Milk Sales Begin Tues. Sept. 19th

I sent a typed note home in your child's agenda today which explains how I organize the purchasing of milk for students in my classroom.  Please read this information if you would like your child to buy milk at school.

Attentive Listening

We enjoyed reading the book "Howard B. Wigglebottom Learns to Listen" by Howard Binko.  We are learning how to be the very best attentive listeners that we can be, just like Howard B. Wigglebottom!

 
When I am teaching a lesson at the carpet and I say "Show Me Five" or "Give Me Five", we know that 5 expectations of good listening are...

1) Legs are crossed.
2) Hands are still.
3) Ears are listening.
4) Eyes are Watching.
5) Lips are zipped.

We are learning that attentive listening is all about using your "WHOLE BODY" to listen.  When you listen with your entire body....

- your eyes are looking at the person who is talking
- both of your ears are ready to hear
- your mouth is quiet... no talking, humming or making sounds
- your hands are quiet in your lap, pockets or by your side (not touching someone else or fiddling with objects that are distracting)
- your feet are quietly resting on the floor
- your body faces this speaker
- your brain is thinking about what is being said
- and your heart is caring about what the other person is saying.

We are striving the be WHOLE BODY LISTENERS when a teacher is speaking and during important learning times.  This takes some time and practice after being on summer vacation for 2 months!

What have we been working on in MATH?

Our first math unit is all about exploring numbers!  Each day we begin our Math period by counting the number of days we have been at school, and representing that number in numerous ways.

The 'Special Helper of the Day' gets to add a bingo dabber dot to our ten frames, and put a straw in our place value pocket chart.  We also show the number of days we have been at school using tally tick marks and by writing the number on a hundreds chart.

We have been chanting little rhymes to help us remember how to print numbers correctly...

1) Straight line one is lots of fun!
2) Around and back on the railroad track... two-two!
3) Around the tree, around the tree, this is how you make a three!
4) Down and over and down once more, this is how you make a four!
5) Fat old five goes down and around, put on his hat and see what you've found!
6) Down with a loop, six rolls a hoop!
7) Across the sky and down from heaven, this is how you make a seven!
8) Down and around and up you skate, this is how you make an eight!
9) A ball with a line, this is how you make a nine!
10) A one and a zero and you're at the end, this is how you make a ten!

If you happen to notice your child printing a number backwards or incorrectly (or a letter), be sure to point it out to them and have them practice writing that number the correct way a few times.

Here are some of the math videos we have used to get our math brains warmed up at the start of a math session...

Today we started learning about the math terms MORE (Greater, Bigger), LESS (Smaller) and EQUAL (the same) and how we can use these terms to help us compare numbers and groups/sets of things. 

Alligators help us remember which way the "Greater than" > and "Less than" < symbols should point. We worked in partners using manipulatives (counters) found around the classroom to complete an Alligator Math challenge.

Al the alligator is always hungry,

and NUMBERS are his food.

He always eats the BIGGEST NUMBER, 

no matter what his mood.

He opens up his big old mouth

and points it toward his snack.

And to the smaller number, 

he always turns his pointy back.

We have also been working on a little math project called "Math About Me" in which we use numbers to tell about ourselves (eg., the number of pets we have, the numbers that represent our birth date, the number of people in our family, the number of teeth we have lost, and so on). Once these projects are complete and I have them displayed in the hallway, I will take a photo and post it on this blog.   

All About Me Bags

The Grade One students did an awesome job sharing their 'All About Me Bags' and we had a lot of fun learning new things about each other.

Students were given the opportunity to share and discuss one item from their bag with the whole class, and then we broke off into smaller groups to share the other three items with their group members.

Amelia shared her microphone and we learned that she loves singing.

Ashton is a baseball fan and went to a Blue Jays game with his family.

Beau enjoys fishing and shared his squiggly bait.

Brayden plays the guitar.

Brianna collects Pokemon cards.

Colton loves playing with Lego and building Ninjas.

Cooper shared a lovely drawing of his family and we learned that he has a very big family!

Felix enjoys wearing tall socks and prefers them over short socks.

James shared a photo collage of his family, including his Nanny and Grandpa.

Keira's favourite movie is "Moana".

Lauren received ribbons in both the swimming race and the running race at the Regatta near her cottage.

Lian talked about his photo collage, including some fun adventures at Blue Mountain with his family.

Lilly enjoys playing with Shopkins and shared her "Lippy Lips" stuffie.

Logan can do cool tricks with his fidget spinner.

Lou presented her hockey puck because she plays hockey and it is her favourite sport.

Mackenzie shared her passport.  She enjoys travelling with her family and has been on some hot and sunny trips to Jamaica and Mexico.

Mia loves reading books.

Noah is a "cookie monster".  He loves eating cookies and chocolate.

Sarah shared a lovely photo of herself and her younger sister, Sophia.

Scarlett shared a photo of her family. She was wearing reindeer antlers in the photo!

Travis likes hunting and so does his Dad.  He showed us how to use his "Goose Caller".  It made quite a funny sound!

Victoria has real chickens.  She brought in an egg that one of her chickens laid.  It was hard-boiled so she could eat it for lunch that day.

The more we get to know each other and appreciate all of our unique interests and talents, the stronger our classroom community bond grows.

Thank you for participating in our "All About Me Bag" activity.

We will be starting up a "Show and Share" Program in October (stay tuned for more details).  In the meantime, I am requesting that students do not bring in items from home to show the class.