lundi le 16 janvier, 2017
In French this week, students are continuing to write the first draft of their pen pal letters using the past tense to describe what they did during the holidays. Today, students practiced their new dictée, which is based on the sound "o". This is a challenging dictée and students are encouraged to study for it at home. During our morning calendar routine, Show and Tell is back by popular demand! Today we started going through the class list so that each student has an opportunity to share something special from home. Show and Tell is a great opportunity for developing French oral language. Everyday, students are reading independently and they are reading one-on-one with our educational assistant Mme Mireille Larminay. Guided reading groups of 4-5 students are also continuing this week.
In Math, students are learning how to read a 25-hour clock. We are continuing to review single-digit multiplication and division. We will also do a graphing activity. We now have weekly access to a class set of laptops! Therefore this week we will use them to access some fun math games covering concepts learned so far.
In English, we are reading a selection of books written by top BC authors that have been nominated for the Chocolate Lily book awards. Students are read the books and will then vote for their favourite ones. These votes are collected by schools all over BC to determine the winners later this spring. Quadra students often pick the winners of this exciting competition! Students will also continue to do some personal writing where they apply spelling and grammar learned in class.
In Science this week we have started our study of habitats, ecosystems and food webs. Today was an introduction to the four primary habitats: freshwater/wetland, forest, ocean and desert. Students created collages of the wetland and desert habitats. On Thursday morning we are going on a field trip to Swan Lake to learn firsthand about the plants and animals that make up our local wetland habitat. In Social Studies, students will continue learning about Canada's provinces, territories, flags, capital cities, provincial bird and flower by presenting their findings to the class. Students used a variety of reference materials to find this information such as agendas, posters, books and maps.
In the gym this week, we will continue floor hockey. They are learning how to hold the stick, control the puck and pass the puck. Once these techniques have been practiced, we will play some games. In Art this week, we will continue making Chinese lanterns and dot pictures we started last week.
Everyday now students are using the "zones of regulation" to help communicate how they are feeling. Each student has a clothespin they can move from blue (sad, tired), green (happy, content), yellow (nervous, anxious) and red (angry, out of control). Students are learning emotional vocabulary they use to express themselves and support their peers. The next step will be to learn and apply calming strategies they can use get back to the green zone whenever possible.
Note that this coming Friday, January 20th is a Pro-D day and there is no school. Have a great week everyone, take care.
Mme Garcin