Interview Planning

Hi parents,

A few important reminders:

1. I am very much looking forward to our Scientist in School workshop tomorrow. I have always been impressed with these workshops and I always learn a lot. I know the kids will have a lot of fun.
Please ensure that your scientist is on time for school tomorrow. Our workshop begins promptly at 9 am and I would hate for anyone to miss the beginning.

2. Tomorrow is the due date for any February Scholastic orders.

3. Please return any interview request forms to me by Friday. I sent a yellow note home Monday. If you received a separate form from the office, you can disregard that form, or use it instead. It doesn't matter, I just need to have them back ASAP so that I can make a schedule and get the confirmations out in time. I indicated on my note if I thought a meeting would be beneficial, but everyone is welcome to request a time.

Dominique took some amazing shots of the kids having a great time in music class with Mr. Greene this week! Looks like so much fun!

She also witnessed some skillful building with shapes.

Thanks for sending the kids dressed for the weather. Snow is SO fun, when we're prepared for it. We've been practicing turn-taking when giving each other toboggan rides - this group even made a super-long toboggan train!

Some archaeologists found a very interesting footprint preserved in ice. The bottom of this boot had some great shapes in it. Who does it belong to? The explorers considered the size of the print - whether it could be a kid or an adult, and went on a search for the owner. I don't think we've been successful yet...

Finally, I think you can tentatively mark in your calendars that our kindergarten concert will be March 8th in the evening. This is not 100% confirmed, but very nearly. Our class, and the other kinders, will be presenting a couple little numbers that we are already working on and which I'm excited to share with you. Please plan to be there (we need the kids!!) and invite your family!

Happy February!

Dear Salle 202 families,
Sadly, our class is shrinking. We didn't have an opportunity to say a proper goodbye to Xavi, who changed schools over the holidays. We did, however, have time to celebrate August's last day with us before his family moves. We all signed a special card and gave him a big group hug. We celebrated his birthday a little early, and we set up a special activity centre at his request: building 3D shapes with marshmallows and toothpicks!
We have a special opportunity to be pen pals with August now, and look forward to hearing from him as he gets settled at his new school. Bonne chance August!!

Yesterday I sent home the February calendar. Don't forget that the $8 for the science workshop is due this Friday. Scholastic catalogues will come home this week and any orders are due next week.
On the back of the calendar, I've put our class list of names. Many students are excited to make valentines for their friends (one student didn't even want to pack the note because she wanted to get started right away at aftercare!!). Of course, it is completely optional, but if your child is going to give out valentines, please make sure they have one for everybody. If writing all those names is a daunting task for your beginning writer, or if you think that matching up each name with the name on a paper bag "mailbox" will be too great a challenge for your beginning reader, please do encourage your child to address their cards to "mon ami". That way, any card can be for anyone. Easy.

Thank you again to the parents who came to the library on Monday. The puppet show this time was "Mud Puddle", by Robert Munsch. The kids found it hilarious and roared with laughter throughout (I laughed out loud too). Our next trip to the library will be in the last week of February.

This week, I've witnessed some great counting at the math centre and a lot of great letter and word work (do we ever love those new printing pages!!). We have continued to add regularly to our list of poems. Ask your student to teach your their current favourite. Some very popular ones are, "Les amis", "Bateau sur l'eau" and "Les tasses de thé". Some newer ones are, "Voici le petit garçon", "Petite souris de cendre" and "Patapi patapiège". Our song, "Hymne à l'amitié" is also coming along nicely. We're about half done learning it - just have to work on the verses now.
Students are getting the hang of checking in their borrowed book and signing out another one and are able to do this more and more efficiently.

We have made it all the way up to Q in the French alphabet, and have continued reading about each letter in our book about "Le Village des Sons". We learned that Q's best friend is U, and that U let's Q make his own sound when they're side by side. We've also practiced pinching our lips together, like a fish, for when U is alone. This sound doesn't really exist in English. A cool trick is to shape your lips for an O vowel, and then say "ee" through that space. You will end up with the French U sound.
OK, so we skipped over R, S and T... we'll go back. But we've now officially learned the vowel sounds in French. There are many exceptions, and different ways to combine them, but we'll worry about that later.

Mots de la Semaine

Alistar noticed that as we placed words beginning with C on the word wall last week, I organized them into two columns. One for words beginning with C, and one for words beginning with Ch. Great observation! We read the story about a little girl named Ch, who is trying to shush a baby to sleep. Whereas in English, we almost add a tiny t sound in front of a ch (think: chatter - the tongue touches the teeth), in French it is a gentle sound, like the English sh (think: should - the tongue is raised). There happen to be many animal names that begin with ch in French...

un chat

un chien

le cheval

la chèvre (goat)

le chameau (camel)

As you probably know, Term 1 report cards (called the "Communication of Learning" for kinders) are coming home on February 13th. We will soon begin scheduling interviews for the following Thursday evening and Friday morning. This time, interviews are by parent or teacher request. I will extend an invite to everyone, and will let you know if I feel that meeting would be beneficial. Look for this paperwork next week. I guess this means we are half way through the school year... wow!

Scientist in School

Hi parents,

I want to start off by bragging about an amazing thing that happened in our class yesterday. I was slow getting to the carpet for our poem time. I usually choose leaders and recite the poems along with the kids, however, Dominique and I were still helping with shoes. Instead of sitting around waiting, some leaders emerged from the group that was already there and they started reciting poems on their own. When one poem ended, they would choose another leader and continue. They knew ALL the words! I was amazed. I simply went and sat down on the carpet and joined in with them. I told them how proud I was, and they told me that I could feel free to go get snack ready and they would just keep doing poems without me! Hahaha! So I did, and they did! Bravo tout le monde!

Another cool thing... for a week now, we've been practicing the song "Frère Jacques", not just as a class, but in 2 groups as a round! We got to be preeeetttty good at it, if I do say so myself. This afternoon, we surprised Mr. Greene with a special performance of it. He was so impressed that he thought we were in grade 3, and challenged us to try it in 4 parts!!

We also started learning a new song that we will perform at the kindergarten concert (March sometime, I think) and a school assembly (April). The song is about friendship, and will be very fitting for Pink Day, which is what our assembly will focus on. It's a song by Céline Dion and is quite long, so we will do a greatly reduced version. However, if you'd like to listen to it at home, you can find it here.

Today, you are receiving a blue note explaining that we will soon have a visit from a Scientist in Schools presenter. We will participate in a half day workshop including about 5 different experiment centres ranging from chemistry to astronomy to paleontology. We need some parents to help lead centres. Don't worry, you don't need to be a scientist to be our science teacher! The visiting scientist will explain everything you need to know. If you're able to join us for the morning of February 8th, please return the slip or email me. This amazing workshop costs $8 per child. Please send this in by next Friday and ensure that a name accompanies the money. Thanks!!

Sometimes, kids wonder things out loud, and it gives us ideas for new centres we should set up. Many months ago, Noa wondered out loud what would happen "if we mixed ALL the colours together in milk". It's been on my mind ever since. Today, we set up a colour mixing station (using water instead of milk... in case of spills). First, students made a note of the colours they wanted to mix, and then they put 2 drops of each colour into their water. We had a selection of 7 colours to mix with. Whatever the result, they tried to find a pencil crayon to match in order to document their findings. Some students, who had an unidentifiable colour, made up a new name for their colour... such as "Swamp-speed" or "Halloween Bats".

This week, I've also added some new pages to our printing duotangs. Many students were very excited to finally have more to work on. On the new pages, there's printing, but there's also room to write and draw words for each letter. Some students have been incredibly independent by looking around the room, using the word wall, posters, bins or books to find words to add. Malaika and August have shared some good tips for how to help yourself find words on your own, and students have helped each other understand words that they have already learned. Bien fait mes amis!

Mots de la Semaine

Ahh! I just realized I forgot to post words last week!

I'll give you an extra challenge this week. Can you review the words to the chorus of our new song?

“Si c’est ton ami, dis-lui qu’il chante

et puis chante avec lui.

La la la...

L'amitié c'est le plus beau pays.”