Word on the street is...

If you've talked to your child already today, you probably know that "The Letter" has gone home!  Lots if information about personal electronic devices coming to school to read...and this is important to read for everyone, even if no device is coming to school.  Everyone will be doing a digital portfolio so all parents need to sign that consent form.  As well, ALL students need to be aware of our personal device guidelines with respect to personal property, so EVERY student needs to sign the contract.  And please do load devices with apps as needed at home since sometimes here at school the network doesn't allow students to upload things from the AppStore etc...

Yes tomorrow is one of those long-awaited GREAT days at school!  Please note that students change into their costumes from 12H45 to 13H00 with the festivities to follow.

And YES! we made our 500 point goal (and then some), so we will be watching a film tomorrow in French :)  People keep walking into our classroom to compliment the students working well in the hallway or the library, speaking French even when no adult is around and showing undeniable evidence of the 7 Habits (being proactive, synergizing, putting first things first).  We can't help it...we just keep stacking up the ClassDojo points!

Tomorrow we will be working on setting a personal, more specific mid-term goal, especially trying to set an action plan in place...that is if the festivities don't get the better of us!  

On the note of climate and weather

When you hear "climate change", what do you think about?  We had a very thoughtful and respectful conversation about climate change and our environment at the end of the day today.  I was impressed with the level of reflection that students put into their comments and how they were able to transition their comments into a real group discussion.  Great thinking!  Students are encouraged to take their reflections home and continue to think about this in discussions this evening.

We are still finishing up our climate projects and students need to continue working on them at home. There will be a period or so of work time tomorrow with oral presentations (hopefully) starting on Monday.  That means they can take the weekend to finish up and practice their oral presentation.

With brisker weather and frost on the ground, we need to be a little more conscious of tracking mud and dirt into the school.  Some of us are not as vigilant as we need to be when changing our shoes coming into school and we need to make sure that we are respectful of our school building.  Students should make sure to have appropriate indoor shoes at school.  And let's not forget to watch the weather when getting dressed and bringing the right outside-wear to school.  We've been spoiled up until now, but it IS getting cooler these days!

We have set up the ground rules concerning bringing student personal electronic devices BUT students need to wait to bring them to school until they have brought home information letters and permission forms to sign.  So a little more waiting is in order!  Hopefully letters can go out tomorrow, but as soon as they are available, they will be sent home and we can start our digital portfolio journey...among other things!  Thanks for your patience!

The advantages of conference-going

This last weekend I was at ACPI2015, the conference for French Immersion teachers.  It is always inspiring, and this year was no exception.  Perhaps one of the most exciting things that I took away was actually a great answer to many of our conversations last week during parent-teacher interviews.  Yes, we know it is a great idea to be reading in French, but where do we find books?

Well, to my great delight, one of my sessions introduced me to La bibliothèque des amériques...a veritable resource for all French readers!  It is an online library of digital books put together by the Centre de la francophonie.  Books can be borrowed up to 21 days and taken out again when the time is up if there is no one waiting to read that book.   It is free and while you do need to download the appropriate apps to be able to read the books, it is fairly simple to do and can be accessed on pretty much any device you would wish to use.  I've spent some time browsing and there is a broad collection from adult to children's books in a large variety of categories.  Personally speaking, I am thrilled to have access to such a range of books...now I just need the time to read!!

So check out this possibility!  It really is a great opportunity to find some of those great Francophone books!

What's the climate like?

Today we started a pretty big project researching the climate of another region or country in the world. We're going to be looking at what that climate is like over a long period of time, preparing a document of some sort, like a presentation or a written document and then presenting our findings to the rest of the class.  As of right now we have decided which part of the world we want to study, created a document in google drive and shared it with the teacher.  Tomorrow we will analyze some examples and do some more research.  Hopefully by the end of the week we will be practicing for our presentations!  It is interesting to see how the choices we make in our research at often influenced by our experiences or interests; in this case, where we have travelled or people we know.  What a wonderful way to make learning meaningful!

Hip Hip Hooray!

We've been working on goal-setting both as a class and as individuals since the beginning of the school year.  Two weeks ago we set a goal to achieve at least 550 points as a class by today.  A free period outside would be the reward for all our hard work.  We got points for being proactive, being on task, helping others, working together, using the right volume in class, and getting our homework done and in.  It is amazing to see what we are able to do when we are motivated...students started adding the totals in their heads with every ding of ClassDojo! How is that for math in your life!!?   I am happy to report that the last period of the day we were out enjoying the sunshine with 12 extra points to boot!  And you guessed it...next week we hit the reset button and set some new goals.  :)

In Math we're going to be turning our attention to decimal numbers and fractions in the next week, but we'll need to keep our adding and subtracting skills dusted off because it all gets mixed into the pot and stirred up.  As much as you can talk about parts of a whole in our world around us the better as it is always a benefit if students see that what they're learning in school has a connection to what happens in life.

Wow!  Almost all of you are signed up to come in to parent teacher interviews!  Wonderful :)  Looking forward to seeing all of you then.  There are still a few spots open on both days if you haven't had a chance to book a time.

Thanks to all of you who took the time to make a homework plan with your child!  This is a great step towards each student beginning with the end in mind and becoming more responsible.

Have a great weekend all!

A note about homework

So far this year, we haven't had a lot of homework so we haven't worried too much about the hows and the whys of homework in our class discussions.  In grade 4/5R there are two main categories of homework so far: 1) work that needs to be finished up at home and 2) a small task that needs to be done by everyone (usually something that takes no more than 10 minutes).  We will have bigger project and week-long tasks that will likely be added into the mix when the time is right, but for now we don't have those types of homework.

Homework of the first type is usually a result of mismanaged time, but could also just be that the student needs a little more time to complete the work.  This could also be catch-up work in the case of an absence.  The timelines for this type of work can generally be negotiated unless the success of the next day depends on it being completed.  Generally if this is the case, I try to notify the specific parents, especially if the student expresses concern about his extra-curricular engagements getting in the way that day.

Homework of the second type is generally related to the instruction of the next day and is necessary to be completed in order to further the work at school.  Usually this type of "unplanned universal task" is not very long and can be quite flexible as to when and maybe in what way, or with what materials it is completed.  For example, yesterday's task was to write down 5 topics that would be good writing subjects for their writing time and to bring it to school.  We could have done this at school, but sometimes being in our own environment sparks a different type of creativity.

As there were a considerable number of people who did not finish this task last night, tonight everyone has another "universal task".  This is to sit down with their respective parent(s) and map out a plan in the case of homework.  Maybe homework is done in a special spot.  Or maybe there is a little homework bag in the car (with a pad of paper and a couple pencils).  Maybe it is done before dinner or maybe it is on the way to piano lessons.  Or in between dance classes.  Each person's schedule dictates how that is going to look and it needs to be something that both the parents and the student are aware of.   Please do have this conversation.  Students have been asked to bring their agendas signed to show that they have indeed made this plan with their parents.

If homework is not mentioned in the blog, it will be written in the agenda.  Remember that homework is specific to each person and the agendas are their place to record things to do, goals, plans and events.  While they do get help with this, they are also expected to become increasingly independent as time goes on :)

Hope this clarifies this aspect of school life.  If you have any questions or concerns, please do contact me!  I have found that students often need some help from the "home front" to identify "openings" in their after-school schedule which could be used for homework.  Part of becoming older and more responsible is putting first things first and planning with the end in mind.  Yep, you saw it coming...Habit 2 and 3 of the 7 Habits!

Le jour de l'Action de Grâce

It's already Thanksgiving!  Today we took a little minute to think about things we were thankful for and write them down.  While we are thankful for many things, sometimes we forget to think about them.  For some of us we had to think quite a while to find 5 different ones, but we did it!  The result is rather festive and now hanging outside our door in the hall if you'd like to come admire it.

We're working on building our stamina when writing and reading independently, getting ready to move into Daily 5 in our Literacy Block.  The minutes on the graph are increasing with each practice so we're moving in the right direction!  It is very exciting to see students taking their learning seriously!

Have you noticed that from time to time students are writing their goals in their agendas?  These goals are related to our class mission statement and remind us to keep working on being the best that we can be in the area that we might need to work on.  These are always great conversation starters.  This month we are working especially on the habit of being "Proactive" and we make really good decisions when keeping this habit in mind.

Have a great weekend everyone!  Looking forward to seeing you back on Tuesday!

Storms a-brewing!

Well actually not REAL storms! But today we started talking about hot and cold air masses talked about the "front" and saw an visual analogy with water and oil...get them to explain it to you. It was an interesting experiment! It would be a great idea to start watching the weather reports at home and discussing what the meteorologists are explaining in the next few days.  We're going to start talking about what happens when weather systems move in and out.

 Even though our whole class did not attend the running meet at Red Deer Lake School today, a good number from our class did and everyone ran really well! Congratulations to everyone in Run Club who gave their all today! It was fun to show some "Bronco pride" out and about! We have one more race next week and I'm sure it will be exciting as well.

 Those students who did attend the Running Meet today will want to catch up on the video that we finished watching in class this afternoon. The link is here and also on the Science links page (if you click on the tab at the top).  It is a great video on weather that is worth a second and third viewing to really grab all that vocabulary and those ideas that could be a little tricky to understand.  Anyone in class would benefit from watching a second time too!  There are also some links for practicing cloud vocabulary and other Science information.  Check it out!

In math we wrote our math "Big Number" tests today and will be starting to talk about adding and subtracting with regrouping next.  Practicing number facts regularly at home can help with these larger calculations.  Students all have their mathletics passwords and are strongly encouraged to use them at home regularly if at all possible.

Just a little note about library today: because there were pictures going on in the Library today, students returned their books but were not able to take out new ones today.  They will be doing so tomorrow and then everything should return to normal in the weeks to come.