New and improved dictee duotang

Yesterday, student came home with a new and improved dictee duotang. We are done dictees for the year (!!), and have moved on to weekly writing assignments. These will normally be given on Mondays, and are to be returned on Mondays. All the instructions are on the first page. Please let me know if you have any questions.

We spoke at length about adding detail to their writing, and making their writing stand out to me when I read it. To get the idea, I showed them this movie clip.

We have been doing lots of writing in class, and have started a new math unit. We are counting money! It would be great to practice this at home. It's as easy as pulling our a bit of extra change and seeing how much you have!

This comes a day late for international woman's day, but any day is a good day to talk about equality and empowerment. I came across this list of books with strong female leads. Some are young for grade 3s, but I know the students always enjoy a good picture book! http://www.todaysparent.com/family/activities/books-about-strong-girls/#gallery/12-picture-books-about-strong-girls/0

Thank you to everyone who has come to conferences so far. It's so great to see the students explaining everything. 

Please don't stress if you've missed your time! There are lots of open times, especially since it's student led conferences. 

Here are a few pictures of some exciting events the last few days 

 

 
 
 
 
 

 

Hi everyone, we didn't get a chance to write in our agendas today. Only reminder is that seed orders are due tomorrow. We appreciate your support of this fundraiser of this garden 

Sorry I couldn't expand on this yesterday… I was quickly writing a blog post while I was in my own masters class last night. You may have seen that my conference schedule is a little bit different than usual. That's because I have commitments on Wednesdays and Thursdays that I can't skip that week. If the times posted don't work for you, please let me know and we can sort something out.

In case you didn't know, I coach special Olympics figure skating. Are used to coach mainstream competitive skating, but when I became a teacher I tried to scale back a little bit. Obviously it didn't happen. The athlete I work with is leaving on March 12 to compete at the Special Olympics World Winter Games to represent Canada. That's why I can't skip his training sessions this last week! Thank you so much for your understanding!

I promise the students I would post more information, so here is a link to the team Canada figure skaters that are travelling to Austria. The boy I work with is Alex, but I've worked with all of these athletes at training camps! http://teamcanada.specialolympics.ca/team-canada/figure-skating/

Speaking of special Olympics, tomorrow is the spread the word to end the word campaign. We will be speaking about this in class! 

Just a reminder that registration for conferences starts tonight at 7pm. You should have received an email with information from Mme Nixon 

Last week we had a great walk to the Fraser river. The kids did so well with road safety crossing marine drive, and remembered to be respectful of residents with their noise level. We walked all the way to Kent and Elliot, and of course at our furthest part is when it started hailing. We stopped along the way to talk about different parts of the eco system. The next day, we spoke at length about the Fraser river food web, and will be continuing on Monday. 

 
 
 
 
 

Here is tonight's homework! 

 

Dear div 1 families,

I am hoping you will help me out to test a new app someone recommended to me. It's called remind, and it is basically a way for me to send reminders as text messages without ever sharing phone numbers. I'd love to try it out and get your feedback. You can find the app in the App Store under 'Remind App'.  I would use it to send reminders such as 'don't forget tomorrow is pink shirt day, and that we are walking to the Fraser River tomorrow', or 'remember hot lunch is tomorrow'. 

If you are interested in trying it out, you can sign up by following these instructions: https://www.remind.com/join/jchape

This is by no means necessary, I'm just hoping some of you would be my guinea pigs :) 

Just a quick note that we will be going for a class walk down to the Fraser River on Wednesday. I'll send a notice home tomorrow, but please make sure that students have appropriate clothing for the weather and shoes for walking.