Addition, Subtraction, and Swimming

PLEASE SEE MATH PICTURES AT THE BOTTOM OF THE POST

The class had another great day at the pool. Most of the groups got into the big pool and a couple of the groups stayed in the deep end.  It's amazing to see the kids tread water (keeping their ears out of the water), attempt to dive into the pool and swim an entire length with little or no support!

The girls haven't been bringing brushes, please bring your own hair brush for tomorrow.

In Language Arts we continued our stories, todays focus was on the "problem". Tomorrow we will begin our solutions.

The whole class was introduced to a Math game in the morning.  Students will share Math games with parents at Student Led conferences on March 16th and 17th.

Parents please remember to email me your individual pictures. 

Question of the day:

Who is your main character in your story?  What is your character?

Grade 2 math - multiple ways to solve a problem.  The key words are to help students understand what a word problem is asking them to do.

Swimming Photos

Swimming went off without out a hitch today.  All of the students managed to get into their groups and into the pool pretty quickly. After a quick assessment one of the classes was moved into the big pool.  As students progress over the week they might also move into the lap pool. Thank you Leah, Karen and Bob for joining us and helping us keep organized in the change room!

At school we worked on story writing.  We began by reading a book about the ocean and listened for interesting verbs and personification. Things we noticed were (the sun wrapped itself around, the ocean kissed the sand, the waves embraced) etc.

Students then worked on the first page of their stories.  They wrote an introduction that introduced the  main character, setting and what the main character likes to do.  Tomorrow we will write our problem.

In Science we watched a 4 minute video about animal adaptations for cold weather.  We learned that penguins have feathers, blubber and coat themselves in an oil to stay warm.  Polar bears have a guard hairs to trap in heat and keep cold and water out.  Whales have blubber that can be up to 30cm thick! We understand that humans adapt for the conditions by either wearing more or less clothing.

Question of the day.

What was your favorite part of the day?

Our New Student Teacher

Hello my name is Cathryn Basterfield and I am the new student teacher for Mrs. Helsen's Grade 1's and 2's. I am so excited to be doing my final practicum at Earl Grey School. I am currently attending St. Mary's University in their Bachelor of Education program, and I will graduate in April. Working with Mrs. Helsen's class will be the third class I have taught. My previous practicum experiences include working with a Grade 3 and 4 split class and also a Grade 6 class. I have always wanted to teach a division one grade which is why I am so happy I get to learn and work with the Grade 1 and 2 students.

My previous degree is a 4 year Bachelor of Liberal Studies with concentrations in English and History. In my undergraduate degree I took a lot of courses focusing on art history and children's literature. In my last year of my undergraduate degree I did an interdisciplinary thesis based around art and journaling. This reflects in my lesson planning as I love to create lessons that are cross curricular and I like to incorporate either writing or art in all subject areas!

I love playing board games, reading out loud, music, and I have a passion for all things Disney! I am already having a blast working with the Grade 1/2 class and I can't wait to start lesson planning for them.

Cathryn

Say NO to Bullies!

Our schools open house is tomorrow from 1:00pm - 3:00pm.

Yesterday we welcomed Ms.Basterfield a 2nd student teacher from St.Mary's into our class.  Ms.Basterfield will be a part of our class until April 28th and will co-teaching with me.  When you see her please introduce yourself.

At last weeks Teachers Convention I spent sometime refreshing myself on teaching poetry writing.  I was able to take the poetry lessons and use them in our class.  The poems the children created are truly phenomenonal!  To go along with our poems we created "Ted Harrison" inspired art works of the Arctic. They are hanging up in the hallway.  They too are beautiful!

In the morning we talked about bullies and how everyone can at some point be a bully.  We learned that bullies can be any age and either gender, we even discussed plants and animals being bullies.

Question of the day-

What does a bully look like?  

Lauren completed the afternoon with a presentation the "The Slime Factory".  This was her Science Fair Project from last week.  Every single child loved learning about and making their own slime.  We learned that white glue makes really great slime and the a glue stick doesn't make slime at all. A HUGE thank you to Lauren and her Mom and Dad for getting everything ready for us!  They should go into the "slime making" business!