Great first week back!

Happy Friday !
What a great week back! I must the week went by fast! The students were great and ready to learn. I hope next week is the same for all of us!

This coming week we will continue to work on learning about clothing, winter activities and sports. We have started to have weekly morning messages where the students are required to read it every morning. Through out the week I might change a few words, mix up an entire sentence or take out the punctuation. Students love doing this and they find when I mix up the sentence to be so silly. Little do they know they are starting to learn and recognize proper sentence structures.
I will also be start next week Je parle en francais reward chart. I find that a lot of our students are able to speak French but chose to speak in English instead. By implementing the chart I hope to motivate them to speak in French and make it a habit to do so. Once students have the chart filled they will be able to pick from the prize box.

In French class we are really starting to work on double sounds and playing with words. We are learning how to decode and cut words apart by sounding them out.
Math class is pretty fun lately seeing that we are playing with blocks and working with different shapes. This coming week we will work on classifying objects by similar traits and look around our surroundings at the shapes we can find in everyday life.
In health today we reviewed how to properly wash our hands and had a chat about H1N1. In health in the coming weeks we will talk about how we are all unique and how to be a good friend.

I will be sending home in their reading package on Monday some memory games with winter activities as well as clothing. These can stay at home. I am also going to send home double French sounds like oi, ou and on. If you have time please feel free to practice these with your child, it will help them with their reading skills.

The virtue of the month is Gentleness and boy oh boy we have some gentle souls in our room. Yoga will start next week as well as Bricks for kidz. Sandwhich day is on Friday. We got second the last time and the kids were so pumped about it. We also won the good deed cup for the Turkey donation to the Food Bank. Every now and then I see a couple of them giving it a rub or a touch.It keeps them motivated.

Thats about it for this week. Enjoy the week end. If any of you are looking to get out of the city I know that they are having a kick off for the olympics in Banff tomorrow from 2-4. Sounds like a great time with lots of activities for you and the kids. Chat soon and see you next week.
Laurie Anne :)

Happy New Year!

Hi everyone,
I hope you all had a great break and are well rested. My break went way to quick and the snow never stopped slamming the maritime's! I am glad to be back and ready to start 2014 refreshed and motivated. I have many resolutions and I am hoping to keep them....for at least a couple of months!

This month in grade one we will be learning about the different winter activities one can do, as well as the clothing we might need to keep warm. We will also be learning about verbs, pronouns and the important ingredients to make a story complete-beginning, middle, end. I tend to teach the students this by showing them a hamburger. The top bun is the beginning of the story, the ingredients or juicy parts is the middle of the story and the bottom bun is the ending holding it all together.
 I will also be focusing on the comprehension of texts by learning how to make story predictions, retelling the story with details and by giving their own personal opinion on whether they liked the story or not. Some of our books are coming in that we ordered from the Gala money!YOUPIE! In those books that have arrived there are some beautiful non-fiction text. We will be reading some of those in class and talking about what we already know about the subject being read, what we would like to learn more about this subject and what we learn by reading the text. 

In math we have put aside the addition for the time being. Please continue though to work on these at home. For the next couple of weeks we will be explore the world of geometry. Students will learn about the different characteristics of shapes and how to class shapes based on these. They will also look at 2d shapes and 3d shapes.

Social studies we will take a closer look at what we need to do to protect our environment and what we can do to help it last for years to come.

We are responsible for putting on the New Years liturgy this coming  month which will be on the 22 of January. We are doing this with Mme Janice's class. More information will soon be sent home.

I also added new books to the reading package to give you more options at home. These can stay in the reading pack until Monday, where I will exchange them for new ones. We also go new books yesterday for our in class library. If you would like for your child to take their French reading bag home every night to practice, please let me know. I would be more than happy to send them home. Please just make sure to send them back everyday, seeing that we use them for silent reading.
Dont forget to practice those sight words when you get a chance!

I will start to do my reading evaluations this month. By the end of grade one your child should be reading at level 7-8. However I always like to have them reading at least two levels above where they should be. It is a known fact that over the summer students drop at least two reading levels if they are not reading. By having them ahead if they drop they are still exactly where they are meant to be reading wise.

I think thats all. Thanks again for the lovely gifts. Wishing you all a great week filled with positive energy!
Laurie Anne

Bravo mes amis!!

I am soo proud of everyone that got together to help our class purchase 54 turkeys....that's right 54! The students were pretty excited to be able to help 54 families in need this time of year. We also had the chance today to make some cards for seniors. I emailed you all the link about the couple from home, if you get a chance look at it. It warms your heart to see how people can still get together make things happen.
Tomorrow is our last day of school for 2013! Please note that we have only a half day and the students will be dismissed at noon. If I do not get a chance to see you all. Know that I am wishing you all the most fabulous holiday filled with love,laughter and great memories. I wish you all the best in 2014 and look forward to the many new adventures and memories that the year will bring.

I will leave you with some great advice from Buddy the elf.....
Remember to try to stick to the four main food groups: candy, candy canes, candy corns and syrup.
Then try saying this to your kids:
First we'll make snow angels for 2 hours, then we'll go ice skating, then we'll eat a whole roll of Tollhouse cookie dough as fast as we can, and then we'll snuggle.   Let me know how they respond to that one!
and finally know that the best way to spread Christmas cheer, is singing loud for all to hear. So be sure to sing nice and loud!

Merry Christmas!!

Mike arriving with the back of his truck filled with 54 turkeys!!

Handing out the turkeys..who would have thought they would be very slippery!

 

A selection of the Christmas cards we made for seniors.

Bring on the Holidays!

Hi everyone,
I hope that you are all having a great week so far and have most if not all of your Christmas shopping done.
This week is our last week before the holidays. The students are excited as well as their teacher. This week in class we will be reading Christmas stories, learning Christmas vocabulary and working on some holiday crafts.
In math students are learning about equal groups and remainders. They are also going to learn about estimating and how it is OK not to know the number exactly when making a guess. They continue to work on addition in their red math duo tang as well.
We will be working on our Christmas cards for Seniors this week which falls into our social studies unity of community. We will also be donating turkeys to the food bank in the next couple of days. We raised a lot of money during the Christmas concert, the number I am not 100% sure of yet because I am still counting and rolling change. Once I know Ill pass it along as well as for the amount of turkeys purchased.
We also received a package from Santa on Monday. I wrote him a letter the week before based on a suggestion of a student in our class. He said that I should so that they students remember to be good in the next couple of weeks, because they were all excited for Christmas. I did as he asked and we were lucky to get one of Santa's head doll making elves named Lulu. They students are extremely pumped to have her in class and are all ears when i am explain important instruction. Too bad they didn't have a year long elf!

We will be having a class party on Thursday. If you would like to send in a nice treat that we can all share that would be lovely. Please note that we have nut allergies as well as an egg allergy. Healthy treats are always welcomed. In the afternoon we will be joining Mme Marie-Christine's class as well as Mme Janice's class in the gym for a movie and some games. I have ordered the students presents from scholastic, however they have not arrived yet :( I am hoping by Friday at least they will be here.

On Friday we only have half a day and students will be dismissed at noon. We will have our Christian action in the morning and the last advent liturgy at 11am. Parents are welcomed to join for both.

If I do not get to see all of before Friday I wish you the very best Christmas filled with love, laughter and great memories. Cheers to a new year and the many new adventures it will bring. May your home be filled with family and friends. Be safe, stay warm and smile often. I am off to PEI to spend time with my dad and to soak up the slower pace of life.
All the best and chat soon.
Mme Laurie Anne

The count down is on!

Hello everyone Happy Monday,
This week we have our Christmas concert, which is Thursday December 12. There will be two times one in the afternoon and one in the evening. Please be sure to practice with your child at home our song, Noel, c'est l'amour. It would be great if you could have your child dress nicely dark bottoms white tops or something festive. We will be having a practice with the whole school tomorrow. For the evening performance students are to come straight to class once you arrive. It would  be great if you could have them all there no later than 6:15.
We will be starting to use the nickles that some of you donated to learn how to count by 5. Please feel free to send more in, we do not have that many as of right now. We have also started story problems in math where students have to figure out different additions for a given number. For example Kate has 16 objects in her school bag, some are books and some are snacks. How many books can she have and how many snacks can she have. Students will have to figure out all the additions of 16. You can practice this at home. Please also continue practicing counting 1-50 or higher some of them are able to count to 100. Also count by 2,5,10. We have also looked at before and after (avant et après) You could ask your child what is the number before 43 or after 43.
In art we continue to work with pastels and will be using the jars for a craft. Please send in your jars if you have not done so yet. We are still missing 7. I would like them for Wednesday.
In English we will learn all about adjectives by reading How the Grinch stole Christmas. The students will have to describe the Grinch. We will talk about how sometimes characters change at the end of the book and we will note how the Grinch changed for the better.
We are learning jingle bells on the xylophones in music....small work in progress. If any of you have easy piano books I could borrow with Christmas songs please let me know.  I would like to do more than one song with them.
That's all for now, Enjoy the week
Laurie Anne

Snow, snow,snow and more snow!

Hello all,
I think winter has finally hit ! That being said please make sure to dress your child for the weather conditions. If you would like to send extra mitts and socks in a plastic zip lock bag with your child's name on it I can keep them here in class for when they need them. They could also just keep them in their back packs.
December is upon us and with that a new theme. Can you guess what we are going to learn about? That's right everything to do with Christmas. We are going to write letters to Santa, make Christmas cards for Seniors (more about that later), sing lots of Christmas songs and chat about Christmas traditions.
In math we have started to look at addition and subtraction from 1-20. We are mainly focusing on the addition part at the moment but I encourage you all to practice subtraction because that is the one that tends to take a little longer to catch on.
I would like to ask you all to send in a glass mason jar  or jam jars in the next couple of days. I would like to do a craft with them, so if you could do so before next week that would be great!
We will be working on Christmas cards over the next couple of week and some small crafts to deliver to seniors who might not otherwise get something this time a year. I like to think of it as adopting some new grandparents. I have done this in the past and the students enjoy doing it. One year I even had a student and her mother and sister come join me at a local manor in my home town. The seniors loved seeing her and she brightened their day by showing off her dance moves. We got to personally hand deliver the cards. I will check to see if I can do the same thing here and if any of you would like to join me just let me know.

I have another Christmas project that I tend to do each year with the students. At home we have the CBC Turkey Drive, which collects turkeys to donate to those in need during the holiday seasons. Each year with my grade one class we collect pennies and sell candy canes at the Christmas concerts. As a class we count and roll the pennies, which is great for math class. (counting one to one, making groups of 10, counting by 10.)With all the money collected ,we meaning me and my father, head out and buy a bunch of turkeys. My dad usually picked them up, brought them to school where I had the salvation army pick them up. I made sure that the students personally hand deliever the turkeys. this way they get to see what their hard work has accomplished and they get the sense of giving back. i usually start near the end of November to collect pennies. unfortunately we no longer have pennies so i was thinking maybe collecting nickles. Would you all be willing to support our class to take on this project? If so it would be great if we could start as soon as possible. I will chat with the students about it on Thursday or Friday once I hear back from all of you. I would also need some volunteers to help sell the candy canes at both of the showings of the Christmas concert. I hope to hear your thoughts on this project.
Our Christmas concert is next week.....EEEKKK we need some serious practice. I sent home the song yesterday for you to go over at home. I will include the link as well to help them practice the song and the rhythm. They day and night of I ask you to dress your child in white.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0J1yO7Kd14&oq=noel%20ces&gs_l=youtube..0.5j0l2j0i10l7.1169775.1172582.0.1174027.8.8.0.0.0.0.115.564.7j1.8.0.eytns%2Cpt%3D-30%2Cn%3D2%2Cui%3Dlr.1.0.0...1ac.1.11.youtube.hsJrJs40ol4

Here is one with just the music and the words. Kareokee style.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KWEmnFYMVQU

I did finally get the xylophones. We practiced a little today but I am not all that sure they will make an appearance at the Christmas concert...we shall see.

I hope the reading is going well at home. Let me know if you would like any more books sent home. it was great to see you all at parent teachers. Anytime you need anything let me know.
Thats all for now....be safe and remember to hug those you love!
Laurie Anne

Reminders:
Advant Liturgie Dec 6 at 2pm- All welcomed
Special lunch- lemon grass Dec 6
Library Friday

Sorry!

Hi everyone,
I did not realize that the last couple of times I have done a post it has not shown up. So sorry about that. I am not all that sure why or where it went to be honest.

The month of November is coming to an end this week. Student continue to learn about fruits and vegetables as well as parts of the body. Last week we started to work on prepositions and will continue to work on them in class. We are also learning about characteristics of books. All books have a cover, title page, some have table of contents, dedication page and so on. Books she be read from front to back (you'd be surprised on those who start from the back to the front) We are paying attention to punctuation this week and will chat about reading with expression.

In math students have been learning about autant, plus, moins and how to identify whether a group of objects are the same, more or less. This week we are learning to represent numbers two different ways to make the whole sum. For example students are asked to represent the number 14 in a two part frame. On one side students could put 7 blocks and the other side they will put another 7 blocks to represent the number 14. Some students will start to notice that they are learning addition problems for the number 14. Feel free to work on this at home with your child. As some of you mentioned, your child already knows how to add. That's great news and I encourage you to push them with different math problems. They are asked to know how to add vertically, horizontal and also with missing components to the problem. (2+4=_, 6+_=9, 10= _+5) I hope to move onto the next unit soon, which is adding and subtracting up to 12. Please continue to count with your child up to 50. If you want to help them get ahead you can start to skip count with them by 2,5 and 10.

In social studies, we are learning about our rights and responsibilities as a member of the community.

Art we are going to be working on some holiday crafts that involve coloring with oil pastels and using tissue paper and just maybe some sparkles.

Music class we have finished working on beats and the students had a chance to use music sticks to create their own unique beats. Some where great and so complex I even struggled to repeat them! For the next couple of weeks we will be focusing on practicing and mastering our song for the Christmas concert. I would love to send it home, so that they may practice there and share it with you. I did order hand bells, in hopes that they would arrive so we could do something with them for the concert, but they have yet to arrive:(

In science Mme Marie- Christine is working on our 5 sens and body parts. Students are getting the chance to do some fun experiments in there. They got to taste popcorn the other day. The smell floated all through out the school and made everyone hungry for the treat.

English, we continue to work on the letter people. I have been playing the Joly phonics song a lot lately with all the sounds the letters make in the alphabet. I find it is really helping those who are having trouble retaining the sounds certain letters make. They also love the catchy tunes and hand actions that go with each letter. I will include the link if you are curious or want to listen to it at home. We are really working hard at decoding words and putting all the sounds together to form words. If you could work on this at home with your child it would really benefit them.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Djz82FBYiug- Jolly Phonics song.


That's all for this week. We have a short week. Dont forget we have parent teacher interviews Thursday and Friday. I hope to see you all there and have a chance to chat about your child's progress. I would also like to thank you all for supporting the fruits and veggies projects. They look forward to it everyday and its great to see them try new things. For example one student told me he didn't like Kiwi at all. I along with his group encouraged him to just lick it, put it on his tongue to try. By the time I passed out all the kiwis, he was asking me for seconds because he realized that he liked them!!! Love it!

Ps  dont forget that reading packages are due every Monday! I am also including a bunch of games for you all to work on at home as well as letters upper case and lower case to practice spelling sight words or no sense words. The stuff on cardstock can stay home for you. The color games must be returned to school. I am also going to send home their in class reading bag. Please make sure this is returned everyday for silent reading!!
Things to remember this week...
Wednesday November 27  is student faith day all day long. Students are asked to bring $1-$2 to donate for the Philippines. By doing so they are allowed to wear their favourite hat all day long!
Thursday November 28- Parent teacher interviews
Friday November 29- Parent teacher interviews- No school for students
Wednesday November 27- Library books due
That's all for now. Have a super week everyone.
Laurie Anne