February 7-11

Hi Families, 

We had another busy week - the energy was VERY high in grade one! 

Here are a few updates before we get into what's been happening in the classroom this week. 


Valentine's Day

On Monday we will be celebrating Valentine's Day. We decided to do a "Secret Valentines Swap" where students randomly picked the name of a classmate to make a special valentine for. They needed to include something the person likes (favourite colour, animal, food or activity) and write a kind message to share something they like about this person. The secret keeping part was definitely a challenge but I was really proud of how hard the kids worked on their cards and how much thought went into them. If your child was away, they will still receive a Valentine in Monday... don't worry! 

Please remember that Valentine's cards and treats should not be brought from home on Monday! 


Loose Part Donations are ongoing, and meant for future use. All donations will be quarantined or cleaned in alignment with current CBE COVID protocols. We thank you for any donations you can contribute to our Montessori learning environment.


Masks

As I'm sure you've heard, masks will no longer be mandatory for students to wear in school starting on Monday, February 14th. We had a talk as a class about how different families will want different things and we all have different beliefs and views. We discussed the importance of showing respect for everyone's decision to wear or not wear a mask. We will not be asking our classmates to put one on, or take one off. If you could please review this with your child and discuss your expectations for your child regarding masks, I would appreciate it! 

More masks and rapid testing kits provided by the government were also sent home this week. 


This week, we worked on our animal dioramas! The students really enjoyed building them and sharing all about them! I am hoping to send them home on Monday. Students will also be completing a self-assessment to share how they think they did with this work. I will share more photos of the work next week!


In math we have continued to learn about 3D shapes and did another estimation mystery! Specifically we looked at cubes and learned about faces, vertices and edges.



In preparation for Valentine's Day, Pink Shirt Day and our upcoming assembly, we have been talking all about kindness! We came up with half a dozen ways to be kind with our own donut boxes. Mrs. Green has also been working with students to create skits to demonstrate ways to be kind. We have also been practicing our Count on Me song! We have decided to extend it to learn the second verse because I love the words! (If you ever forget how much you really mean to me, every day I will remind you). We are learning up to the 2:15 mark. I will try to put together a version of the students singing the song without their faces so I can share it with you! 


Today we also learned about the artist Kandinsky and looked at some of his artwork. We made some Valentine's Day art inspired by his work. 




This week we talked about the digraph "sh" and during daily 5 our word work activities were focused on "sh" words.



We continued to learn about landmarks this week and did a sort of things that are landmarks and non-landmarks. We also played a landmark "I have, who has?" game. 


Upcoming Dates
  • Monday, February 14th - Valentine's Day
  • Wednesday, February 16th - Fun Lunch - Little Ceasars
  • Thursday, February 17th-Friday, February 18th - Teacher's Convention - no school for students
  • Monday, February 21st - Family Day - No School
  • Wednesday, February 23rd - Pink Shirt Day 
  • Thursday, February 24th - Beach Day
  • Friday, February 25th - 100th Day of School!! 
  • Thursday, March 3rd - Fun Lunch - Swiss Chalet
  • Thursday, March 10th - Inside Out Day
  • Thursday, March 10th (PM) & Friday, March 11th (AM) - Virtual Student-Led Conferences & Book Fair
  • March 21-25 - March Break

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