Last day of "novembre"

We had a great day today! Crazy hat day was a big hit and kept us excited for the whole day! :) We finished a French paper, looking at different words with "in", "on" and "ch". We also played a math game of our choice as well as prepared some cards for next month's calendar. Ask me if I know in French what they are called ("sapin"). We finished our work from the week and had some free time, too. Sadly, we had to say goodbye to a student who is moving schools. You will be greatly missed, mon amie!

Scholastic flyers went home today. Due date is Tuesday, December 3. If you wish for them to be kept secret, let me know and I will put them in a plastic bag.

Crazy Hat Day tomorrow

Thank you for all of your donations to the Food Bank! Our class has almost reached our goal of 100 items. We are at 83!
Today, we drew on stickies. Ask me why. We did "l'éducation physique." We had a discussion on school rules. Ask me which I think is the most important and what the golden rule is. In mathématiques. we got to use special markers on our 100s chart and moved up and down.

Grade-appropriate library books today! (updated!)

Today, we focused on bringing home library books (our French ones) that had fewer words on the page, with simpler words, ones that we are starting to read. The English book could remain more complex as our parents can help us there, but in our french books, we are searching for words/syllables studied: la/le/ma/mon/words with "in", "on", "ch". Thank you for helping me with this. Any questions, please ask Mme!

Today, we did two of our four centres. Ask me which ones I did. We played "Go Fish" in Math. See if I know how to say the vocab "en français". In Social Studies, we drew what was important to us about our school, how we felt like we belonged, what we enjoyed about school. We also wrote about our community in our journals.

Reminders from Mme: Thursday is special lunch and Friday is crazy hat day! **update: We will be styling up our hats tomorrow with our buddy class in preparation for crazy hat day. Please send in a hat. We will be embellishing/bedazzling using tape and if appropriate, safety pins. Nothing permanent.

lundi, le 25 novembre 2019

It was a great start to the week. We have a new sound this week and we discovered many animals have this sound! Ask me what the sound is ("sh"), which two letters make the sound ("c et h") and if I can come up with one (or more) words with this in it. We had music and gym today! We also talked a little bit more about zones, began practicing our community phrasing, coloured important parts in the school on a map and started a new math problem. Ask me if I can tell you about it! (It involved different ways to make the number 7 using dominoes.)

Reminder from Mme: tomorrow is library day.

Ma Communauté discussions start next week

Bonjour, a reminder from Mme to please start bringing in the yellow forms on community on Monday, along with a drawing or photo of the landmark your child picks of your community. Please help them practice the words at home, as well. Parent/Teacher conferences are tomorrow (ie. no school for the students!) and a reminder that your child can visit M. Trevor in the gym as well as Mme Zdrill in the music room (in school from 8.00-1.00).
Today, we worked with our buddies uploading a learning artifact into IRIS. This is our online portfolio. Mme will be handing out our usernames and passwords tomorrow during conferences. We also worked on another word problem in math, made an "on" poster (ask me for a word) and wrote in our journals. As it was our last day of the week, we have some free time during our time to finish work. A great day!

Keep observing how much light/darkness there is this week or next!

A snowy November day today! We all had some great stories from recess about what we did with the snow. In class, we played a shape bingo with Mme Emily. We continued a talk from yesterday about the Zones of Regulation. (Ask me what the four colours are.) In math, we played a new game with a die. En français, we made up a poster of words that have "in" in it (lapin, sapin, lutin, matin). Ask me if I can tell you one, or two, three! À demain!

Parent letter coming home today in my pochette bleue

Our class is starting our focus shortly on community in Social Studies and all of the Grade One teachers are sending home a letter today about a presentation I will be doing about my community ("ma communauté") and a landmark ("un point de répère"). If you have any questions, please send an email to Mme Harbinson.

Today, we did some literacy centres when Mme Emily was in the class. In gym today, the nets are up and we practiced catching and throwing with a partner. Ask me what are the differences in the nets (answer: height). In math, we watched an interesting video on patterns in numbers (see photo). Ask me what he was doing. 

A reminder from Mme that this is a short week: no school on Thursday or Friday! Remember to sign up for parent/teacher conferences. Mme looks forward to telling you all about how I'm doing after three months in Grade One!
Another note from Mme: some parents have been asking about Scholastic (https://canadaclubs.scholastic.ca/en/home). We sorted out the glitch so you can order online. Thank you for your patience. Scholastic have asked me to inform you of the following:
Parents pick a FREE Book (worth $7 or less) when they spend $30 or more online! Share Coupon Code: CLIFFORD with your students' families.

Science detective work to do at home!

Please read the letter I am bringing home. It's about the Science investigative work I'm going to be doing at home next week or the week after. If you have any questions, please send an email to Mme Harbinson. Today was our short day, so we did catch up work as we do every Friday. For French time, we chose which station to visit with a friend. Ask me which I chose to do.
From Mme: Thank you for signing up for Parent/Teacher conferences next week. I look forward to seeing you then!

Parent/Teacher Conference sign up today

A busy day! We were fortunate enough to have Elder Randy come in and talk to us and do some storytelling as well. Ask me about his visit and if I remember any of the Blackfoot language. We learned Hello and counted up to 10 with him. We are also bringing home a book today. (See below for more information.) With our buddy class, we did a math activity and in gym we practiced throwing and catching (the last photo is an action shot!). There are three steps to this important life skill.

About the book:

This fall, all Grade One children in Canada will take home a free copy of My Heart Fills With Happiness (J’ai le Coeur Remplie de Bonheur), written by Monique Gray Smith, illustrated by Julie Flett and published by Orca Book Publishers. In honour of 2019 being named the International Year of Indigenous Languages, both the English and French editions will include Plains Cree text (translated by Mary Cardinal Collins).

The sun on your face. The smell of warm bannock baking in the oven. Holding the hand of someone you love. What fills your heart with happiness? This beautiful book reminds readers young and old to cherish the moments in life that bring us joy.

Since 2000, in cooperation with ministries of education, school boards and library organizations across Canada — the CCBC has given every Grade One child a free Canadian children’s book.

The book is to be taken home by each child to keep and to read with their parents. This far-reaching annual book giveaway program, which provides over 550,000 books to Grade One children across Canada, is fully funded by TD Bank Group. The program is intended to encourage literacy and reading for young children and supports the Canadian Children’s Book Centre’s mandate of bringing great Canadian books to Canadian children and to promote a love of reading and a passion for books.

Library Day = new books!

We picked out two new library books today - youpi! ("Yippee" en français!) In math, we built towers, making them bigger and smaller. We did centre time today in which we moved through four centres. Ask me which four they were. We also had art with Mme Emily.
A note from Mme: Scholastic orders are due tomorrow. As well, just an FYI: the next library time is Tuesday, Nov. 26th.

A message from the office:

Hello families,

Just a reminder that November's Parent/Teacher Conferences for Kindergarten to Grade 5 are next THURSDAY, November 21 from 8:00 am - 1:00 pm and 3:30 pm - 7:30 pm.  There is no school for students on Thursday.

On Wednesday, November 20, our Kindergarten students have Student/Involved Conferences so their is no classes for Kindergarten on Wednesday, November 20.  Grades 1-5 have regular school on Wednesday.  

Friday is a Professional Learning Day for teachers so there is no school for students on this day.

The conference booking system opens tomorrow at 4:00 for families. 

Please see the VAS website for a reminder of other non-instruction days throughout the school year.  This information can be found at: http://school.cbe.ab.ca/school/varsityacres/Pages/default.aspx under 'Calendar'.

Library Day tomorrow

Library Day is tomorrow. My job is to try to find my books on my own but I'll ask for help if I need to.  Today, we had gym and music. In math, we worked on solving some word problems. Ask me how many leaves I had to draw and which one needed to be red (1st) and which needed to be yellow (6th). I also needed to order five numbers from biggest to smallest. We played a shape and colour bingo today as well.

Remembrance Day Weekend

Today, in math, we worked on the direction of numbers, what number comes before, after and in between other numbers. In French literacy, we put together different letters to make syllables (ask me if I can tell you how to say syllables in French).  Our Remembrance Day assembly was very special; we enjoyed the bagpipe and the bugle.  We finished some unfinished work and we earned 10 minutes of free time this morning to start off our day. Ask me how.

A note from the office:

VASPFS HOLIDAY PURDYS FUNDRAISER IS HERE!!!

We are once again fundraising with Purdys chocolatier for the holiday season! VASPFS will receive 25% of all sales.

To order online, go to fundraising.purdys.com and click Login or Create New Account

Then click Join Campaign. Our customer number is 28645.

All orders must be placed by Monday, November 25th.

Orders can be picked up on Thursday December 5th between 3-5pm in the school gym.

You may forward this info to any friends or relatives that would like to participate!

Any questions? Please email VASPFS@gmail.com

Thank you for your support

Remembrance Day Assembly tomorrow - 10.30 am

Some more of us finished our poppy window art today. Some of our art is also up in the gym for the assembly tomorrow. We had buddies today where they read to us and we read to them. In math, we noticed more patterns in numbers. They look differently on a line going down from 0-30. Ask me if I noticed a pattern. In Science today, we got to paint again! Ask me what is happening on this paper and how we did it. (And how it ties into Science!)
A reminder from Mme that we don't have school on Monday for Remembrance Day.

Window Art

Please ask me if our new window art is using opaque or transparent objects (hint: it's actually using both: tissue paper and construction paper). Today, we made Remembrance Day books to read. We also explored the number line some more and in Science, we did an experiment in the dark about how much light comes through something that is opaque and something that is transparent. A great day!

Reminders from Mme: Scholastic flyers are coming home today. You can purchase or not. If you do, you can send a cheque or cash to me with your order form or buy it online. Orders are due by Wednesday, November 13. Also: special lunch tomorrow!

mardi, le 5 novembre 2019

We learned two new words today in Science - ask me if I remember them (transparent et opaque) and what they mean. Also, ask me why we were examining ketchup today! Science moved into Art today where we worked with tissue paper. Ask me what we're making. We also had gym today and in math, we continued with patterning, but this time, exploring what patterns we can find in our numbers.
A note from Mme: this Friday is our Remembrance Day Assembly at 10.30 am. Parents are welcome to attend. Students who are in Scouts, Girl Guides or Cadets are welcome to wear their uniform if they wish and they can be part of the procession into the assembly.

November = new calendar/new desk arrangement!

Today, we met with our buddies to do some of our own reading. Ask me what I read to them! We also went to gym, did some art with Mme Emily and made videos in Math. We got a new letter today - can I tell you it's name, it's sound and what the visual is for it? A great start to the week!
Below, Mme has put up the pictures of our letters studied. Have me do some literacy work at home with you, please. (More info in the newsletter.)