IMPORTANT INFORMATION
Glenbow Museum Volunteer Call-out! All Grade 3s will be going to the Glenbow Museum for a field trip on Tuesday, March 13th for the whole day. We need 5 volunteers (with police clearance). If you can share in this day of learning, please let Jodi our Room Coordinator know, or you can email me and I will pass it on to her. Glenbow Museum Field Trip Forms Field Trip forms are coming home soon. I am just finishing the document. *sigh* Gone are the days of the single purple photocopied sheets, where parents signed the bottom, cut the strip off, and sent it back to the school, with the dime for the bus. Zoo School This is a callout for volunteers for Zoo School. When: April 9-13 Time: All day. Bus leaves at 8:10, arriving back at the school shortly before dismissal. You can meet up there, and parking at the zoo will be free for volunteers. I will confirm the time our day starts at the zoo if you choose to meet us there. We need 5 volunteers a day. You can contact Jodi (classroom coordinator) or you can email me. You can volunteer for 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 days. They have to be whole days. A Zoo School coordinator will be visiting our class on April 4th to go over the program, protocols and expectations. Volunteers are invited to this event. More details to follow. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me. IMPORTANT DATES March 13: Field Trip to the Glenbow Museum (all day) March 21: Fun Lunch (Jugo Juice) March 21 & 22: Spring Concert (evening; more information to follow) March 23: PD Day - No School for Students March 26 - April 2: Spring Break April 3: Classes resume April 9-13: Zoo School OUR DAY 105 days to go, 75 days left. Today, we had Pink Shirt Day. The hallways were a sea of pink (metaphor). We talked about how we must take care of each other, what we can do if we someone being bullied (talk with the person on the receiving end), as well as consider what is going on in the bully’s life that they feel the need to do what they do. I picked up a wonderful picture book yesterday, called The Bad Seed, written by Jory John and illustrated by Pete Oswald. A sunflower seed is a Bad Seed, who does mean things and just doesn’t care. He also gives his back story of why he is the way he is. Ask your child what happened to him. The story ends with him deciding he just doesn’t want to be the Bad Seed anymore, and starts making positive changes, even though he still sometimes late or talks during a movie. Students worked on their Pen Pal letters, while I did conferencing with students that were ready for it. I am impressed with the writing I am seeing! Students are giving reasons why, and their voice is coming through. Students also wrote their Elder Shirley reflections in their Visual Journals. We have been learning different ways to take notes and document our learning. Today, I nudged the birds out of the nest to write/document on their own, without me first taking ideas, writing them down, and they copy what they want. Again, they flew! I will continue working with them on their note taking during learning and discussions, a skill that keeps on giving. Okay, maybe not “giving”, but it certainly makes life easier. In gym, students practiced their tennis ball and racket handling skills by bouncing a ball on three rackets as they walked around the gym and others, trying to beat their personal best. We finished the day with Library and Circle, sharing gratitudes in our learning. Students always have the right to participate and to pass during Circle, and all are encouraged to be present and thinking during Circle. Cheerios! Ms Lauf IMPORTANT INFORMATION
Pink Shirt Day Tomorrow is Pink Shirt Day, a day to raise awareness to bullying, the effects of bullying for everyone, and discuss strategies to help and prevent. Glenbow Museum Volunteer Call-out! All Grade 3s will be going to the Glenbow Museum for a field trip on Tuesday, March 13th for the whole day. We need 5 volunteers (with police clearance). If you can share in this day of learning, please let Jodi our Room Coordinator know, or you can email me and I will pass it on to her. Zoo School This is a callout for volunteers for Zoo School. When: April 9-13 Time: All day. Bus leaves at 8:10, arriving back at the school shortly before dismissal. You can meet up there, and parking at the zoo will be free for volunteers. I will confirm the time our day starts at the zoo if you choose to meet us there. We need 5 volunteers a day. You can contact Jodi (classroom coordinator) or you can email me. You can volunteer for 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 days. They have to be whole days. A Zoo School coordinator will be visiting our class on April 4th to go over the program, protocols and expectations. Volunteers are invited to this event. More details to follow. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me. IMPORTANT DATES February 28: Pink Shirt Day OUR DAY 104 days to go, 76 days left. PINK SHIRT DAY TOMORROW! Students began their day with Word Work and Music. We finished up the Peru research and began sharing what we learned. The students have been tasked with thinking up how we can share all this information so we can have them in our Visual Journals. After lunch, we started making our Medicine Wheel in our journals. We will finish our Elder Shirley reflections tomorrow. We began tennis today, and by tennis, it was bopping a tennis ball around the gym, exploring and playing. We will be doing different games and activities to learn the hand-eye and movement coordinations needed to be the next Graf or Murray. We finished our day with finishing up our six-room poetry rooms. Our next step will be to deconstruct the four student sample poems and putting them into the right rooms. This will lead into constructing our own poems. It’s a short message, but certainly a full day. One student remarked, and many agreed, that it seemed like we were only in school for 5 minutes, and it was 1:25 pm. Time really does fly in our class! Cheerios! Ms Lauf IMPORTANT INFORMATION
Word Sorts are coming home today! See above. If you are expecting one, and it has not come home, remind your child (and send me an email), and I’ll give them another one tomorrow. Pink Shirt Day Wednesday is Pink Shirt Day, a day to raise awareness to bullying, the effects of bullying for everyone, and discuss strategies to help and prevent. Glenbow Museum Volunteer Call-out! All Grade 3s will be going to the Glenbow Museum for a field trip on Tuesday, March 13th for the whole day. We need 5 volunteers (with police clearance). If you can share in this day of learning, please let Jodi our Room Coordinator know, or you can email me and I will pass it on to her. Zoo School This is a callout for volunteers for Zoo School. When is our week at Zoo School? April 9-13 Time: All day. Bus leaves at 8:10, arriving back at the school shortly before dismissal. You can meet up there, and parking at the zoo will be free for volunteers. I will confirm the time our day starts at the zoo if you choose to meet us there. We need 5 volunteers a day. You can contact Jodi (classroom coordinator) or you can email me. You can volunteer for 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 days. They have to be whole days. A Zoo School coordinator will be visiting our class on April 4th to go over the program, protocols and expectations. Volunteers are invited to this event. More details to follow. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me. IMPORTANT DATES February 28: Pink Shirt Day OUR DAY 103 days to go, 77 days left. Oki! Elder Shirley spent some more time with us today, sharing some of her knowledge about water, the medicine wheel, and the Blackfoot language. We will write a reflection and make a medicine wheel in their journals tomorrow. While I was with the Word Sort Groups, students worked on their Pen Pal letter, their Anger Signals, or a reflection on the Heart Build Challenge from last Thursday. After recess, we worked a bit more on our reader’s responses, starting our illustrations with the focus on pulling evidence from the text to support it. Also this morning, we looked at a hearing assessment chart we got from Mrs Bezugley, discussing that the graph is showing us (decibels and hertz), and a chart showing the hearing/frequency range of humans and some animals. A discussion came about whether it would benefit us humans to have bat hearing. I’m thinking a reflective journalling response in the making! After lunch, we entered our “Campground” and added some more to our Six Rooms. Such beautiful ideas are coming out. I can’t wait to read their final poems. After gym, I finished up the sorts while students worked corrected their addition sheets, and then on some math activities, focusing on addition and subtraction. We will review the answers and strategies this week. We finished our day with Circle. We talked about the medicine wheel, something Elder Shirley had talked with us about. The East is a time of sunrise, Spring, and infancy, which is how we learn. Anytime we begin something new, we try things out, and keep trying. We talked about how we don't give up when something doesn't work out. I gave the question of, "A baby is learning how to walk. Does a baby stop trying after falling down the first time?" The students said, "NO! They keep trying. They don't give up." One student said, "Babies don't know how to give up." This is my new favourite saying to keep trying. We learn how to give up, for all different reasons. I gave a little reflective homework to the students to think about what is happening when they stop trying something. When we identify what is it that makes us choose to give up, then we can identify how to change the task or thinking so we don't give up. Babies don't know how to give up. I love my class. Cheerios! Ms Lauf IMPORTANT INFORMATION
Glenbow Museum Volunteer Call-out! All Grade 3s will be going to the Glenbow Museum for a field trip on Tuesday, March 13th for the whole day. We need 5 volunteers (with police clearance). If you can share in this day of learning, please let Jodi our Room Coordinator know, or you can email me and I will pass it on to her. Zoo School This is a callout for volunteers for Zoo School. When: April 9-13 Time: All day. Bus leaves at 8:10, arriving back at the school shortly before dismissal. You can meet up there, and parking at the zoo will be free for volunteers. I will confirm the time our day starts at the zoo if you choose to meet us there. We need 5 volunteers a day. You can contact Jodi (classroom coordinator) or you can email me. You can volunteer for 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 days. They have to be whole days. A Zoo School coordinator will be visiting our class on April 4th to go over the program, protocols and expectations. Volunteers are invited to this event. More details to follow. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me. IMPORTANT DATES February 26: Elder Shirley Hill February 28: Pink Shirt Day OUR DAY 102 days to go, 78 days left. Days like today is why I love teaching! Actually every day I spend with your kids is why I love teaching. True story! We have been working on a different reader’s response journalling technique, with the focus on setting. We had read a page from the book Coraline and discussed words we didn’t know. Today, we discussed setting (time and place). On one side of our journal page, we glued the text in, and the other we used the silver pencil bins to trace a good sized circle. On the text students will underline the evidence of the setting. The inside of the circle will be an illustration based on what we are reading. Outside of the circle will be the evidence from the text (to help the different learners in the class: numbered, point form, colour-coded…). Students were mindful in their work. Huzzah! After music and a story, our buddies came into our class to practice our Hand Rain Song, which will be performed at the Spring Concert. They did a FABULOUS job! This is going to sound amazing! When our Buddies left, we focused on the Six-Room Poetry. I had the students look at three different Alberta campground pictures. The beautiful thing about the SmartBoard, is the SmartBoard can show one thing, while I can do something on my screen. On my screen, I found different campground sounds: a campfire crackling, a guitar quietly strumming, children playing, someone walking on gravel, an axe chopping wood, and wind in the pine trees. I played these overtop of each other, changing the volume for each one. It got very quiet in the room. I think we all wanted to be there, in the mountains, being part of nature. I had the gave the students observational intentions, such as “Imagine you are roasting a marshmallow. What is happening to the marshmallow? How is it getting golden brown? Did something distract you, and now your marshmallow is on fire? Imagine someone is cooking dinner.” After a few minutes, I had students give me phrases for the Image Room. I reminded students that this is like being a scientist, where you are stating what you see. Some wonderful statements came out, such as, “a circle of grey and blue rocks”, or “I see light green and dark green trees”. This was a great one, as I discussed how this phrase could also go into the Light Room, and how light affects colour. “It’s the same coloured tree, but this tree looks light, and this tree has a dark green.” Many students had the “AHA!” moment. I had the students copy down each phrase in their Visual Journals. I reinforced the concept of adding detail isn’t being “poetic”, using similes or metaphors (yet), but adding in more describing words to build the picture of someone who can’t see what they see. For example, “a circle of grey and blue rocks” became “a circle of grey and blue rocks around the campsite”. We continue this process next week. We finished our day off with Circle. The intention for today was coming to Circle quickly and quietly. I wish you a beautiful weekend. Cheerios! Ms Lauf IMPORTANT INFORMATION
Spirit Day - Olympic Spirit! Tomorrow! Students may wear read and white tomorrow to show your Olympic spirit! Some More Tax Receipts Some more tax receipts have been sent home with some students. Please check your child’s backpack. If you have any questions about this, or believe you should have received one, please contact the office. Glenbow Museum Volunteer Call-out! All Grade 3s will be going to the Glenbow Museum for a field trip on Tuesday, March 13th for the whole day. We need 5 volunteers (with police clearance). If you can share in this day of learning, please let Jodi our Room Coordinator know, or you can email me and I will pass it on to her. Zoo School This is a callout for volunteers for Zoo School. When: April 9-13 Time: All day. Bus leaves at 8:10, arriving back at the school shortly before dismissal. You can meet up there, and parking at the zoo will be free for volunteers. I will confirm the time our day starts at the zoo if you choose to meet us there. We need 5 volunteers a day. You can contact Jodi (classroom coordinator) or you can email me. You can volunteer for 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 days. They have to be whole days. A Zoo School coordinator will be visiting our class on April 4th to go over the program, protocols and expectations. Volunteers are invited to this event. More details to follow. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me. IMPORTANT DATES February 22: Spirit Day - Olympics! - Wear red and white! February 26: Elder Shirley Hill February 28: Pink Shirt Day OUR DAY Today was the 100th day of school, meaning we have 80 days left. Students began their day playing around with their words, and then writing the rough copy of their Pen Pal Letter. When the majority of students have finished their rough copy, I will be going over the C.O.P.S editing strategy with them.
After Music, we worked some more on our math strategy. I remind the students that the class is a safe place to always ask for help or to come to me when they don’t understand something. I believe the students are knowing this, as more hands are coming up. With that, more students were able to show a better understanding in their learning. Huzzah! We went out for recess today! It was a wee bit chilly, but the sunshine sure felt good! After reading some more from the book The Math Curse and tuna, we did some more Peruvian picture walking, weaving, and listening to stories and music. Fun Lunch happened today. Before gym, we read some Six-Room poetry that some grade 3s and 4s had written, and reflecting on what could make the poems better. The big consensus was adding in more detail. We will continue to look at the poems, and seeing how we can fit it into the rooms. We also decided we will do a whole class Six-Room writing together. I will have the students write down the brainstorming ideas, and then they will create a poem from the room phrases. I am excited to read the 24 different poems from the same notes. After gym, we focussed on learning a reader’s response journalling technique. A shot passage was read, and the first thing we tackled was underlining words we don’t know and then finding out their meaning. When the meaning of all the unknown words has been figured out, a reread will happen. From there, students will identify setting (time and place). This will end in an illustration with students justifying their choices with evidence from the text. I will be gone all day tomorrow at my third Indigenous Education session, with Mrs Bezugley. Ms Temple will be here in my place. Cheerios! Ms Lauf IMPORTANT INFORMATION
Tax Receipts Tax receipts went home with some students today. Please check your child’s backpack. If you have any questions about this, or believe you should have received one, please contact the office. Zoo School This is a callout for volunteers for Zoo School. When: April 9-13 Time: All day. Bus leaves at 8:10, arriving back at the school shortly before dismissal. You can meet up there, and parking at the zoo will be free for volunteers. I will confirm the time our day starts at the zoo if you choose to meet us there. We need 5 volunteers a day. You can contact Jodi (classroom coordinator) or you can email me. You can volunteer for 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 days. They have to be whole days. A Zoo School coordinator will be visiting our class on April 4th to go over the program, protocols and expectations. Volunteers are invited to this event. More details to follow. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me. IMPORTANT DATES February 21: Fun Lunch (OPA!) February 26: Elder Shirley Hill February 28: Pink Shirt Day OUR DAY Okay. I counted twice this year. Miss Konno and Mme Pallesen counted twice, and well, I think I should’ve been making ticks on the wall. Tomorrow is the 100th day of school. I will look at this as I have gained some time back. Today, students settled back into the routine of school. They received a page with their previous 3 sorts on it. They will do some activities in class, and on Friday they will do a review quiz. I did not print out a sheet to bring home, however if you would like your child to have one, please email me, and I will make sure they have one for tomorrow. We also reviewed a sample Pen Pal letter, looking at the different features, such as content, and formatting. Students began writing their rough copy. After recess, we began the last Peru centres such as weaving, and studying and reflecting on Peruvian pictures. In the afternoon, we tackled our six-room poetry. The focus for today was a bit confusing for the students - this one focuses on light and how it affects colour. I informed that the class that sometimes when things aren’t working out, we can change the way we do it. They were quite shocked at this! I will discuss this idea further with the students tomorrow, because it does tie in with the design-task process. If you are building something or experimenting in science, and you feel the result can improve, you change the experiment/task, so why not with writing? After gym, we look at using base-ten blocks and a place value chart can help to add 3-digit numbers. At the end of the model, it was messsssss-yyyyyyy. Tomorrow, we will use magic to clean it up and make it efficient. Cheerios! Ms Lauf IMPORTANT INFORMATION
NO SCHOOL UNTIL TUESDAY!! Zoo School This is a callout for volunteers for Zoo School. When: April 9-13 Time: All day. Bus leaves at 8:10, arriving back at the school shortly before dismissal. You can meet up there, and parking at the zoo will be free for volunteers. I will confirm the time our day starts at the zoo if you choose to meet us there. We need 5 volunteers a day. You can contact Jodi (classroom coordinator) or you can email me. You can volunteer for 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 days. They have to be whole days. A Zoo School coordinator will be visiting our class on April 4th to go over the program, protocols and expectations. Volunteers are invited to this event. More details to follow. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me. IMPORTANT DATES February 15-16: Teacher’s Convention - No School February 19: Family Day - No School February 21: Fun Lunch (OPA!) February 26: Elder Shirley Hill February 28: Pink Shirt Day OUR DAY I say 100 days in today, but the announcements say it’s next week… Oi vey… Today was a day of building things out of paper! Well, two things, but a challenge nonetheless. Students tackled pillars. Today’s goal was learning how to measure exactly 1 cm from the edge, which we used as a guide to cut tabs to create more surface area for gluing and stabilizing. Students made many prototypes, which strict rules to not alter their previous models in any way. This is important, as it helps see what works, what doesn’t work, and then to reflect to keep creating something with better results, as well as they will be reflecting on their changes, and what they did to improve their design. The second build was a Paper Heart Build. Students were given strips of coloured paper, in varying lengths. They were shown once how to make a heart, and then they were challenged to make the tallest structure out of the hearts, and they had to be on the sides. Today was more of a play day, so next week, I will be giving them specific parameters for the challenge. Students sang their hearts out in music, and also had a Valentine’s card exchange. At the end of day, I let them eat AAAAAAALLLLL their candy and sent them home. HAVE A FABULOUS LONG WEEKEND! I’m just kidding about the candy. They were advised to bring it home, and share with you. Well… They are bringing the treats home to show you, and that you decide when they can have them. Cheerios! Ms Lauf IMPORTANT INFORMATION
Early Dismissal February 14th A reminder that this Wednesday is an Early Dismissal Day, and we are following the Friday schedule. Dismissal time is 11:45am. The Cinnamon Heart Shaped Day… We will be doing a Valentine’s Day Card Exchange tomorrow before dismissal. On an unrelated note, students did some code-breaking in class, where they figured out who everyone is in their class, based on the numbers of the alphabet. They brought these home to show you! Some students asked about bringing in a treat. This is not necessary, as there is not celebration, BUT if they wanted to, they will hand them out during the card exchange. The class promised me that they will eat their lunch first. Zoo School This is a callout for volunteers for Zoo School. When: April 9-13 Time: All day. Bus leaves at 8:10, arriving back at the school shortly before dismissal. You can meet up there, and parking at the zoo will be free for volunteers. I will confirm the time our day starts at the zoo if you choose to meet us there. We need 5 volunteers a day. You can contact Jodi (classroom coordinator) or you can email me. You can volunteer for 1, 2, 3, 4, or 5 days. They have to be whole days. A Zoo School coordinator will be visiting our class on April 4th to go over the program, protocols and expectations. Volunteers are invited to this event. More details to follow. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to contact me. IMPORTANT DATES February 14: Early Dismissal at 11:45 am February 15-16: Teacher’s Convention - No School February 19: Family Day - No School February 21: Fun Lunch (OPA!) February 26: Elder Shirley Hill February 28: Pink Shirt Day OUR DAY Wayne Gretzky days under our belt, 81 days to go! Mrs K was in for me this morning. This morning, students were code breakers! They figured out who is in the class using the code chart. After Music, students worked on their addition skills. We will continue working on this, looking at different strategies, reflecting on what works, and making sure students understand the process and place value. Students soaked in the sunshine during recess, and then met up with Mrs Ferrari to wok on the next step in their Water themed oil pastels. When they had finished chowing down on their lunch, we reviewed the Code Names. Students did a quick check making sure they had capitalized the first letter of each name, and only the first letter. We finished looking at the structure of a friendly letter, and students began the first planning stage, jotting down things they might want to share with their Grade 3 pen pal. Many students were concerned about sharing personal information, as they recalled our Internet Safety presentation with Constable Jan. LOVE IT! We talked about when it would be appropriate to ask for or offer personal information. It is a mighty gray area, and it is wonderful that they are being mindful about it. In gym, students continued practicing their basketball skills with a Red Light, Green Light Basketball Version and a Fruit Salad Basketball Version. The are some mad skills out there on the court. We began our paper pillar build. We watched a video, paying particular attention to the centre of gravity and balance of the pillar. I did a demonstration of how to create a pillar with tabs. We discussed surface area - what it means and why it is important to the tabs, and how to measure out an equal distance line (1 cm) from the edge, and why this might be important, relating all back to balance. I have planted the questions of: Why can pillars be hollow and is it important? Where do we use pillars (and tubes) in everyday life? What makes the pillar strong? Why are tabs important? I’m thinking a pillar challenge is in the works… Perhaps a challenge of supporting weight… Maybe their own weight… A reminder that we are on a Friday schedule tomorrow, so dismissal is at 11:45 am. Count Chocula! Ms Lauf Valentine's Day Card Exchange
I have received a number of emails this evening regarding Valentine's Day cards and if they can bring them to class to hand out. In a cinnamon-flavored nutshell, yes they can, however it is not expected. Students will be given some time before dismissal on Wednesday for a card exchange. The class will be working on a name/number scramble tomorrow, so they will have a class list to take home. Cheerios! Ms Lauf One more thing...
Sound Pattern Sort List (Spelling) As this is a short week, we are not doing a sound pattern sort. I will have them do a review of their sound pattern sorts next week. |
AuthorMs Lauf Archives
June 2018
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