Shoes?

Now that we're back to warm-ish weather, you might want your children to have their running shoes at home. While the kids are always allowed to keep shoes at school in our bin (a good idea so that we're always prepared for gym), they can also bring them home and just wear them to school everyday. Of course, on rainy days when they come in boots, they will need to think about bringing shoes for gym. If you'd like your child to bring home his/her school shoes, let him/her or me know and we'll make it happen.

Area 24 was well-dressed to celebrate le jour de rose today. As a class, we talked about girl colours versus boy colours (is that really a thing?) and decided that it's ok for anyone to like any colour. In fact, some of our boys really love pink, and some of our girls really love blue. We also talked about what to do if we see someone being bullied in the school yard. If you're standing nearby, there is something you can do to help. Some examples are: get an adult, report the incident to the office, be a friend to the person in trouble, encourage the trouble-maker to think about how the other person feels, or even just yell for help. We talk about this type of thing often at school, but they are good conversations to have at home as well. Today, the children had a lot of "but what if...?"questions about what to do in different situations when they're not at school.

Beginning of the week update!

Happy Monday! Hope you had a nice weekend!

The kids had a blast at Friday's dance-a-thon, I saw some amazing dance moves! We used a calculator to add up how much money our class raised for the school. The total was over $1330.00!  That's quite an accomplishment. On behalf of Dewson, thank you!

This is another exciting week, with our science workshop and the art show both happening Thursday afternoon. Please remember to send in your $5 tomorrow if you haven't already. Also, if you volunteered to help with our workshop, please check your student's bag today for a note and confirm with me whether you are still available. I am inviting more parents than the presenter requested, but I still wasn't able to fit everyone in. Don't worry, there will be other opportunities to help out with special activities before the end of the year.

In our own science lessons, we've been talking about everyday objects that need energy, and where they get it from. For example, the sun provides a lot of energy, but objects also use batteries, plug in, or use gas in order to move. When we started looking around our class, and imagining our homes, we came up with lots of examples for each source. At home, you can invite your child to stop and think about different moving objects and explore what is making it move.

In math, we have started our important work on addition. So far, we have been using pennies and nickels to help visualize 2 groups being put together. We have come up with a few helpful rules for adding with certain numbers. For instance, when we add 0 to another number, the other number always stays the same. We also noticed that when we add 1 to something, we just have to count up 1, so that's not so bad. When we add 10 to another number, we sometimes say "dix" and then the other number, and we usually replace the 0 in 10 with the other number, but there are exceptions to both of these rules. It is also always true that you can exchange both numbers in an addition sentence and the result remains the same (e.g., 1 + 8 is the same as 8 + 1).
Last week, students practised reading an addition sentence that we had displayed with numbers and pennies (e.g., "Huit plus un égal neuf.") and showed me that there are different ways to make up the same amount of money using different combinations of pennies and nickels.
This may seem like simple stuff to us, but it's important to get some good basic strategies under our belts this year, so the more review we can do, the better. We will be starting to add other combinations of numbers, and work on additional strategies, such as doubles facts (2+2, 3+3). At home, and with very little effort, you can make up simple stories to help your child practise adding numbers up to 10. For example, I am going to pack 1 chocolate egg in your lunch on Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, but I'll pack you 2 on Friday. How many eggs will you get this week? (Have eggs on hand for counting!)

In language, we are working away at learning our lines for our plays (going surprisingly well) and are slowly working away at learning our verbs. When we write in our journals now, students have more opportunity to decide what they would like to write about (rather than finishing a sentence that I start). Some children write about what they have done recently (as I often prompted them to do), others write about something they imagine (candy land, for example), and others have started writing a story which they add to each time. Ask your student what he/she has chosen to write about recently, and if you like, brainstorm an idea for next time.
In our morning message, we are focusing on how we put a sentence together. Occasionally I mix up word cards which students read and try to unscramble, and other times I have brave volunteers come up to write the message for me. This is fun because it gives everyone a chance to look for improvements (such as adding a period, or making a bigger space between words).

Words of the Week – Les Mots de la Semaine

 “Je suis” (“I am”) is the present of the verb “être”. We use it all the time in conversation and in our writing. With it are frequent feelings. The feminine version is on the right and mostly involves adding an e. Miming helps children associate the action with the word and the correct pronunciation. 

masculin	féminin
je suis content	je suis contente
je suis triste	je suis triste
je suis fâché	je suis fâchée
je suis calme	je suis calme
je suis fatigué	je suis fatiguée

In art, we have started another neat project called "Scratch-away Klee", after the artist who did the original. Last week, everyone used pastel to completely colour in a face made up of geometric shapes. I gave students the basic face, and they added to it, using circles for eyes, triangles for shoulders, rectangles for hair and so on. Each face is very interesting, colourful and unique. This week, we will completely paint over our careful work (awww) and then scratch most of the paint away to create a really neat aged effect.

Check out the new link in the language section! It's got tons and tons of French songs, many with videos, music and words! There are some songs on here that we have sung in class (e.g., "Ah! Vous dirai-je maman", "Les petits poissons").

Here are some pictures of the "Klees", our egg hunt from a week ago and some of our building-time creations.

Upcoming events!

Dear families,

There is a lot to look forward to this spring! Let me remind you of a few things...

1. Dance-a-thon: This FRIDAY! Please return your pledge envelopes by THURSDAY!
2. Wear PINK to support anti-bullying, April 10th.
3. Scientist in the School: Thursday, April 11th, PM. Please return your $5 by next Tuesday!
4. Dewson Art Show: Thursday, April 11th, 3:30-7:00pm. Make sure to stop by the gym. Area 24 is displaying the structures we made with Donnely!
5. Dewson Festival: June 13th - parent council is always looking for volunteers to help run stations, so keep this day in mind!

I'm sure there will be other fun additions toward the end of the year.

I have given out the April Scholastic packages. Please return any orders by Thursday April 11th.
On this note, I have been thinking a lot about how much great progress our readers have made this year. They have come from not knowing a single French sound to reading short stories independently. It's so exciting to see them reading! In no time at all it will be summer, and I would hate for these super-readers to forget what they have learned. As always, I encourage everyone to maintain the same reading routine you have developed over the summer months. If you feel you do not have enough French reading material at the right level, I can suggest some book sets that are available through the Scholastic teacher catalogue. If this interests you, please email me or speak to me in person before the end of April (when the catalogue expires)!

The words for this week are:

je vois, je bois, je dois, je veux, je peux,

je lis, j’écris, je dors, je vais, je fais

Here are 10 verbs which do not end with –er in the infinitive form. They follow different rules which we will not focus on in grade 1. Nevertheless, these are verbs which we use frequently and students should be able to recognize them. Look for some common patterns in the words, and find the sounds we have studied!

oi, eu, i, ai, é

Tonight, ask your child what "Poisson d'avril" means. We read a story about this today, maybe your student can re-tell it to you!