Holiday Bingo

This holiday BINGO card was sent home with students today. It is optional to complete this over the Winter Break. Enjoy the holidays and Happy New Year! I look forward to seeing everyone again in 2017!

3D Dioramas of First Nation Villages

After lots of research, cooperation, and team work here are the final products! Students learned about how a specific group of Indigenous peoples lived during the 1700's. Then they worked together to recreate a village that showed different aspects of life at this time.

    This is a Huron Village.

This is an Anishinaabe Village 

 This is the Metis Village

 This is the Inuit Village

This is an Ojibwa Village

Math Update

We have been having fun learning about money in real life situations. Today our classroom became a variety store! Students took turns being customers and cashiers. Tomorrow we will continue learning about money in a similar way. Many students need lots of practise making change. Over the holidays any opportunity to use money in real and play situations is beneficial!

On the December newsletter I wrote that we would be learning about probability this month. I have decided to change that and continue learning about money this week. When school begins in January again we will learn about probability for the first week and then move into learning about linear measurement.

3D Diorama of a First Nation Village!

Today we began an exciting new project in social studies! Students are working in groups to research about what life was like for a particular First Nation group living in Upper Canada during the 1700's. Each student has a special responsibility in their group. Some students are readers, some students are writers, and some students are sketchers. I was impressed with how well each group worked to gather information today. Tomorrow we will continue to research and our next step will be to begin creating these villages in pizza boxes.

The First Nations groups that we are focusing on are:

Inuit
Huron
Ojibwa
Metis
Anishinaabe

Students are becoming "experts" about their particular group by learning about what every day like was like, transportation, food, clothing, location, and other facts.

After the research time today as a class we met on the carpet and discussed where we could get materials to create the dioramas. I am hoping that students can bring some items from home ( not bought from the store).

Some really useful items for our dioramas are:

-toothpicks
-Popsicle sticks
-recycled materials (cleaned out)
-paper items
-cloth

Thank you so much for your support!

Math Update

This week we are learning about money in math class! We have been learning about how coins and bills are related: For example students have been using play money and trying out strategies to solve problems like this:

4 quarters= ______dimes

1 toonie=_______nickels

Two 5 dollar bills=______toonies

We have also been learning about strategies that help us estimate and count money.

Estimating Money:
-look for big coins or bills first (loonies, toonies)
-look for quarters and think about if there are about 4, more than 4, more than 8
-look for dimes and think about if there are more than ten

Counting Money:
-begin with the larger amounts (bills, toonies, loonies)
-make piles of one dollar
-count the smallest coins last

Today we discussed ways to write money amounts. We learned about the meaning of the decimal and talked about how the dollar amount is written on the left side of the decimal and the cents amount is written on the right side of the decimal.

Two Ways to Write Money Amounts

1 cent   $0.01

5 cents $0.05

10 cents $0.10

25 cents $0.25

1 dollar  $ 1.00

2 dollars $2.00

5 dollars $5.00

6 dollars and seven cents       $6.07

twenty five dollars and fifty cents   $25.50

A Note From Parent Council

The Parent Advisory Council will be selling treats this Thursday at 1:00pm in front of the library. All treats are $1.00 and students can choose between chips, chocolate, candy, and juice. All treats are peanut free and will be sold on a first come first serve basis as quantities last. All proceeds will go toward funding necessary items for technology, music, learning commons, and athletics. Thank you for your support. 

Electives Volunteers Needed!

Dear Parents and Families:

We are in need parent volunteers to help with supervision of our Winter Electives at the Aurora Dome on Tuesday, January 10th, and on Monday, January 16th.  Parents will not be supervising a set group of students.  Instead, parents will be supervising a set station alongside school staff, as our students rotate through.  If you are able to assist on both days, please email Mrs. Vian at lindsay.vian@yrdsb.ca.  

Please note that since volunteers will be working with groups of students, they must have a Vulnerable Sector Check completed through the York Region Police well in advance of the trip.  A Vulnerable Sector Check form can be picked up from our school’s office. We will leave the school after attendance both mornings and return by lunch.

Thank you!

New Social Studies Unit

Today we journeyed into the past and began thinking like historians. Together we looked at this picture and discussed our observations and assumptions. I was impressed with all of the different ideas that the students were sharing! Students may wish to look at this picture again with their families and discuss more observations. 

Math Test Friday

This Friday we will have a unit test about 3 digit addition and subtraction. A practise booklet should have come home on Friday. Students were instructed to complete enough so that they feel confident for the test. The word problems page is important as there will be similar problems in the test. Students have been asked to return the practise booklet this Wednesday so that we can discuss solutions before the test.

*Students are invited to see me for extra help this week during recesses if they would like extra support!