Newsletters

April News

What it takes

If you know me then you will know that I love to meet people, to talk to them, to find out what brings them passion and to grow my understanding of the world through the eyes of others.  Over the break, I attended a business dinner with DH (Dear Husband) and met the wife of another attendee.  An artist by profession, I practically rubbed my hands with glee. 

Thankfully, she was thrilled to chat, to answer my many questions, to let me peek at her sketchbook and to share her understandings of the artist community these days.  As I found myself mesmerized by her sketchbook, she said something profound.

 

“A good artist needs to draw, paint, create every single day.”

 

She then proceeded to tell me that life doesn’t always allow her to spend hours in her studio.  Afterall, she is a busy mother, involved in environmental education, and a volunteer in a few charities. 

 

“So I sketch and draw on the fly sometimes.”  She then told me about sketching her daughter in the dental chair at the orthodontist, drawing the flowers outside the music teacher’s home.

 

“Even 10 minutes makes a difference in my skills.”

 

Seeing her beautiful artwork, I had to swallow the hard truth of what she was telling me.  Talent, natural ability, giftedness can only take us a short part of the journey.  It is practice that builds ability, skill, proficiency and ultimately, success.

 

This year, I have been telling the students exactly this.  To be strong readers, the backbone to much of their future academic success, they just need to log in the hours.  They need to use every minute of class reading time for reading.  They need to read for a minimum for 20 minutes a day alone.  They need to listen to adults read books.  They need to snatch the ten minutes in the car, just like the artist, and practice their skills. 

 

As caring adults, we need to make every opportunity for good reading.  We need to, at the very least, limit screen time, surround our children with good books and model reading by reading ourselves.  We need to make reading a priority rather than something that can fit in around extra-curricular activities and play dates.  We need to accept that hours in books might not be possible, but 10 minutes here and 15 minutes there adds up quickly. 

 

During this term, we are looking more and more toward the intermediate years, where students are expected to be proficient, independent readers.  To get to this place, I echo the words of my new acquaintance:

A good reader needs to read each and every day.

 

Beth

 

With thanks

Much appreciation for taking time before the Spring Break and attending your child’s conference.  I love to see the big smiles, pride and joy on the faces of my students and their parents.  I hope you enjoyed a glimpse of their terrific efforts as much as I enjoy teaching them each day.

 

Dictée and Verb tests

This term, we will be picking up the pace in our grammar, syntax and language development.  Starting on Friday, we will alternate our learning between spelling and syntax and verb conjugation.  Each Friday, students will be tested on their learning and given the new paragraph or verb to learn.  Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays students will practice at school and are encouraged to review the material at home. 

 

Cultural Corner

This week, we learned that jokes, pranks and laughter are universal values.  We looked at the history of April Fool’s Day and learned about traditions of joking and pranks around the world. 

 

Social Studies

The beginning of April we will be working to complete our projects on a Canadian Province.  Students did excellent research using print and digital resources.  We will learn how to organize notes into paragraphs and how to present our learning in a meaningful format.

 

This month we will be attending Langley Municipal Awareness Day.  This exciting opportunity links well with our Social Studies program as we will broaden our understanding of services and government in Langley.  We will be travelling by bus that day due to the lack of parking, but would love some parent helpers to meet us there and help us as we move through the stations.  Please look for the information letter and permission slip coming home soon about this trip.

 

We will also begin our major term 3 unit this month, Communities Then and Now.  Students will develop a deeper understanding of pioneer heritage, the technologies used in the 1800s and their counterparts today.  We will note the ways that communities have evolved, but also recognize the many values and practices that remain the same from one generation to the next.

Over the course of the unit, we will learn  how to knit, sew, make bread from scratch, and simple wood crafting.  We will be visiting the Langley Centennial Museum in early May where we will get a glimpse into the one-room schoolhouse, the general store and the home.  We will even try our hand at butter making. 

 

There will be several projects that students will undertake during this unit.  In particular, once we explore technologies of Then and Now, students will be making short speeches about pioneer technology.  Please look for a project sheet coming home later this month.  In the meantime, begin pointing out to your child the many tools and technologies that make our lives easy and ask them to consider what we used to do without these such things.

 

Personal Well-Being and Safety

Over the next few weeks, we will be discussing how to manage anxieties and fears as part of our Health and Career curriculum.  We will be developing strategies to manage our concerns and identifying trusted adults.

 

Late April,  we will be focusing on personal safety using the School District approved curriculum, Kids in the Know.  This is covered in English by Madame Cairnie.  An information letter outlining the curriculum and providing links to more information will be coming home mid-month.

 

Because families are already engaged with supporting students in their personal well-being and safety, please never hesitate to ask questions about our curriculum or to reinforce your family’s particular practices in these domains.

 

 

Fire Safety House

As part of our focus on safety this term, the students will visit the Fire Safety House (hosted at JKE) on April 25^th and will review safety plans at home, along with general fire safety rules.  This is a great month to review escape plans with your children at home.

 

April is a Dramatic Month

This month we will be working on Reader’s Theatre in groups of 5 or 6.  The focus of Reader’s Theatre is to develop accuracy, fluency and expression.  Each group will mount a presentation in French.  We will hope to share these with a few other JKE classes.

 

Math Updates

The boys and girls have waited with enthusiasm to start multiplication and the time has come!  This month students will be working on multiplication.  For some this is a not a new concept but for others the notion of multiplication has not yet been explored.  Before diving into learning times tables, we will focus on understanding the operation.  We will learn that multiplication involves making equal groups.  We will learn to express multiplication as repeated addition and that skip counting is another way of explaining multiplication.  We will show our understanding of multiplication using manipulatives and arrays.  We will learn when to use multiplication and when to choose another operation.

Once a firm understanding of the operation is established, students will work on their multiplication tables, with the expectation being that they learn up to their 5 times tables.  We will practice these in class using games and activities, and will send home some games and flashcards so that you can work on this with your child at home.

 

In Math with Mme St. Pierre this term, we will begin working on measuring perimetre and then focus on geometry for the remainder of the year.
 

Book Talks

Next week in class, students will have completed a novel of their choosing and will write and present a book talk to their classmates.  This is the first of our Reader’s Workshop independent reading projects and marks an important step in our journey toward independent reading.

 

Your child will be encouraged, once their 1 minute presentation is written, to bring it home and read it aloud a few times in preparation for their presentation.  We hope to enjoy the presentations on Friday, April 11 and on Tuesday, April 15.

The Science of Growing

This term, Div. 13 will be learning about plant growth. If your garden has interesting specimens of buds, leaves, flowers, or seeds, your child is most welcome to bring them in on Mondays to display on our Plant Discovery Tray. I cannot promise they will be returned, as we might dissect them to discover their secrets!

1$ Planting Supplies Fee: Div. 13 will be doing science experiments that may impact our species' ability to survive on Mars in the future. Tomatosphere is an educational project sponsored by the Canadian Space Agency. We will be growing tomato seeds (some of which have been to space) and comparing germination success and growth rates.
Please send in 1$ for planting supplies (mini peat pellets and greenhouse trays).

English
Students will learn to recognize non-fiction text features during our Science readings about plants. They will also be sharing their enjoyment and understanding of short novels and stories with each other in 'book clubs'.

 Our English writing lessons will focus on different forms of poetry. Spelling tests will continue every second week. A new list will go home next Monday, April 7, to be tested on April 14.