Thank you for helping your child count out and bring in 100 items for our 100th Day celebration this past Wednesday. We have the following display up in the classroom to show many different object representations of 100.

The students enjoyed rotating through four of the Grade 1 classrooms on Wednesday afternoon to take part in different learning activities focused on 100. Our classroom's activity was a workout that included 10 sets of 10 different active exercises and 10 sets of 10 stretches and yoga poses.

Our weekly words were: ill, spill, all, fall, small. The students had daily practice reading these words in a variety of sentences and created their own written sentences using these words. The students' writing is constantly improving. I am really impressed with their willingness to sound out words by applying many of the phonics skills taught so far this year. 

We started to work on a class research page on Polar bears today. We have been learning many interesting facts about these mammals and are learning how to organize our learning into the following categories; Food, Habitat, Life Cycle, Appearance, and Fun Facts.

In Math, we have shifted our focus from addition to subtraction. The students have been practicing using a number line and a hundred chart to solve subtraction problems. Next week, we will be learning about fact families and will see how addition and subtraction are related.

Today, we met up with our Grade 4 buddies. Mrs. Miller talked to the students about Black History Month and read them a book about an artist named Alma Thomas who lived in the United States. The students made bookmarks inspired by Alma's art. Mrs. Miller also spoke briefly about Viola Desmond and showed the students Viola's picture on our $10 bill.

Please return Home Reading book bags on Monday and library books by Tuesday.

Next Wednesday is Pink Shirt Day. Please encourage your child to wear a pink shirt to school as a reminder to be kind to others.

Next week, Mrs. Burch and I hope to take the students on a community walk to look at some of the landmarks in our community as well as to make observations of nighbourhood elements such as; community mailboxes, bus stops, pedestrian crosswalks, fire hydrants, light standards, etc. Our walk will be weather-dependent but will most likely occur later in the week.

Unfortunately, I was away sick for most of the three days this week, aside from Monday morning, so this week's blog will be short and sweet.

Our focus words were: lost, must, just, best, and fast.

The students listened to stories about love and kindness and wrote ways in which they can demonstrate both this emotion and virtue towards family, friends, and strangers.

We continued to learn about polar bears by reading books and watching video clips and we recorded interesting facts about their appearance, their adaptations, and how they hunt.

In Math, we continued to work at adding 3 addends, practicing different addition strategies, solving oral word problems involving 3 addends, and playing a game to practice identifying odd and even numbers.

The students did a Valentine's heart line-art project which involved using many different types of lines and colours. They also decorated a Valentine's Day card bag.

I will be sending home new books on Tuesday for those who are doing Home Reading. I apologize that I was unable to send new materials home this week.

Please remember that there will not be school on Monday, Feb.19th due to Family Day.

*** Important 100th Day of School Information***

Next Wednesday, February 21, we will be celebrating our 100th day of school. We will be celebrating this day with different learning activities all focused on the number 100. The students will be rotating through 4 stations on Wednesday afternoon to participate in the different activities. We have been learning how to represent 100 through tallies, ten frames, and base ten blocks and we'd love to see other representations of 100 from the students.

* If possible, please have your child bring in 100 small items in a small ziploc bag with their name on it to show to their classmates. The items could be things such as Lego pieces, buttons, macaroni noodles, cereal pieces, beads, dried beans, etc. Please have your child count these with you to ensure you have 100. You may wish to have your child sort the items into groups of 5s or 10s for quicker counting. The items will be returned the following week. We will be making a temporary display of the items in the classroom for the students to see all the different "looks" of 100. Thanks for your support!

I hope you all enjoy a wonderful Family Day long weekend! :)

Our focus words this week were all from the "ick" word family: pick, quick, thick, chick, and kick. We practiced reading, spelling, and writing these words in sentences throughout the week.

We have started to learn about polar bears as part of our Science curriculum. We've read non-fiction books and watched videos to learn facts about these incredible animals. The students have especially enjoyed watching videos of young cubs as they emerge from their snow den for the first time in their lives. Here's a link for a BBC two-minute video, if you're interested. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OwZH_aT0FGI

Two facts about the polar bears we learned this week and found to be very interesting were about the colours of polar bears' fur and skin. You may want to ask your child to share this information with you.

We did a polar bear art piece using chalk and oil pastels yesterday. I forgot to take pictures but will try to remember to post some next week. In the meantime here's an example:

In Math, we practiced adding the numbers 0 - 10 to 10 and continued to review and practice adding doubles up to a sum of 20. I will be sending home two games with the students next week that we have been playing in class to strengthen our skills.

The students have really enjoyed being introduced to the game of curling in Gym over the past two weeks. They have learned the correct form to use when throwing a curling rock and have learned how to score. Please see Mr. van Sluys's blog post for more information and photos.

Today we met with our Grade 4 Buddies. The students listened to a story read by Mrs. Miller called Nian, The Chinese New Year Dragon. Afterward, they made a paper dragon puppet to celebrate this holiday that begins today. 

Upcoming dates:

Wed. Feb 14th - Your child is invited to wear red or pink or both to celebrate the day. We will be doing learning activities in class related to kindness, caring, love, and friendship next week.

Valentines Day Information

Your child is welcome to bring in Valentines' Day cards for each of their classmates, if they choose but CBE policy is that no candy can be attached to these cards. Also, please have your child sign only their name to the cards and simply leave the To:____________ section blank or write To: My friend. This makes the passing out of cards much quicker and easier. There are 24 children in our class.

There is no school Thurs. Feb. 15 or Fri. Feb. 16 due to Teachers' Convention and no school Mon. Feb. 19 for Family Day.

Mrs. McLean will be away next week so we will not be doing a book exchange at the library. Your child is welcome to keep their book until Feb. 27.

Please return Home Reading books on Monday if you have not yet done so.

Our focus words this week were: do, bring, back, of, ate. We also focused on the letter blends "pl" and "gl".

This week in Math we continued to practice the effective use of a number line for addition and focused on learning and/or reviewing the double facts - 2+2, 3, 3+3, etc.

In Science we completed our Winter Booklet, focusing on what different animals do in winter as well as significant natural signs of the season. The students also completed their Under and Over the Snow art. I meant to include some photos of their art in this week's blog for you to see but forgot to take pictures - my apologies. I will make sure they are included next week!

We have been using picture prompts to inspire writing recently. This week, the students were given a drawing of two children playing in a snowy park and were asked to describe what they saw with as much detail as possible. We are beginning to add colour, size, and texture words to our writing as well as more details to answer questions such as, Who?, What?, Where?, When?, and Why?.

Today, we watched short clips of Groundhog Day celebrations in Ontario, Nova Scotia, and here at home. The groundhogs in Ontario and Nova Scotia predicted that spring is on its way while our Balzac Billy told of more weeks of winter. We shall see! 

Please refer to last week's blog post for important information regarding Valentine's Day and upcoming dates.

I hope you all enjoy a relaxing weekend and perhaps the chance to play in fresh snow! Enjoy. :)