Concert Dress

Dear parents,

Thanks for all the styrofoam trays. We have enough and started using them today. I don't have a lot of storage space, so I'm taking this item off the wish list, but if you have any of the extra large family size trays, I'll still take those anytime. In about a month we'll be doing a building project involving lots of boxes. You've been so great sending in all your tiny boxes throughout the year. We will definitely use them. We would also use cylindrical shapes (paper towel roles, tea bag canisters) and any other less common box shapes. When we're ready for the project, I'll also ask each student to bring in one large box (like a cereal box) to use as their base. I won't collect these in advance, but if you don't go through boxes super fast, you might want to hang on to one. Thanks!

The weeks seem to be going by so quickly now. I thought our concert was still so far away, but it's actually coming up very soon! I will send home a letter with all the details the week of the concert, but I'll tell you about the clothes now so that you don't have to scramble.

For the choir performance, students are expected to wear black on the bottom and white on the top. For our class performance, I am hoping each student can add a red, dark blue or beige accessory to their outfit (think Paris). This must be something that students can bring and leave in our classroom while they perform with choir, then put on quickly and independently before our class performs. We're not doing a costume change here, just adding one thing. Good ideas include a scarf, vest, cardigan, pin or a hat that does not block the face. Ties, bow ties and hair accessories are also great and can be worn the entire evening. Please make sure your singer knows how to add this accessory to their outfit quickly. I don't expect anyone to go shopping for something new. If you don't already own an accessory that could work, we have a few scarves in class that can be borrowed.

Tamara

Happy Pink Day!

Here we are in our fabulous pink! Ask your student about the assembly we went to today. It was all about inclusion. What can we do if we see someone being excluded? What does empathy mean? We'll talk more about the performance tomorrow. If you're interested in talking about empathy at home, there's a great song called The Empathy Song that I love. It's fun to sing, and it has a nice message. If it were in French I would certainly teach it to the class!

Please don't forget to send in your dance-a-thon envelopes tomorrow! So far I've only collected envelopes from half the class so there must be a lot more out there! On Friday, we are dancing from 9:05-9:40, so you will want to be right on time for school. Tell your dancers if they wear white, they will glow in the dark!

Words of the Week

All of these words contain the letter o but in “gomme”, “pomme”, “colle” and “je dors”, it’s a slightly softer sound. Although “zoo” is spelled the same as in English, the word in French is pronounced with a true ‘o’ sound, so imagine the second o just isn’t there!

If you’re wondering about accents on letters other than ‘e’, join the club. Your children have already asked me about what they do, and the simple answer is nothing!

“Gros” and “grosse” are the masculine and feminine version of the same word (meaning large or big). In French, everything has a gender - spoons are girls, books are boys! Even my French friend can’t explain to me a fool-proof way of knowing what’s what, there are exceptions to every rule! Anyway, once you know if you’re talking about something feminine or masculine, you can adjust your adjective. E.g., L’éléphant est gros. La baleine est grosse. The kids have already seen that gender can affect words, for instance, un policier v. une policière, and cher v. chère.

gâteau, trop, le zoo, gros, grosse, tôt, 

gomme, je dors, pomme, colle

Bonus words: ciseaux, océan

Joyeuses Pâques!

I hope everyone has a great long-weekend. We did a couple Easter activities in class, including egg-dyeing yesterday and an egg hunt today.

Today we completed the challenge of measuring the field using our foot as the unit. Ask your student if they remember how many steps it took to measure the field (we had to count in French up to 186!). Also, ask about what you have to be careful of when measuring, whether we are using our feet, toothpicks or rulers... there are a couple things.
We also re-measured ourselves and compared our heights with where we were back in September. Everyone has grown between 1 and 6 (!!!) centimetres in the last 7 months.


Since, in science, we are learning that some forms of energy aren't so great because they cause a lot of pollution, we have started imagining what we might invent to help take care of our planet. Each writer has come up with an idea and they are writing about what it is, what it does, what it looks like and how it helps the world. We hope to put all our ideas together into a class book when we're done our good copies! Ask your writer what their invention is.

Our eggs yesterday turned out pretty nicely, but I asked an artist friend of mine to make one just for fun and look what happened... pretty cool eh? Complete even down to the great lakes! I forgot to show the kids today, but I'll bring it again next week.