Oct. 24 - 28

This will be a short week as the Annual Teachers' Convention will be held on Thursday and Friday. Therefore there is NO school for students on October 27th and 28th.

Literacy:

We are beginning to look at "Making Connections" as our next reading strategy. Readers have their own personal experiences (schema) which effects the way we understand texts. Making connections to texts helps us to put information into context, and therefore helps us to better understand the texts we are reading. Connections can be text-to-self, text-to-text, or text-to-world. What we read can remind us of ourselves, of other texts we have read or of things that are happening in our world. We will focus on looking at each type together, and students will have opportunities to make and share connections in the next couple of weeks.

In writing we are using the writing process to create recounts. Students have started their own "seed" idea - a very specific, memorable moment in their lives. We will look at how to "hook a reader" with an effective lead, how to organize our writing, and to edit for capitals and end punctuation.

Math:

We will continue to work on estimating sums. We have been working on rounding, and we will also look at front end estimating as a strategy.

Social Studies:

The focus in Social Studies for the coming weeks will be Canada. We will look at provinces, territories, and their capitals. We will also be discussing the different regions in Canada and what makes them each unique.

Art:

With Halloween around the corner, I thought it would be fitting to do a Frankenstein activity using the cubism technique of Pablo Picasso. We will work on these on Wednesday so make sure you keep your eye out for them at the Halloween Dance on Friday evening.

Our class also did a lovely job on their Fall Trees paintings. They are proudly displayed just outside our classroom in 4D's Art Gallery. Students used water paints to blend shades for the background, and then used acrylic paint to create the tree. They used smudging techniques with Q Tips to create the leaves. They are all very unique and creative!

Important Dates/Upcoming Events:

1.  Thursday, Oct. 27 - Halloween Dance. You can purchase tickets up until Wednesday, Oct. 26th. They are $2.00 per person. Parents also require tickets to get in. Tickets will NOT be sold at the door.
2. Tuesday, Nov. 1 - Picture re-takes.