Reminder: Parent Meeting

Reminder: Tomorrow (Wednesday) is the visible thinking parent session from 8:00 to 9:30 am in the community hall. I hope some of you are able to attend! Please see this document by Ron Ritchhart for some things you can do when interacting with your child/children to encourage growth.

Learner Profile Traits and Attitudes

The Primary Years Program (PYP) focuses on the development of the whole child as an inquirer, both in the classroom and in the world outside. Not only are students taught and encouraged to think and question, but they are also taught to focus on attributes that make them well-rounded citizens. Therefore, we regularly discuss and use common language called the learner profile traits and attitudes. See a list of these 20 terms here.

During this Unit of Inquiry we have examined appreciation and what this word means. We watched the following short animated film and discussed in which ways both the girl and the old man showed appreciation. This led to a discussion on how we appreciate the world in which we live. We even realized that plants provide us more than just objects; they also provide happiness and a sense of peace.

Upcoming Parent Session

Dear Parents,

Next week our school has the wonderful opportunity of welcoming presenters Laura Manni and Aquili Ruiz to work with all early years teachers (PreK and kindergarten) on "visible thinking" in the classroom. I realize you most likely do not know what I am referring to with "visible thinking", so please check out this site for more information. We do a lot of this in our classroom and it really encourages deeper thinking and connections between the various disciplines and our lives. We are also very fortunate that the presenters are offering a parent presentation. Please see this note from our curriculum coordinator, Gareth Jacobson:

'You are invited to a special information session on Wednesday, October 30th. (8.00 to 9.30) in the Community Hall. The focus of the session will be how to support your child along the road to becoming a life long learner. During the session you will hear about how to cultivate growth mindsets in children and practical ways you can help your child develop self esteem and the habits of mind for successful learning." 

I highly recommend that you attend if at all possible. This session will be beneficial in helping you learn techniques to continue helping your child grow as a learner. Please let me know if you have any questions. 

Kind regards,

Kacey

Watch Us In Action!

Bean Sprouting Experiment from Kacey on Vimeo.

trim.oBqluF from Kacey on Vimeo.


Following this 'narrative pantomime' students shared what they felt throughout the experience:

I felt warm from the sun. – Sahan

I felt achy from my branches being so heavy. – Nora

When the kids picked my apples I felt lighter. – Ashman

When the wind blew I was super strong because I was a tiki tree and my roots were keeping me strong. –

Mikail

When the wind was blowing I was moving (swaying) but I did not fall over because my roots kept me in one place like a statue. – Imran

I felt my apples getting redder because it was so sunny. – Aiden

I felt my roots growing down into the ground. – Aiden

My roots grew out to the side and down to keep me stable. – Nora

I felt big because the rain and sun helped me grow. – Sandeep

I felt myself getting stronger and growing. – Cadyn

I felt tight when I was the little seed in the ground because my hard skin was there. - Aly

I felt like I was sleeping when I was just a seed in the ground in the winter.  – Shanza

I felt cold when I was the seed because the snow was falling.– Aylin

I felt safe when I was a seed because I was underground and it made me warm and safe. – Iris

And We're Back!

We're already back into the swing of things after the break. I hope you and your family had a lovely time and got to relax if you were able to have a vacation that matched the school holiday! My husband, son and I went to Malaysia and enjoyed the beautiful ocean. It is nice to be back with the children and hear all about the connections to our curriculum that they made over the break!

On Sunday we planted seeds that we will nurture and hopefully help grow into large bean plants. We will check on them every day and see if we need to give them water and/or more sunlight.

We are continuing with our math focus of measurement and will tie this into our Unit of Inquiry as our plants begin to grow and we see what measurement tells us about how our plants are doing. We've done many activities that help us understand how to accurately measure using various tools. 

Reminders:

• Halloween Carnival: This Friday from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m. Please check the Shamachar note  regarding ticket sales as tickets will not be sold at the door.
  
• Swimming: Our last swimming session for this quarter is tomorrow (Wednesday). Please make sure your child brings his gear.
  
• Home Extension Activities: Please make sure to check your child's backpack every Monday for her packet and help her to return it on Sunday. I have created a page called "Home Extension" at the top of the blog with this week's activities. Please check here if you loose the paper with instructions.

We Are Authors!

We spend time daily during writer's workshop discussing authors and the process they go through when writing books. Our current focus is on "how-to" books that teach others how to accomplish something. Today two of our teammates published their very first books! As authors we write for the purpose of sharing with others, so authors Iris and Shanza shared their books with the class:

How to Make a Rainbow by Iris Whittingham

How to Do Swimming by Shanza Chowdhury

Reading Strategies Page

Check out the page above called "Reading Strategies"!

How-To Books

In writer's workshop we have been learning all about informational, "how-to" books, which tie in nicely with our Unit of Inquiry. We have learned that sometimes authors want to teach others how to do something. They organize their writing in a special way with steps and easy-to-follow text with accompanying pictures. We are trying out this genre of writing ourselves as we write our own "how-to" books on topics of which we are 'masters'.

We explored the idea of a 'process' by remembering how we made cinnamon toast to connect our senses Unit of Inquiry with our plant Unit. Thinking through the steps of this activity and writing them down was a great way to solidify our learning.

Last week and this week we have explored our new Unit focused on plants. We have examined plants closely and recorded our findings like scientists. Today we did an experiment in class that encouraged us to observe and predict. We will observe again tomorrow and post our findings, and then when we return from break we will practice being botanists as we grow our own plants!

Seeds, fruits and vegetables needed!!

We want to do some scientific observations in our classroom and need your help at home! Please help your child find several different kinds of fruit or vegetables s/he can bring into class. We will use these to dissect and examine. In addition, we are looking for all sorts of seeds. Please do not go out and purchase these seeds; rather, encourage your child to look around and find them in the natural environment (food, outside...)

We would like to use these items beginning Wednesday, so if you can help your child collect them before then it would be much appreciated. Thank you for your ongoing support!

A New Unit of Inquiry

Last week we finished our Unit of Inquiry on the senses. To wrap things up we went on a "sense-ational journey" around the school, keeping track of the various ways we use our senses as we move throughout the day. We recorded data like scientists and used it in the classroom to lead a discussion about how important our senses are. We concluded by popping and eating popcorn, realizing that in doing so we were using all of our five senses!

We have now started a new Unit that focuses on plants. The central idea of this Unit is:

By providing us with many things we need, plants help sustain life on earth.

We will explore this idea more deeply through the following lines of inquiry:

• The properties of plants
• What plants provide for us and other living things
• Learning to care for and nurture plants

At this point in the Unit we are sharing our current knowledge and are beginning to share our "wonders". We will work as scientist to prove and disprove statements throughout the next several weeks and will learn how our math focuses of patterns and measurement can provide lots of important information to help us appropriately nurture plants.