Ms Burton Snow's Blog

The students watched a video about Terry Fox today.  We will complete some Math problems next week with Terry Fox as the theme of the problems.... I hope this makes sense.

Today marked the first day of band.  All band students are pretty excited about their new instruments.  Just a reminder that the students are expected to complete any work that they missed while they were gone to band for homework or when they have a few spare minutes during the rest of the school day. I will partner each student so that your child will know what he/she missed while they were out.  For example, one of my flutists could be paired with a saxophonist.  The flutist would write the saxophonist a short note about what was covered when they were out and vice versa. Band days will remain constant, however, the schedule will change each month so that the students do not miss the same subject for the entire school year.  It will take some getting used to and likely mean an increase in responsibility, but I believe they are all up for the challenge!

This is the book that my new friends gave me.  I've got a lot to learn. Gurdwara Located at the start of Logy Bay Last Sunday I went to the Gurdwara where I saw an actual Sikh service.  Sikkism is one of the religions that we study in Grade 5 and since I did not know much about it, I decided to find out a little more.  I am currently organizing for a guest speaker to come speak to the Grade 5's about the Sikh faith.

September 29, 2011 Dear Parents and Guardians, For the past several weeks we have worked on reviewing the vocabulary associated with the basic objects in the classroom as well as some common French expressions.   We have also devoted a great deal of time to addressing some of our French Culture outcomes.   For example, we just finished studying French place names in Newfoundland and Labrador . In the weeks to come we will be working on a new unit of study Vive L’amitié!   The theme of the unit is Friendship.   Your child will learn how to describe a class friend in French in terms of physical characteristics, personality traits, favourite colours and pastimes.   As part of this current unit I am asking each child to bring 4 photos of their friends to school.   A friend could be a neighbour, sibling, family pet, penpal, cousin or teammate.   The photo does not need to be on actual photo paper, a printed copy is fine.   I would like the studen...

Today we owe a big shout out to Mr. Walter as he helped fix our classroom computer.  Now we can use our Smartboard again.  Today the students saw a Peer Pressure video on the Smartboard.  Thanks again Mr. Walter!  We appreciate you helping us out today!

Today we had our first buddy reading session with Ms. Squibb's Grade 2 class.  Everyone had a great time.  My class wrote the sentences for the Grade 2's.  We spent a great deal of time reviewing the need for capitalization and periods... we don't want the Grade 2's to pick up bad habits.

Today we talked about Foster Families and the reasons why children might need to stay with a foster family.  The students in my class will be participating in a writing contest for Foster Families Awareness week.  The top prize is $75.00 so that is proving to be quite the incentive.  You may see your child's writing piece come home this week, I am sure you will find it an interesting read!

Many parents seemed supportive of having some sort of weekly Spelling/Grammar/Reading activities during Curriculum Night last week.  I am currently researching possible options so it will take me some time to find what I think will be a good fit for the class.  I hope to have something selected by the end of October.

A cinquain is a five line poem that does not rhyme.  It gets the poet thinking about nouns, adjectives and synonyms so it is perfect for Grade 5!  You will see the finished copies of the cinquains tonight at Curriculum Night.  We begin the Elementary Curriculum Night at 8:00.

Today Ms. Doyle talked to the class about good and bad reputations.  The students identified famous people who had good and bad reputations.  Sarah-Kate thought Oprah had a good reputation, Grant mentioned that Martin Luther King was known for his good reputation.  Nic mentioned that Hitler had a poor reputation and Jakob identified Lindsey Lohan as having a questionable reputation.  It was a good Health lesson! We are trying to help the students understand that the way we are treated impacts on self-esteem and general emotional well-being.

We had some awesome presentations this morning.  Here is a photo of one treasure. Well, it looks like I'm having some technical difficulties with my camera... grrr!

Today we got out for our first walk around Kenny's Pond.  Here are a couple of photos from the outing. A class photo Standout Caption and Photo courtesy of:  Jack An amazing swan Caption and photo courtesty of:  Jack

Today we got out for our first walk around Kenny's Pond.  Here are a couple of photos from the outing.

Well we managed to work on some Smartboard Place Value activities before school closed for the day.

Today we worked on spicing up our writing.  The students replaced "worn-out words" with new and exciting verbs.  Doesn't hollered and exclaimed sound better than said?

Please have your child dress for the heat in our classroom.  We do not seem to get much of a breeze in our room.

I have just added some Math links which might prove quite helpful this year.  We began this school year with Chapter 2 Numeration.  We will return to Chapter 1 later in the school year. This chapter is essentially a reveiw from last year, however, the students are now expected to read and write numbers up to millions. Parent Note:  We do not say AND when we read our numbers.  For example:  6 023 is not read six thousand AND twenty three.  We reserve the word AND for decimals which we will study in the next chapter.  Also, we do not place commas in our numbers.... we use spaces instead.  Each group of three numbers is called a period so a number like 6 453 802 has two periods... the 453 and the 802. Thought you should know.

Today we used individual whiteboards to write numbers in standard form.  The students love having their own whiteboards.

Physical Health + Mental Health = Well Being We talked about the statement above during Health class today.  Each student will be coming home with a copy of Canada's Food Guide.

Today we got to really begin the hard work of Grade 5.  Ms. Doyle, our teacher intern, began the day by telling the students a little about herself.  We heard all about her furry friends and how much she adores visiting her home around the bay.

I hope you alll had a great first day.  Remember to try to get mom or dad to fill in the bunches of forms that went home today. See you tomorrow when we will decide on our classroom rules. Madame

Welcome Back Everyone!