Dec. 10th Update

Holiday Concert

Our class will be performing in the Primary Holiday Concert this Thursday! (December 13th) Here are some important things to know:

-There are two performances in the gym. The first one is on Thursday afternoon beginning at 2:30. The second one is on Thursday evening beginning at 6:30.  Families are welcome to attend either one. 

-Students should be in the classroom at 6:15 on Thursday night to be ready for the evening performance. 

-Students are encouraged to wear "festive colours" for the performance. Today we talked about wearing red, green, blue, black, white, or something shiny and sparkly. Santa hats, or other festive additions are welcome! Students should wear or bring their festive outfits to school on Thursday.

-Watch out for emails from the school which may provide additional information, and don't hesitate to contact Mrs. Gibbs with any questions!

Math

In math we are working on strategies for addition. Students are learning how to think flexibly about numbers so that they are able to add, and later subtract numbers in their heads. There are two main strategies that we are learning about, and working on right now:

We are beginning our lessons with "strings". The strings are a series or "string" of questions designed intentionally to support mental math strategies. The question is in blue, the green and purple writing shows exactly how different students explained their way of solving the problem.


A great way to support this learning at home is to practise "taking leaps of ten". Begin in a simple way with a number between 1-9 and keep adding ten. "8, 18, 28, 38..."

If this is easy, try taking "leaps of 9", by doing the same thing but instead of adding ten each time, try adding 9.

 Later try adding different two digit numbers (e.g., 19+18, 21+31, etc.). Encourage students to share how they came to the solution, what strategies did they use? Do they make a friendly number (e.g., change 19 to 20), or add the tens and then the ones? Can they use and explain different strategies for mental math addition?