Week 10 in Div. 11

Bonjour!

Please look for a newsletter coming home tomorrow about our upcoming field trip.

What we're working on in class right now:

Math
- Learning and practicing French numbers:  Many students enter Grade 3 having difficulty remembering French numbers over 59.  Please practice counting by 10s in French at home.  To practice matching numbers from 1 to 100 at home, try this game.

You can also make flashcards on this link.

- Place Value:  We are also learning all about the "House of Math", otherwise known as "Thousands, Hundreds, Tens, and Units", and recognizing that the "2" in 3298, is greater than the "9" because it represents 2 x 100, which is greater than 9 x 10.  We will be working with blocs, representing numbers with words and illustrating them, as well as breaking numbers down into smaller parts.

French
- I have started to assess French reading for the first report card and will update the first page of each student's agenda so you can double-check that your child is bringing home the correct reading level.

- This week we should be finishing to read our first French novel together.  It's the story of a family vacationing in a house with a bat problem.  We have been transforming the non-fiction parts of the story into our own ideas to create an informative poster about bats.

Remembrance Day posters
This past week we started to discuss what Remembrance Day means to us.  Many students have connections to this time of the year and were able to share them in class.  We also started to work on posters for this occasion.  Every year, I invite students to participate in the Canadian Legion's Remembrance Day poster contest.  We take time to look at other students' artwork which leads to discussions about what makes an interesting poster.  If your child is interested in participating in the contest I will send a form in the agenda.  Find out more information about the contest here:

This week's happenings:
Monday Nov. 6th: reading assessments.  Please send your child's labeled choir uniform in a labeled plastic bag.
Tuesday:  Choir practice, P.E.
Thursday:  Choir practice
Friday:  Remembrance Day assembly, little buddies

Next week:
Monday Nov. 13th:  holiday, no school
Tuesday:  P.E.
Friday:  Pizza/Sushi, little buddies

Here is this week's audio dictée:

Week 10 Update

Bonjour!

Upcoming this week:

• We will be on grounds clean-up this week, rain or shine!  Please make sure your child is dressed for cold & rainy days.
• Please send your child's labeled choir uniform to school, in a labeled bag.  (white top, black bottom)
• There will be no dictée this week.  Next dictée - week of Nov. 14th, the theme is words with an "é" sound.  You can find these in your child's agenda, in the week of Nov. 14th.  

Monday - Library book exchange.

Tuesday & Wednesday - Afternoon choir rehearsals in the gym.

Thursday - Morning Choir performance, only open to parents of children performing as part of the honour guard.  The choirs will perform the same songs (and more!) in the Christmas concerts.

Friday - Remembrance Day, school not in session.

As noted above, please make sure your child's choir uniform is labeled.  Students change in & out of their uniform in the washrooms and I'm sure you can imagine what a sea of white and black becomes of items dispersed on the floor.  Labeling your child's clothes will help us organize them quickly.

Swim Club:

The Willows after school Swim Club is in the process of accepting applications.  Permissions have been sent home with interested students.  If you would like more information, please email me and I will send a form home in your child's agenda.

Remembrance Day Posters:

On Friday we had a class discussion about what Remembrance Day means to our class community.  Students shared many stories of relatives having served abroad, or stories of war in other parts of the world.  This serves as an introductory discussion to Remembrance Day and other themes such as sacrifice, caring, and working together as a team.  Students have started to work on a Remembrance Day poster reflecting our discussions.  Interested students may wish to take part in the Royal Canadian Legion's Primary Poster Contest.  Local Legions award prizes, and local winners have a chance to win a trip to Ottawa.  If your child is interested in participating, I will send a registration form home for you to complete.

For inspiration, we also watched a short video here to see other students' Remembrance Day posters.

Other concepts we are currently studying:

Math:

We just finished a unit on Patterns, using numbers, letters, and shapes.  Some of this included skip counting, mostly by 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 10, and 20, either adding or subtracting.

Next week we will be starting what I feel is the most important elementary age unit, that of placement value.  Kids who understand placement value know that in a number such as 498, the 4 represents 400 and is a larger than the 9 which represents 90.  We will be using blocks and many out of textbooks activities to reinforce these concepts.

Social Studies:

We are finishing a unit on Mapping concepts, and the students are creating their own map of the Musgrave field making sure they include a title, a legend, and cardinal directions.  Last week, we snuck outside when it stopped raining for 10 minutes in the early week, and used compasses to find out where North, South, East, and West fell on the playground.  

P.E.

Students have been playing Handball, focusing on fair (and safe) play, and short passes.  

Bonne semaine à tous!