Literacy, Prairie Landscape Art, The Search for Delicious and Awesome Dancing Fun!

Halloween Update:

Royal Oak is excited to move in a new direction this year! In place of Pumpkinella, students are invited to wear their Halloween costumes on October 31^st. Please have students come dressed in their costume in the morning (PM Kindergarten, please come ready in the afternoon!). Please have your child practice getting in and out of their costume so they can independently dress for washroom breaks. We ask that costumes do NOT include: masks, weapons, accessories, or blood/gore. Regular learning activities will continue throughout the day. Students will get the opportunity to share their costumes with each other by participating in a parade in the halls. In keeping with learning about healthy eating, please do not send any special treats or snacks to share. Our Staff is looking forward to the 31st!

You are also welcome to wear black and orange if you do not want to wear a costume. 

Literacy

This week we have been focusing on two strategies:

The first one we call Skippy the Frog or Skip the Word!

Accuracy Strategy: I can skip the Word and come back to it later.

You can practice this strategy at home with your child with their home reading and library books by:

The second strategy we are practicing is a Comprehension Strategy: 

I can make a mental picture in my mind while I am reading.

This is how you can practice this strategy at home with your child:

Prairie Landscape Art:

This week we added a buffalo to our prairie art. We have been talking about how in the past when Calgary was just becoming a city the landscape looked very different. We looked at pictures and have been reading stories of some of the first people to come to Canada. We started by looking at the First Nations as the first inhabitants of the land. We looked at what the view would have been like over a hundred and fifty years ago. 

We also talked about the abundance of the Buffalo and the importance of this animal to the Blackfoot First Nations.

http://www.glenbow.org/blackfoot/EN/flash/index.htm

Click on the link above and click on the buffalo icon to take you to information about: How we lived with the Buffalo. 

We added a Buffalo to our Prairie Landscape of the Past to depict what was here before us. We used oil pastels and watercolor to create the fur and texture of the Buffalo. Ask me what my favorite part of making my Prairie Landscape: Past was? 

Novel Study

The Search for Delicious

We are starting to really get into the book "The Search for Delicious". We are about a quarter of the way through the book. Today we had to add the important places (settings) and main character, plus the pathway that he is taking from the castle to poll everyone in the land for the most delicious thing! 

Right now Gaylen is in the forest. Ask me who I think he is going to meet there!

AWESOME DANCING FUN!

This weeks Dancing with Dance Pl3y Residence has been so amazing. Please feel free to come in and watch us dance and see some of what we have been learning on Monday October 22 from 9:30-10:10.

We have learned lots of different kinds of dance moves and practiced making up our own! 

Everyone looks different and everyone is having FUN! 

Teachers Pet, Base Ten, Adjectives and Pumpkins!

Teachers Pet

Yesterday we got to enjoy a special presentation in our classroom from Teacher's Pet. It was an introduction to water and the three states water can be. We got to do 4 different experiments to learn about some important properties of water:

Some of the Vocabulary we started talking about and making note of:

Evaporation
Precipitation
Condensation
Water Cycle
Density
Repel
Absorb
Melting
Freezing
Solid
Liquid
Gas
Water Molecules (H2O)

We will continue working with this vocabulary and experimenting with the properties of water. Ask me if I remember the Water Cycle Song!

Base Ten

In math we started working with Base Ten materials to explode numbers into their tens, fives and ones. We will continue working with base ten this week to visualize the tens and ones in a number in order to strengthen our understanding of PLACE VALUE. 

Using a T-Chart also helps us to remember the tens and the ones and which side they belong on:

Links to Practise Exploding Numbers:

https://www.coolmath4kids.com/manipulatives/base-ten-blocks

http://www.abcya.com/base_ten.htm

We built the number using base ten and then exploded it into its tens, fives and ones. We had to write it and draw it.

Writing

Adjectives
Today we started looking at Adjectives. Words used to describe Nouns.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A4XZDyxJ23Q



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ZkMbLkGims


We looked at a pumpkin and had to think of as many describing words or ADJECTIVES for it:

We then used these adjectives to try begin writing sentences (using sentence starters) about the pumpkin in our classroom!

CLASSROOM VOLUNTEERS 

I have created a sign up sheet for volunteering in the classroom. This would be for an hour period in the morning and would usually be to either support literacy by reading with student's or groups of student's or to put up student work around the room, on the bulletin boards or in their student scrapbooks depending on the day and the need. If you would like to sign up and have not already received an email invite from me please click on the link below to sign up. 


Thank you in advance for your support!



https://www.signupgenius.com/go/30e0f48abad23a5f94-volunteering

Teacher's Pet In-Class Field Trip

IMPORTANT REMINDER: 

If you had stated that you are interested in coming in to Volunteer on Monday October 15th from 1pm-3pm please come in right at 1pm. I had three parents say they were interested and so long as you have your Volunteer Clearance please feel free to come in and help out at that time. 

Please remember to wear comfy clothes Monday that are easy to dance and move in but are also ok potentially get a little dirty and wet when we do our Liquids Experiments in the afternoon! 

Prairie Landscapes, People of the Past, Dance and Teacher's Pet and a Novel Study!

Art

Today we worked on the second part of our Prairie Landscapes. Last week we worked on using water colours to create a prairie sky. We talked some important artistic terms:

Foreground
Midground
Background

With the sky we looked at the background and made sure to have a HORIZON line. 

Today we looked at creating the Foreground and Midground that we would see in a prairie landscape of the past, before any people came. 

Next week we will be adding an animal from the past to our work in order to complete our Prairie Landscape of the Past. 


People of the Past

We have been looking at the Stories of 4 prominent people of Calgary's Past. 

Chief Bull's Head of the Blackfoot First Nations

Sam Livingston: A Farmer and Settler from Ireland. He was a prospector, a trader and a farmer. 

Father Doucet: A Missionary from France who came to teach people about his god. 

Inspector Brisbois of the North West Mounted Police who came to keep law and order between the settlers, First Nations and traders all coming to Calgary and surrounding area. 

Today we had to imagine we could go back in time and meet one of these characters. Who would we meet and why? What questions would we ask them? What would we want to learn about from them? Ask me who I chose and why?

Dance Residence starts next week!

ROS Students will begin their dance residency on Monday. All classes have been scheduled to take part in four forty minute sessions with our guest instructor. The final session will be our Parent Share session. Parents are invited to the gym during this session to check out what students have been learning during the residency. You will have the opportunity to watch your son/daughter dance as well as to participate and have fun with them. Your parent share session will be: __Monday October 22 from 9:30-10:10

For more information please see the DancePl3y website:

https://www.dancepl3y.com/

Teacher's Pet In-Class Field Trip Reminder:

Monday is our day to have Teacher's Pet come into our classroom and do some fun, interactive and introductory experiments about exploring Liquids. Please wear comfortable clothing that if it gets wet or dirty is not a big deal! 

Novel Study

We started reading a novel called "The Search For Delicious" by Natalie Babbitt. Ask me what the problem in the story is so far? What characters have I been introduced to? 

Reminders, Literacy Math and More!

A Reminder that our 

ROS Parent Night is this

Thursday, October 11th from 6-7pm

on Disciplinary Literacy!

                                                                       

Royal Oak School is pleased to invite you and your family to join us for an engaging evening of interactive sessions where you will have the opportunity to explore ‘Disciplinary Literacy’. Your experience will show you how your child is learning to be an artist, an illustrator, a historian, and a geologist through hands-on activities throughout the school.  

Where:

Royal Oak School

When:­­­

Thursday, October 11, 2018

6:00 - 7:00 pm

Reminder: Book orders for October are due by this upcoming Friday October 12th. 

Reminder: Next Week on Monday October 15th we will be having Teacher's Pet Educational Services in to our classroom to introduce several key components of our Science curriculum: Exploring Liquids! 
Notices were sent home in your child's folder today. If you are able to volunteer (and have a valid CBE security clearance) please fill out the bottom portion of the form and return it to your child's teacher. 
We need 3 volunteers to make this in-class field trip as successful as possible. 

Literacy

This week we have been working on practicing two strategies to improve our reading Accuracy and Comprehension:

Flipping the Vowel Sound:

We have been reviewing our Vowel Sounds and practicing flipping the sound when the word does not make sense or sound right.

For Comprehension we have been practicing Back up and ReRead when it does not sound right, does not make sense, or when we can't remember the WHO or the WHAT.

Math

Last week we read the book The Napping House by Audrey Wood.

We were challenged to come up with our own Napping House for our families which included drawings, a number equation and an answer in the end. 
Today we practiced figuring out possible combinations for different numbers. We used whiteboards to practice our math thinking through pictures, numbers, words and equations. 

Book Orders, Literacy Nouns and Verbs and Exploding Numbers!!

Reminder: Book orders are due by Friday October 12th. Placing the order online is the easiest but if you like you can send in the paper order form with a cheque if that is easier for you. I would like the orders to all be placed by October 12th in order to get them back before Halloween!

Dear ROS Families,

If you are still interested in ordering AdMazing coupon books, please note that the last day to put an order in is, Wednesday, Oct. 10.  

Thank you for your support!

ROS Fundraising Society

Literacy

Today we were very excited to reach 16 minutes of stamina during Read to Someone! We are so close to reaching our goal of 20 minutes! This week we have been practicing the reading strategy of Chunking and finding smaller words inside of big ones to help us sound out more tricky words:

You can help your child become independent at using this strategy by practicing it at home:

We also practiced being reading coaches when we read with a partner. Here are some ways we can be great reading coaches and get better at reading together!



When I am reading I need to stop and CHECK FOR UNDERSTANDING. This is an important COMPREHENSION strategy to ensure I am THINKING about what I am reading. 

Here are some ways to practice this at home:

Today when your Home Reading comes home please follow the Parent Pipeline suggestions in your child's home reading bag. Return the books by Tuesday with the filled out student form. You can use Raz-Kids for the remaining Tuesday and Wednesday evenings before new books come home the following Thursday. 

Raz-kids:
https://www.raz-kids.com/

Writing a Sentence: Nouns and Verbs

In writing we have continued looking at how we can extend our sentences using Nouns and Verbs

We practiced finding nouns and verbs in sentences and then practiced writing our own.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c292_2_W-hc

We also looked at Verbs. These are the action words in our sentences or the "doing" words. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ineCCpqpZrM

Next week we will practice adding descriptive adjectives and adverbs to our sentences to make then even more powerful!

Math
Exploding Numbers

Today we looked at exploding numbers into their tens and loose. We have been practicing finding all the packs of ten and the loose. Today we looked at double digit numbers and then tried to find the tens and the loose. If the loose had a group of 5 in it we also looked for that.

Example:

We are not adding yet but seeing all of the tens, fives and loose/extra's (ones) really helps us in visualizing place value and understanding double digit numbers so that when we start to add it is more efficient. 

Ask me to practice exploding these numbers:

17

26

39

58