Friday October 29 Day 3

Boo! 
Today we read our scary morning message and then read some not-so-scary scary poems.
We then had Drama/DPA with Ms. Leung.

After recess we completed our twigs and leaves for our "geometree." 

If you look closely you will see that the twigs are in three colours and each colour is to be either an acute, right or obtuse angle.  The leaves that were added were made by combining 2D geometric shapes.



Can you see the different angles?
Can you see how the leaves were made?

After lunch was the exciting Halloween parade.   We had some great costumes.  We had zombies, witches, Harry Potter, Wendy ( from PeterPan), Mr. T,figure skaters, storm troopers, Batman, Hannah Montana, and the Grim Reaper.   We then visited the Halloween maze in Ms. Pearlman's class. 

We we returned we ate some candy and did some activities and before you knew it, it was recess.    Last period we cleaned our desks had some more candy and did a word search.  It was a really fun day.
Have a great weekend and trick or treat safely.

HOMEWORK: Study Spelling Lesson 7
                         Read
                         Count pieces of candy in groups of ten.



Thursday October 28 Day 3

We started off with Gym today.

We then did our temp. graphs, read the morning message and then we did a math problem as a class.

After recess we had an assembly.  Today the assembly introduced the school to the character traits of  respect and responsibility.   Over the next couple of months we will  practice being more respectful and responsible and at the next assembly we will give certificates to students that best exemplify these traits.  In our class we started a chart that allows students to put sticky notes with messages about other students in the class that did something respectful or responsible.

After lunch we had independent reading.   Before beginning our literacy activities, we talked about answering questions.   We looked at where we find answers in a text.   Are they on the line, between the lines, or beyond the lines?
On the line: the answer can be taken word for word from what they are reading.
Between the line: the answer is found from clues in the text or words
Beyond the line: the answer is NOT in the text but comes from your own ideas and experiences

We also talked about answering in full sentences.  We will continue to practice these strategies.

Last period we watched a video on soil.  We learned how soil is made, where it is found and what are the components of soil.  We also saw what things live in soil and why they are important to us.

HOMEWORK: Spelling: complete all Lesson 7 activities if not done
                         Read 20 min.
                           

Wednesday October 27 Day 1

Today we were lucky to have Ms. Jean with us for half the day today. She begins a four week block on Monday.    We  did two periods of Math today and the students worked really hard.    We did four different centres.   At the end of the period we did some problem solving with base ten blocks.    The students were happy that there were so many correct answers for the numbers between the greatest and least.
       e.g)  In a bin of base-ten blocks with  100s, 10s and 1s, if you could pick any four blocks what are the numbers you could get? What is the greatest number you could get?  What is the least number you could get? 

After lunch, we talked about solving problems without using hitting or kicking.    We reviewed using the I message and using powerful words.   We also talked about making friends do things and threatening to NOT be someone's friend if they don't!   How would that make you feel?

Afterwards we editted our rough copies and completed the good copies of our descriptive paragraphs on a haunted house.   When ( and if ) the good copy was completed students began working on their Spelling Lesson 7 sentences.

Last period I worked with Gr. 3's to discuss urban and rural communities and how people meet their basic needs ( food,shelter, clothing) in different communities in different ways.   We read about how aboriginal people met their needs compared to how we do it now.

School pictures were handed out today.

The parent council is assembling classlists of numbers for parents. This is a great way to arrange play dates, invited friends to parties, and communicate between parents.  Please fill and return the forms sent last Thursday if you  are interested.

FYI:  Next week, we will begin our TLCP  ( teaching-learning critical pathway).  Our focus will be on writing. We will look at explanations, expositions (personal opinions) and recounts.   We will also focus on purpose and audience while exploring these different forms.   Now that we have a practice with basic descriptive paragraphs we can use the model to build on other forms of writing.

HOMEWORK: Spelling Lesson 7 sentences
                          Good copy of paragraph. ( 6 students)  Had 1 hour of class time to do this.
                                 Read.

Tuesday October 26 Day 5

Today I was at an in-school workshop so we had Mrs. R as a supply teacher.     She gave the students a Math Review that looked at several of the concepts covered in math this term.   I was very pleased with how the students did.     After recess they wrote in their Journals about Halloween and what they thought about it.

In an effort to reduce the socializing and increase the amount of work getting done, I rearranged desks into a new formation.  I'm hoping this will increase focus on work.

After lunch, we finished writing our descriptive paragraphs and we tried to do some peer editting.   Students exchanged what they had written with a fellow student and listened to the suggestions they had that would improve their writing.   We also all checked to make sure we had capitals at the start of each sentence and an endmark at the end.

We then did our literacy groups.   We did penmanship, grammar ( naming and telling parts of sentences) and two groups worked on reading a story and responding to questions.

Last period we went to the library with Mr. Brutto.

Several students are sad that Angi has moved and started at a new school.  We will miss her. Good luck at your new school, Angi!

HOMEWORK:  Read 20min. +

Monday October 25 Day 4

Sorry for the delayed posting.

Today Ms. Jean lead the opening activities and talked about the importance of voting and explained why the gym was closed today.    Mr. Costa took the class to the Library since Gym was closed for polling.
After recess we worked on Math activities.  We are continuing with similar strands to last week.  We are looking at number patterns in more detail this week.

After lunch, we did writing workshop.   We are still exploring descriptive paragraphs.   So we drew a haunted house in pencil.    After our sketch was complete we started our rough copy.   We started with a good topic sentence.   Our goal is to use good sentences and precise words to help readers get a better picture in their mind about what the haunted house is like.      We finished reading our novel so I asked students to do a reading response using the retell, relate, reflect guide from our response notebooks.

After recess we had our Spelling test.      We then started Lesson 7 with words from the text.

HOMEWORK: Spelling:Complete copying words, alphabetical order and syllables.
                         Read 20 min.

Friday October 22 Day 3

We started the day by graphing the temperature and reading the morning message.     We then listened to the story " Oliver and the Oil Spill."   We are learning about water in science and we talked about how water is not just used for drinking and washing and crops, but we use water to transport things across the ocean.  We even drill for oil in the ocean.   An oil spill effects lots of things and we learned how animals and the environment are impacted by spills.

In Math we finished up all unfinished work from the weeks activities so we can begin a new set next week.

 After lunch we finished our multistep art project.   We cut out our tissue paper covered leaves.   We printed out our poetic sentences from the computer lab. in which we experimented with font.   We then assembled our mixed media artwork and displayed it in the hall.    We all had to embellish the sentence " The wind blew the leaves."  to make it more interesting.     We continued to explore line by creating a black and white background and added our leaves that looked at the warm colours of fall, while working with tissue paper and a glue and water mixture.   Look at the beautiful examples below.



drawing leaves in crayon



Ezra and Jonah using paste to add tissue to leaves before painting background.

 

Mixed media: "The wind blew the leaves."

 



Artist: James

 




Artist: Kyral

 





Artist: Mikayla

 

We also finished reading the novel " The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane."  After being repaired Edward was in the doll shop.   Bryce came into see him, and was told not to come back and to say goodbye.   Edward met a little doll that told him no one would buy him because he was a rabbit and not a doll.  Edward didn't care.   He did not want to be purchased.    After a few months, a 100yr. old doll was placed next to him on the shelf.  She helped him understand how good things and bad things happen in our lifes and to be hopeful.  She told him to keep hope and someone will buy him.   Edward opened his heart. After many years sitting the shop, someone finally came and had interest in him.   A little girl named Maggie.  She wanted him badly.   Edward was pleased and he noticed that the mother of the girl was wearing his pocket watch as a necklace!  YES, Edward was purchased by his first owner's (Abeline) daughter.  What a happy ending to a great story.

HOMEWORK: Study Spelling Lesson 6  and  Word Search

                         Use the words on the word search to study for Monday.

                         Read daily.

Thursday October 21 Day 2

Today we had Gym with Mr. Costa.
We worked on our Math activities.    Tomorrow we'll make sure all activities are completed.

After lunch we worked on our Literacy activities, we then worked on completed the good copy of our descritptive paragrahs.   We read some more about Edward Tulane.   He had a dream where all the people he loved appeared.  He was dreaming about flying away.   He didn't. When he woke up, he found himself in a doll fixers shop.    Bryce dropped him there after he was broken into 21 pieces.    He could not to have him fixed so the doll maker fixed him and is going to put him for sale in his shop.

Last period we completed our Social Studies that we began yesterday.

There were several notes sent home today.  Have a good look at the important dates and opportunities for the clusters.    

"Summer" by Area 203 with Dr. Weinstangel

Wednesday October 20 Day 1

Today we graphed the temperature and then moved into our Math activities.   We had a quick lesson on growing and shrinking number patterns and discussed why we needed to learn patterning.    The geometry activity is coming along nicely.  We are gettting some interesting leaves made from combining shapes.   Most students have a good understanding of expanded form and place value.    We are focussing on subtraction.   Subtracting with regrouping is always a challenge but we are working at understanding why we need to regroup using base ten blocks.

After recess we worked on the Second Steps social skills program.  We were talking about what empathy is and why we need to understand how others feel.  We watched a video that helped us understand that both situation and facial expressions can help us see how someone is feeling. We also learned that feelings can change quickly in one situation.

After lunch we did DPA with Mr. Brutto. when we came back to class we worked on our Literacy activities.
We are using information books to find answers to our Science questions on water, air and soil.    We are learning that good sentences need a naming and telling part and we also answered questions after reading a story.

In the final period we looked and what clues can help us decide whether a place is urban or rural by looking at a variety of images.   The Grade 3's illustrated urban and rural images to show their understanding, while the Grade 2's worked with me on comparing Canada to other countries.   We read a short book and worked together to fill in a web that organizes information. Later each student will do that for a different country.
HOMEWORK: Rhyming words for Spelling List ( some are hard to rhyme.. but try anyway!)
                         Read 20 min.

Tuesday October 19 Day 5

We started our day off in the library with Mr. Brutto. Those students who remembered their books were able to exchange their books for new ones.

Ms. Jean did the morning message and we read a couple chapters of our novel.   After Edward became a scarecrow and was stolen by Bryce to give to his sick sister, we hear that his sister was very ill and died.  Her father took Sara Ruth away and Bryce very upset by this has ran away from home with Edward aka Jangles.   They went to Memphis where they were busking for money to buy some food.  They get some money, and go to a diner.  When Bryce gets the bill he does not have enough money to pay for what he ate.  The owner is furious and takes Edward and smashes his head against the counter.   Everything went dark.

After recess we did our Math activities.  The students worked very hard today.

After lunch we did some paragraph writing, describing what we were wearing today.   Some continued to use the hamburger organizer and some were able to organize their ideas without it.     We were looking at using descriptive words to describe things, while  have a topic sentence and closing sentence.

We then did our Literacy activities.    Last period we watched a video about what makes a community and what are the similarities and differences in communities.  The video explained the difference between urban, rural and suburban and the how towns and villages are different.

HOMEWORK:  Spelling words in sentences.    Theme words.
                           Read 20 min.

Monday October 18 Day 4

Today Ms. Jean  started in our class.  She will be with us all of November.  She is from OISE.  She worked for several years teaching in Korea and India.   She taught a range of ages from Kindergarten to High School.  We are very lucky to have another adult in our class. 

We went to Gym with Mr. Costa.     In Math we worked on patterning using a 100's chart, in Geometry we created leaves using geometric shapes to attach to the angles we made last week.   We continued to work on expanded form, and the last group worked on subtraction using base ten blocks, if needed.

After lunch the children wrote to Ms. Jean about themselves and their preferred learning styles.  Each student wrote about their favourite and least favourite subjects, whether they prefer learning alone or in groups, and also  how they like to learn.  Do they learn best by reading,  doing,  making , or watching videos?   It will help both of us program effectively for each student.  We did our Literacy activities.  In Grammar we looked at the naming and telling parts of sentences ( also know as subject and predicate), one group worked on penmenship, others continued to find answers to questions they have on the science topics ( today was soil) and one group read with me and answered questions based on their reading.

We had a spelling test, and we had new words for lesson 6.  I chose theme words from Science and Social Studies since the words in the text were review.   The words we have are  air, water, soil, pollution, living, people, urban, rural, community, store, park, home, map.   We copied them down and did alpha- order and syllables during  class time.

HOMEWORK:Spelling Lesson 6   Spelling words  in alpha order and syllables
                         Read 20 min.

Friday October 15 Day 2

I apologize for not posting yesterday.    We had an exciting day today.   We started the day with Math activities.  Every group completed an activity in each strand and will continue work on similar activities next week.

We rehearsed our compositions for one period and then we performed our pieces to several Grade 1, 2 and 3 classes.  It all came together and the students were very excited to present their compositions inspired by poems.

After lunch we completed our Literacy activities  and then went to the computer lab. where we used Word to type a sentence we will use in future art activities.   In this activity we learned how to change font, font size and use spellcheck.   We then saved our work to our individual files.  Stay tuned for the artwork that this will go with.

Last period we finished work, copied our weekend homework, and had "Open Mic".   Jasper, Kyral, Thanasi  had some really funny  knock, knock jokes, and Olivia and Samantha performed and hand clapping game with a chant.   

We are looking forward to hosting a pre-service teacher from OISE on Monday.  Ms. Jean Jennifer will be with us for three days in October and four weeks in November.  

HOMEWORK:   Study Lesson 5 Spelling words  ( some students have to complete the lesson)
                           Reading Response:  Choose a book from school or home and complete the sentence   
                                                          starters from the front of the notebook.

                        

Wednesday October 13 Day 1

Today we did two rotations of math activities.   The students are grasping acute, obtuse and right angles quickly.   I talked about degrees in a circle and used skateboarding terms  180's, 360's etc. to help understand what 90 degrees is suppose to mean.  For now if Gr. 2's know what an angle is that is great, and if Gr. 3's can tell if an angle is greater or less than a right angle we are doing great.   But, many of the students, are already using acute, obtuse and right!    : )    We continued with number patterns, expanded form, using base ten blocks to subtract.

We had our final class with Dr. Weinstangel, and we worked together to compose a piece of music using Summer as the theme, and also,  worked on the soundscapes for the poems we will perform on Friday morning.

The students visited Mr. Brutto for DPA and upon return worked on Spelling.   Todays activity was to write a sentence for each spelling word in their list.   

HOMEWORK:  Complete sentences for Spelling, and alpha-order, and syllables.
                           Read 20 min.

Tuesday October 12 Day 5

We started our day off in the Library with Mr. Brutto.   When we returned to class we completed our temperature graphs, read the morning message and then working in our Journal to complete the writing we started on what we like about our community.

After recess we worked with Dr. Weinstangel on our compositions.   Each group is working at adding musical sounds to go with a poem chosen by the group.  We will have a performance on Friday morning.

After lunch we started a rough draft of our descriptive paragraphs.   We used our hamburger organizer to help us write our paragraphs.   We are focusing on topic sentences and good supporting details.  We are also learning to indent and use capitals and end marks consistently.    We then worked in our Literacy groups.  Yellow did a reading activity, Blue worked on penmenship, Green did grammar looking at commands and exclamations, and the Red group read some nonfiction books on our Science topic of Soil, Air, Water and Pollution and made simple notes on something they learned.

We had our Lesson 4 Spelling Test, and we later started Lesson 5. We copied the new words into our notebooks and should have alphabetical order and syllable for homework if not completed in class.

HOMEWORK: Spelling Lesson 5   Copy words into notebook.  Alpha -order and syllables.
                          Printing ( Blue Group)  Cc, Dd, Ee, Ff.   8 of each sample
                         

Friday October 8 Day 4

Today we had Gym with Mr. Costa and had several visitors from China observing the class.   After recess, we worked on composing songs using poems as inspiration.   Some students even performed their pieces..

After lunch, we did an art activity.   We continues with our work focusing on line and colour.  We drew different leaves on paper and then using a collage technique applied warm coloured tissue paper, to make our leaves look like fall leaves.   Our second step was to paint black and white wavy lines and a background.  Next week, we will apply the leaves and have a finished product.   

Last period, everyone was asked to choose two books for the weekend.   I sat with each student to make sure one of the books was at their level and could be read independently.    

HOMEWORK: Study Spelling Lesson 4.
                         Reading Response.  Choose from the books taken home to read and write a response using
                         the sentence starters at the front of the Reading Response  notebook.
                       

Thursday October 7 Day 3

Today we added yesterday's and today's high and low temperatures to our daily temperature graphs.  When we were at the carpet Olivia shared how to find the difference between the high and low temp for yesterday
( 15C / 11C) and Jasper explained his technique for today ( 20C/ 10C).   We then worked at completing our Dinner Guest writing activity.

Students had drama/DPA with Ms. Leung.   After recess we went directly to Dr. Weinstangel and continued to compose music.  Everyone had an instrument ( glockenschpeils, xylophones, triangles, drums, finger cymbals, tambourines, etc) and they explored the difference in playing a lullaby and a march.  They later looked at how a story can help compose a song.   We looked a Jack's day ( sleep, alarm, dress, brush teeth, eat, walk to school, play, school bell) and played our instruments and made sounds to go with it.

After lunch we worked on planning our paragraphs.   Each group was given an object and they had to use their 5 senses to describe the object for their group.    Then they used "the hamburger" to write the topic sentence and add supporting detail.   Next week, they will do a rough copy of a paragraph from their hamburger plan.     We did another round of Math activities before recess.

After recess we did Social Studies and talked about "what is a community?"  We worked with elbow partners to share our ideas with each other.   After hearing everyones ideas, partners worked out a new definition and wrote it on a paper strip.   Here are some examples....
     " A community is stores, parks, schools, houses, roads and highways."
     " A community is a group of people with houses and with a school."
     "A community is an organized neighbourhood where people communicate."
     "A community is a big city that has lots of schools,people,  houses, drugstores,markets and 
        restaurants."
     "A community is a place that has parks and everyone gets along, where people play and make
        new  friends."
     " A community is  a place for dogs."

REMINDERS:  School photos were sent home today.
                            Several notices were sent home.  Student Index cards.
                            Monday there is no school.

HOMEWORK:    Read 20 min. +  

Wednesday October 6 Day 2

We started of the day with Gym.   We started a writing activity about inviting a famous person as a dinner guest.   After recess we had Dr. Weinstangel work with our class on composing music.   We learned about percussion, wind and what the difference is between noise and music.   We used our bodies, and different objects to create some music.  Some students even got to conduct our class in creating sounds using things in our environment.

After lunch we did some independent reading, while the final touches were put on our acrostic poems.  The poems are on display outside the class.    We started to talk about writing descriptive paragraphs.    I introduced the graphic organizer called "The Hamburger" to help us organize our ideas.  The top bun being the topic, the burger, cheese, lettuce, mustard etc.  are the supporting details and the bottom bun being a closing or summary sentence.   As a class we used our five senses to look at Stone's stuffed animal.  We put our info into "the hamburger" and together wrote a descriptive paragraph.

We did our Math activities and after recess we read another chapter of our novel.  Edward is now in the possession of a young boy Bryce.   Bryce stole the rabbit from his job as a scarecrow in the garden of a woman Bryce works for.

HOMEWORK:  Find rhyming words for each spelling word on the list.
                           Read  20 min. +

Tuesday October 5 Day 1

This morning we did our Math Groups.   This week, one group is continuing working on the name patterns, and describing patterns.   The geometry activity is looking at shapes and counting the number of sides and seeing if any sides of the shape are parallel.   One group started to do expanded form and caught on really quickly ( e.g.  45= 40 + 5, 341 = 300+40+1).  The final group worked with base ten blocks and place value mats to explore 2-digit addition.

After lunch we had DPA with Mr. Brutto.   Upon return to the class, we worked for 30 min. on our Spelling. today's activity was to write a sentence using each word from the list.  After that we talked about what makes a good retelling.  We looked at naming the characters, setting and telling the events in order in detail.   We read the story "Jack  and the Beanstalk" since it was familiar and we could get all the elements of the retelling without worrying too much about remembering a new story.

After our picture we came back to class and worked on fininshing up our forms of media activity from last week ( Everyone is complete!!! yay!).   Others worked on acrostic poems and Spelling.

Tomorrow we have  a great program from the Ontario Arts Council called "Composer in the Classroom."  Dr. Weinstangel will be with us for 6 days to work on composing an original piece of music.  The performance is scheduled for Friday October 15.

HOMEWORK:  Spelling: sentences for list words (30 min. was given in class to complete this activity)
                           Read:  20min. +

Monday October 4 Day 5

Today 10 students were at the Cross Country Races.  With so many students away we were with students from Ms. Pearlman's class and Mr. James' class.  We all went to the Library with Mr. Brutto, had Gym with me and after watched a video with Ms. Pearlman.

After lunch when everyone returned we worked at getting our acrostic poems published and completing our media literacy.   After recess we had our Lesson 3 Spelling Test.  Today, I tried doing our Spelling lesson differently.  Many students found the text book too challenging.  This week we are all going to write the list words, put them in alphabetical order, write a sentence using each list word, and find rhyming words for each word.  I hope more students are more successful.  (Some students may wish to continue using the texts if they don't find it frustrating.)

REMINDER: Tomorrow is Picture Day.     SMILE  : )
HOMEWORK:  Copy the list words from Lesson 4 and put them in alphabetical order.
                           (Grade 2's did this as a class, so most should be complete this activity)
                           Read 20 min.

Friday October 1 Day 4

Today was a very busy day.  To begin the day we started by making new temperature graphs for October.
We talked about graphs needing a title, lables and a scale.  We counted by 2's on the vertical axis.   We also looked at the Sept. graph to find the hottest and coolest day of the month.

We did our final round of Math activities and everyone has done a patterning, place value, geometry and addition/subtraction activity this week!  Good work!

We did our Literacy Groups.    After that we tried to finish our forms of media  assignment. 

Last period we did some independent reading and to finish off the day we had 15 min. of Open Mic.   We had James, Kyral, and Jasper tell jokes. Jasper, Drue, and Kyral sang songs, and Stone did a break dance. It was fun.  It is not easy performing in front of people.  We had some very confident performers today!  

HOMEWORK:  Study Spelling Lesson 3
                          Practice adding/subtracting up to 10, so it becomes automatic.
                          Read daily.