle solver. Congratulations to Lola U. and Padmira!

The class said "good bye" to the 95 word wall words we've studied so far, as they were taken down to make room for the next words. The children created their own personal dictionaries by writing down the word wall words in alphabetical order. Each child now has a reference book to look at for the correct spelling of these words.

In science, the students read about liquids and solids and how they are different. This week we focused on how liquid water turns into solid ice. Each child had their own plastic bottle with water in it. All the bottles were kept outside for two days. Since it was below O degrees Celsius outside, of course the water froze into ice BUT the surprising things were that the ice was bigger than the liquid water and that the ice floated on top of the liquid water as the ice melted.

In guided reading, the students worked in groups to read the fairy tale, The Three Billy Goats Gruff, and started to compile a list of things that make a fairy tale different from other fiction stories.

On Friday, the children started to create a new large painting project by designing a frame for the painting using coloured masking tape.

Books read aloud this week:

Flat Stanley by Jeff Brown (chapter book) - We are lucky to have a class set of these books. The students and I read aloud the chapters together.

Three Pigs, One Wolf and Seven Magic Shapes by Grace Maccarone

Update from Ms. R

Well, after 9 days without electricity and 14 days without an internet connection, we're finally back to normal at the Rawlinson household! I apologize for taking so long to post the photos and blog.

The homework assigned was that there was no homework over the holidays! I hope everyone had a happy and safe holiday.

Important dates:

January 6 - first day of classes for 2014
January 24 - P. A. Day - no classes on this day
Week of February 10 - Report Cards go home
February 14 - Valentine's Day
February 17 - Family Day holiday - no classes on this day
March 10-14 - March Break

Dewey the library cat

The students learned the story about a real cat named Dewey, that was the "library cat" in a public library for 19 years. Here is a video of this special cat:

News for December 19

News for December 19


The last week of school went by very fast and was only four days long...

We had several assemblies. There were two sing-a-long assemblies and an athletic assembly. At the two sing-a-long assemblies, the students had a chance to sing with other students, some traditional holiday songs. Since the children had learned the history and meaning of the lyrics of many holiday songs during our daily guided reading times last week, this was a great chance to sing these songs with their friends. During the athletic assembly, Francesca honoured the athletic achievements of individual students and teams.

The children created paper lanterns by finding and tracing geometric shapes (for example, circles, triangles and rectangles) on to thick paper and cutting out the shapes. Then they glued on pieces of thin paper behind the shape openings to create windows. They used thin, black markers to draw designs on the windows. Finally, the students each taped the sides to make a box shape and put a battery-operated light inside to create the lantern effect.

Each student had a chance to read an electronic version of our read aloud book, Kate & Pippin,  using the book app on an iPad, for a different type of book reading experience.

The class did some games to review the word walls words they have studied so far this year. Then, they were challenged to count how many words were up on the wall. Working in pairs, the children counted the number of words using various strategies (for example, tallying the number of words beginning with each letter, then using skip counting to find the total). The final total was 95 words that they must remember how to spell correctly, for the rest of their lives! (That's an ongoing joke in Room 5.)

Students were given a small, stuffed evergreen tree and asked to use this tree for inspiration to write fiction stories with a focus on adding adjectives to their writing. The students used all the writing stages (planning, rough copy, editing, good copy, front and back book covers) to create small books to attach to the little tree.

After reading Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas, the students watched the cartoon version to analyze what was the same and what was different between the book and the DVD.

The students reviewed the science concept of solids dissolving in liquids by doing a delicious experiment...making hot chocolate. Then they sat down with some snacks to finish watching the movie Santa Claus is Coming to Town.

Finally, our amaryllis plant has grown to a height of 60 cm and has not one, but two flower bulbs. Many thanks to Bhavya's family for taking care of our plant over the holidays!

Books read aloud this week:

Kate & Pippin: An Unlikely Love Story by Martin Springett
How the Grinch Stole Christmas by Dr. Seuss
Dewey - There's a Cat in the Library! by Vicki Myron
(Dewey's Christmas at the Library by Vicki Myron)