Monday #1!

We had a great day today, a real whirlwind of activity as we get into the meat of this year's curriculum. We had our first formal art exercise, discussing the basics of form and using dry-erase markers to dissect the line and shape elements of Paul-Emile Borduas' L'Etoile Noire. I was very impressed by their interest and engagement in the activity, and their willingness to deal with what is (admittedly) very abstract, context-driven art.

We expanded this discussion into our Health topic, which is self-esteem and self-image. This was a fascinating discussion as well, and one that we will be returning to often.
Thank you to those who helped the students copy their recipes; this is an activity we will do later in the week. By the looks of it, I might have to start dipping into their lunches (kidding, of course).

In today's Language Arts class, I read aloud from a great book called Love That Dog by Sharon Creech. It is written as a narrative poem, and focuses on a boy who doesn't want to write poetry and who also harbours some sadness about an old dog he had. Throughout the novel he begins to engage in writing and we find out more and more about why he is so reluctant. Again, the subsequent class discussion was very interesting and they were more than eager to Journal about their thoughts.

We have begun to implement the Monopoly Money reward system, to much excitement. Periodically, they will be able to buy things with their accumulated cash. Starting next week, they will begin to monitor each other and will be able to accumulate more money as they "catch" their friends speaking English during class.
I would also remind everyone about Curriculum Night, which takes place this Thursday at 7pm. I will provide a lot of information about what we are doing and will be doing, and it will be a great chance to see what the class has been up to.

On another note, we did a fun Science Experiment today after we brainstormed about Habitats, our first theme unit. The experiment involved a Hair Dryer, and I would encourage you to ask your child about what happened. We also began our Math unit on Numeracy, which focuses on place value, number relationships and other basic ongoing concerns.

Today's link relates to the Self-Esteem element of our Health unit. It gives a number of ideas about activities you can do at home to build Self-Esteem and enhance their self-image.

http://www.howtodothings.com/family-and-relationships/a2533-how-to-use-self-esteem-games-for-kids.html

Talk to you tomorrow!

Some ideas for supporting Math learning at home

I wanted to post this, just a a precursor to the work we are going to be doing with numeracy in the first unit this year. It is a number of ideas that someone forwarded me about helping kids with number awareness at home; often doing these type of activities in your daily routine can be more useful than piles of homework!Hope some of it is useful.

Everyday situations:

• Weighing, measuring capacity and timing when cooking. Converting a recipe for 4 people to one for 6 people.

• Being involved with measuring and calculating how much curtain fabric is needed, how much wood for shelves, how many wall or floor tiles are needed, how much carpet etc.

• Talking about time, e.g. How long is it until lunch time? The journey takes 2½ hours, when will we arrive? We need to be there at 2.00 pm, when do we need to leave home? Many children will still need practice with reading clock times, particularly minutes past and minutes to the hour.

• Handling amounts of money when shopping, working out total costs, working out change, checking receipts. Working out prices of sale items, e.g. 20% off. Managing pocket money and saving for things.

• Working out distances and directions from maps.

• Discussing and comparing house prices from newspaper house sales pages.

• Working out how much gas will be used on a journey, working out average speed for a trip, costing holidays, etc.

Play activities/games:

• Card games such as cribbage, etc.

• Any games involving calculating scores, e.g. scrabble, darts, bowling.

• Beat the calculator. In pairs, one with a calculator, one without, each works out the answer to a calculation aiming for the one without the calculator to say the answer first.

• Games involving strategic thinking/logic, e.g. checkers, chess, mastermind.

Mental activities:

• Practising and developing knowledge of addition and subtraction facts within 20 (7+8, 13-5 etc.) and multiplication and division facts to 10 x 10 (6x7, 35/5 etc.) Make it into a game if possible, e.g. have a set of cards numbered 1-10, pick a number such as 4, say 4 times the number on the card as each is turned over, keep all the cards you get right. Beat the calculator as above. On a journey, adult passenger times response, try to beat your own time.

• Ask ‘progressive’ calculations, e.g. 7 + 6, 17 + 6, 27 + 6, 47 + 6, 147 + 6; 5 x 2, 50 x 2, 500 x 2, 500 x 20.

• Working out 2-digit additions and subtractions, multiplying and dividing 2-digit numbers by 1 digit numbers mentally. Talk about how to make it easier, e.g. for 28 + 15, call it 30 add 13 and that’s easy; for 16 x 4, double 16, then double 32.

• Open- ended activities, e.g. The answer’s 25, what’s the question? How can you use combinations of 3 and 6 to make different numbers? (Use each number as many times as you like with addition, subtraction, multiplication or division.)

Desks, Dictionaries and Dice

I am happy to say I have been able to free up more space in the class (didn't think it was possible!), which hasn't gone unnoticed. We also gave out class jobs today for the first time, which will be done weekly from now on.
I will also have a schedule drafted tomorrow that I will send home. I can tell you now that the class will have Music on Friday and Gym on Monday
I will be having each student maintain a personal dictionary that will be made up of words they ask me to translate in class. I will write it on a sticky note (or have them look it up if time permits), after which they will be asked to transcribe it into a designated pink half-notebook.
I have been/will be using dice a lot early in the year, as a numeracy tool and to give ideas of fractions, proportions, chance, etc. Here is a link that outlines some games you can play at home to help build numerical awareness.

http://www.activityvillage.co.uk/dice_games.htm

If anyone still has forms left to come in to me, please try to get them in as soon as possible.

Have a great day!