Room 3 2019/20

Tomorrow is our Celebration of Learning. There is not formal meeting time with the teacher at this celebration. The celebration is from 1:30-2:30 and 4:00-6:00.  There is no signup so please choose the time that works best for your family. There will be Science, Social Studies, Art and Math activities for your child to share and explore.   In March, we will have parent teacher conferences where you may book a meeting with your child's teacher.   Immediately following our celebration of learning w ill be the Montessori  PEACE Night .  All  CJP families are more than welcome to a ttend. PEACE night, which stands for Parent Education and Conversation Event will take place in the CJP gym. Doors will open at 5:45PM. We are lucky to host Dr. Kelly Moroz, from 6PM - 7PM presenting on anxiety and social skills. This will be followed by time (7 - 7:45PM) to celebrate, share, and network with other parents from your community. Child Care will be provided in the learning commons.  

FORT CALGARY Today was a great field trip!!! Thanks to all the wonderful volunteers who came and allowed us to go on the trip.  We appreciate you. When asked about what they learned from the trip, one of the student's shared that "sod is a thing."  We learned about what sod is and how it was used as a building material. We discovered Fort Calgary  used to be a Northwest Mounted Police station. We learned about the mounted police. They wore bright red uniforms. We got to dress up like them and follow some commands from our sergeant. We acted out a play that happened in the past about a real criminal.  Some of the characters were John Ware and Sam Livingston.  We got to wear costumes. We ate lunch in groups of four and after we ran around outside. We learned about various structures in the past and the building materials used.  We learned that the Blackfoot used the buffalo to make teepees, that were moveable structures s

Letter Writing Today we read The Jolly Postman by Janet and Allen Ahlberg. We read lots of different types of letters, post cards and  flyers related to  fairy tales. We learned how to write a greeting and a closing. In the body of our letter we wrote compliments, asked questions or  told something about ourselves. We even learned how to fold our letters up into envelopes! We each have our own mailboxes in our classroom  where our classmates can put letters for us. We aren't worried if we don't have a letter yet as we know we are just beginning letter writing and that everyone will get a few letters by the time we are done! Some students may also bring home letters for they want to write for their family members!

Parents, We are bringing home a reading log tonight. Once student read 100 books or chapters, they will earn a class prize. Please find the log in their backpack with more information. Here is a review of some decoding and comprehensions strategies  you may find helpful when reading at home! Happy Reading! Here are some of the decoding reading strategies we have been working on with students depending on their reading level and needs. These strategies can help you at home, as well, when your child gets stuck on a word they are unsure of. We hope you find them helpful! In developing   Comprehension ,  one strategy we have learned  is to  Check for Understanding  while reading. This is when we take a pause during reading and think about who  the story is about and  what  is happening in the story. Here is some great information for parents to help with working on comprehension during reading times at home:

CJP will be hosting a Talent Show in March. We are looking for a variety of acts, including: singing, dancing, playing an instrument, juggling, comedy, gymnastics, magicians, acting, etc. We will have a Division 1 show for students in Grades 1-3 and a Division 2 show for students in Grades 4-6.  The Div. 1 Talent Show will take place on Wednesday, March 18 from 1:30-2:30pm. The Div. 2 Talent Show will take place on Thursday, March 19 from 10:00-11:00am.  All interested students must audition. Auditions will take place during the last week of February (February 24-27) at lunch recess (12:15-12:35pm)

ArtFelt Studios, and 4 of their artists will be coming to CJP from Feb 3 – 12. All kindergarten to grade 6 classes will be able to participate in this residency. Each class has a morning, or afternoon, that they will be spending with one of the artists to create an individual piece connected to curriculum currently being studied in their classrooms. Guess what? In order for this to be successful we NEED volunteers in the spaces with these artists, and the classroom teachers. The recommendation is for 4 adults per session. On some days we have 3 artists in the building at the same time. That’s 12 volunteers at a time!!! This is going to be a great opportunity for our students, and for you to also learn more about the process. If you are available anytime between the February 3 – 12 please sign up at: https://signup.com/group/146999386319958024 Room 3 will be participating on the following days and times if you would like to volunteer with our class! Tuesday, February 4- morning

Class photos are on Tuesday!

Today, we got to learn about  how our school is heated with a visit to the boiler room. Mr. Lam told us all about how the boiler heats  up water that flows through pipes with the use of pumps to heat our school. The water flows back to the boiler to be heated again. At home, it would be great for you to take your child to see how your home is heated with a furnace. Our two boilers Pipes carrying the hot water Pump The hot water was 92'C!!!

January 30 – Learning Celebration and Montessori PEACE Night Thursday January 30 presents plenty of great learning opportunities for our community.  1:30 - 2:30pm 4:00 – 6:00pm There are two time slots to come to your child’s class and celebrate their learning. Children will be prepared to share their current and most recent learning in Science and Social. Many classrooms will also have robotics, health, literacy and math activities available for your children to share with you. This is a great opportunity to reflect on the current learning discussed and shared in the report card, their next steps and best ways to support them. It is also hoped you will see many other curricular areas, not written about in the report card but where indicators of achievement were shared. If a picture is worth 1000 words, imagine what an experience is worth. We encourage all families to take this time to examine their child’s work and how it relates to what was shared in the report card. I

Place Value Game - Cards or Dice This is a simple place value game that several teachers might already know and have taught.  It helps to reinforce place value.  You can teach students of many levels, since you determine what the highest place value that will be used.  You can also determine whether students are playing to create the highest number or lowest number. Materials Place Value Mat One dice or playing cards (no face cards) How to Play 1. Each player takes a turn either pulling a card or rolling the dice. 2. The player determines where on their place value mat, they want to place the number. They write that number in the designated column. For example: A 5 is pulled out of the deck of cards. The player chooses to put the five in the hundred column. 3. Play continues until each player has filled up their place value mat. 4. Students compare numbers. The person with the highest (or lowest) number wins. Notes and Modifications *Note that when using dic

As Chinese New Year is on Saturday, we did some activities around the dragons. We did another See, Think, Wonder and Write activity.  I see... What does it look like? What do you notice? Can you describe it? What do you observe? I think... What do you think it is used for? How do you think it works? What do you know about it? I wonder.... What do you want to wonder? What do you want to know about the photo? Who, What, Where, When, Why, and How In art we drew dragons and explored colour.  Check some of them out. 

Language Arts/Social Studies We started a new activity called See, Think, Wonder and Write.  The purpose of this activity is to build the students' critical thinking, descriptive writing, and making connections to items from the past.  In this activity the students talked about what they saw in the picture, what the object might be for, how it worked, and then they shared their wonders about the object.  Can you figure out what this might be? (answer below at the bottom of blog).   **If you have a picture of a old/odd/traditional item that we can use for this activity, please send me a picture and a little description of what the item is and what it is used for.  It would be greatly appreciated. Math Both Grade 1 and 2 have been doing Math centers so students have time to practice number sense. Grade 1’s are working on numbers up to 20 and the Grade 2's are working on numbers up to 100.  Some main themes that students have been practicing in these centers are: 

Next week we are having another Scholastic book fair from January 29-30.  Feel free to buy items through this means and support the school library. Scholastic Forms came home today.  These order forms come every month and I thought I would send them home in case you are looking for something in particular.  This is not to compete with the fair. It is just another option available to you.  Please use whichever option meets your needs.   These are due Feb 5 please.   FIELD TRIP FORMS These forms were sent home on Monday.  There are many students with forms in their backpacks that have not been signed.  Please fill them in and send back ASAP FEES FOR OUR FABULOUS FIELD TRIP TO FORT CALGARY Thanks for responding so swiftly and paying fees for the field trip.  We have a couple more students to look after this before all fees are covered.  Please double check if you have paid your fees soon or contact Tricia in the office if you are unsure.

We exploring Calgary's temperature and using a  thermometer to track our increase and decreases in temperatures. Last week we had a temperature of -35'C and today was 2'C. Together we figured out the temperature had gone  up  37'C! Your child may be interested and  checking the weather at  night for the following day  to help pick out the clothing they will need . Talk to your child about how to read thermometer. Here is a fun link to an interactive thermometer we have been using in class. We have talked about making sure to use the Celsius side! https://www.mathsisfun.com/measure/thermometer.html

Gymnastics Unit  Students will be participating in our gymnastics unit, starting on Monday January 20. All classrooms will be following the Heads to Toe, ready to go, guidelines to ensure that all students are dressed appropriately to participant. Please encourage your child to come to school ready to participate in gymnastics everyday till Wednesday, February 12.    Head to Toe, Ready to Go  Head –  long hair pulled back  Ears/Throat/Wrist – no jewelry  Shirt  one layer  Waist – tucked in  Pants – sporty pants (tight fitting)  Ankles – ankles showing (rolled up pants)  Toes – barefeet or shoes (please let us know any issues that require your child to wear shoes instead of barefeet)

January 22 - School Council 28 - Class photo day 29 - Fort Calgary 29-30 - Book Fair 30 - Early Dismissal 30 - Celebration of Learning 30 -  MAPSS PEACE Night - 5:45 doors open.    Dr. Kelly Moroz will be presenting about anxiety and social skills.  31 - No School PD Day

On Friday, we used Google Earth to look at our planet and then we zoomed into see where we live.  We discussed Canada landmarks and symbols (Canadian flag, maple leaf, beaver, hockey, lacrosse, O Canada.  Then we chose some images to represent Canada in our booklet. We also read the book Me on the Map.