Students enjoyed a fun week of learning and physical activity. They participated in many classroom activities, and enjoyed swimming and outdoor fun. Next week will be short, but busy. We will start the week with a fun lunch, that is hosted by Apple Canada. Connect is an Apple Distinguished School, and as such we are provided with opportunities to participate in special events. In December, we participated in a coding event, which earned us a grade wide pizza party. Tom’s House of Pizza will be providing our lunch on Monday!
Enjoy the weekend, Gail, Kevin, Terran and Rebecca Important Dates Feb. 10 - Pizza Party for Grade 5 Feb. 12-14 - No School: Staff Retreat Feb. 17 - No School: Family Day Mar. 6 - No School- Staff PD March. 12 - Snowshoeing with PE Mar. 16 - Report Cards Mar. 19&20 - Student Led Conferences Humanities: Our Humanities focus this week was on stories. Students worked on some of their personal stories, and added details into a story they started last week. We also started an inquiry into Indigenous stories. We looked at how they are shared and the reasons they were told. We also compared the stories of different nations across Canada. Math & Science: Our guest speaker, Mary, led a workshop with our students on snowflakes and how they relate to mathematics: fractals, angles, division, multiplication, symmetry, and shapes. Students created their own snowflakes and will be taking them home or have them displayed at school. We spent time at the beginning of the week practicing our division strategies in preparation for the division check-in today. Since we placed much of our focus this week into math, we will dive deeper into electricity for our 2-day week next week! Looking ahead (short week): parallel and series circuits, electricity in our lives Connect Wear Connect has partnered with a local company, Kodiak Sports, to offer custom spirit wear for our school community. Purchase opportunities will be available a few times throughout the year. Our first run is open from now until February 24, 2020. Delivery to the school is scheduled for before spring break. There are a variety of items available, some with customization options. Sizing charts are on the website. Sample sizes are available to try on. Students can visit the Mountainview room, starting Feb. 10. We have the option to access extended sizes, that may not be seen on the website. Please see contact info below, with size requests. If there are any suggestions, or requests for additional items please forward those along and we will see what can be arranged for future runs. The link will take you to the Connect store. You will be able to create an account, select and pay for any of the items you wish. The orders will be delivered to the school around March 18, 2020. Further questions and inquiries can be directed towards: Catherine Newton ([email protected]) or Dawn Elliott ([email protected]) https://store.kodiaksports.ca/stores/connect-school
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Important Dates
Feb. 5 - PE Swimming Field Trip Feb. 7 - Skating - bring helmet and skates (periods 5 & 6) Feb. 10 - Pizza Party for Grade 5 Feb. 12-14 - No School Staff Retreat Feb. 17 - No School Family Day Swimming notes: Students will be swimming on Feb. 5th (Wednesday). They should bring a lunch with extra snacks, a swimsuit, a towel, and a plastic bag for wet clothes. Students may bring quarters for the lockers, but no other money. Students will not be permitted to purchase items from the cafeteria. A second towel or a robe to wear at lunch is suggested as they will be swimming after lunch, and will eat while wearing their swimsuit from the morning swim. Pizza Party: The grade 5 classes were rewarded with a pizza party for participating in Hour of Code in December. This will take place on Feb.10th. Math & Science: This week in math we continued on our division unit. Students reviewed the 2 division strategies from last week, and began working with long division. For long division, students learned DMSB (divide, multiply, subtract, bring down) to help remember the steps of long division. Students are aware that there will be a check-in on Friday the 7th so feel free to test them on division problems! In science we continued with our electricity unit, focusing on electrical safety and potential hazards in everyday life. Looking ahead: long division tips and tricks, division check-in Friday, electricity in our lives, circuits Humanities: We started the week with a breakfast viewing party. Students enjoyed waffles, hot chocolate, and fruit as we watched the Youth Media Awards. Students found out that, “The Undefeated” won the Caldecott medal. It wasn’t their top pick, but it is a beautifully illustrated book and the award is well deserved. Students should have completed a proposal that requests a Mock Caldecott book be purchased for the school. The proposal includes a book trailer and a piece of opinion writing. These artefacts of learning should be viewable on Seesaw this weekend. If you don’t see them in the student learning journal, this likely means they weren’t complete. Students also worked on their writing and started an inquiry into indigenous stories. Looking Ahead: We will research indigenous groups in Canada and begin creating an artefact of learning to represent our understanding. We are also starting a new read aloud with each class. Important Dates
Jan. 31- No School Feb. 5 - PE Swimming Field Trip Feb. 10 - Pizza Party for grade 5 Feb. 12-14 - No School Staff Retreat Feb. 17 - No School Family Day Math & Science: Mr. Sonico is almost finished with interviewing students with their mental multiplication. This is a chance for students to show their understanding of special number properties like multiplying by 10s, doubling, halving, etc. If your child has completed the interview, there should be clips of this interview in SeeSaw. We also continued our work with division, practicing the 2 methods (partial quotient and the box method) we learned last week. In science we started the electricity and magnetism unit, and on the first day we were able to light up a light bulb using only a battery and 2 wires! Looking ahead: keep practicing division problems, long division, electricity safety and where we use it in everyday life Humanities: This week was our last week for spending time with the Mock Caldecott titles. There were a lot of books eliminated, as we took the selections from 20 books, down to 10 books, then down to 5 books. We selected our winner on Friday. We focused on examining each book based on the Caldecott criteria, and tried hard to see the merits of a book, even if it wasn’t a book we liked. Students will find out which book won our Mock Caldecott on Monday. We will also find out the results of the real Caldecott Medal on Monday morning. Students worked on a proposal letter that requests a Mock Caldecott book be purchased for the school and added to our Learning Commons Collection. The proposal includes a book trailer and a piece of opinion writing. The proposal letter and book trailer are due Tuesday of next week. Mrs. Sterling is also teaching us and leading an inquiry around the role of stories. Looking Ahead: Mrs. Sterling will be taking the lead with our inquiry into stories. Important Dates
Jan. 31- No School Feb. 5 - PE Swimming Field Trip Feb. 12-14 - No School Staff Retreat Feb. 17 - No School Family Day Humanities Our Caldecott books were narrowed down to a field of 20. Students took another look at each of the books and used the criteria to rank each book. They participated in a short debate and had the opportunity to share their views with others. We will choose our winner on Friday of next week. Our top titles are going head to head, and students will be very sad to see some favourites eliminated. We worked on some writing skills. Next week students will begin crafting a persuasive letter to Mrs. Veteikis. They are making a case for, and requesting that their favourite Caldecott eligible title be added to our school library collection. Math & Science This week, we focused our studies in science on the scientific method, particularly in designing fair tests. We looked at how the weather impacts human’s clothing choices for water resistance, wind resistance, or protection from the cold. Students completed a lab report (through Google Slides) as a result of this experience, and we will be sharing our findings with our classmates next week. In math, we have begun to wrap up the multiplication unit with the mental math interviews and started working on division. Students have been introduced to 2 strategies to solve 3-digit by 1-digit division problems; the partial quotient method and the box method. We also learned a new game to practice division problems which only requires 3 dice, so ask your child to play at home! Looking ahead: continuing our mental math interviews (double-digit by single-digit factors) and starting the electricity unit. Dear Parents,
Welcome back to all our families. It was a busy week as we settled back into the routine. Students got to know our student teachers from Mount Royal University and we set some intentions for our time together. Mr. Fong joined Mr. Sonico and Mrs. Sterling is with Mrs. Stevenson. They will be with us until April 9th. Students also enjoyed an off campus trip to the Glenbow Museum. We examined artefacts and used observation skills as we determined the stories that the artefacts could tell. A few pictures of the day can be viewed on twitter. https://twitter.com/GailStevenson Important Dates Jan. 17- No School Jan. 31- No School Feb. 5 - PE Swimming Field Trip Feb. 12-14 - No School Staff Retreat Feb. 17 - No School Family Day Humanities- We spent this week immersed in our collection of Caldecott eligible picture books. There were over 40 books available on the long list for students to examine against the Caldecott criteria. Students voted for each book on a 3 point scale, and the top will 16 move onto the next round. In addition, 4 books will be assigned wild card spots and will move on. We will continue narrowing down the books until Jan. 24th, when we will choose a winning selection. We will compare our results with the official results on Jan. 27th. Looking ahead, we will continue with Mock Caldecott and students will be creating book trailers and persuasive letters. Math & Science - This week we got back into the swing of things by reviewing multiplication. I returned the multiplication pre-test students wrote in November and they had the opportunity to see how much growth they experienced in the last two months by working hard on this skill. For most, they were able to show how to multiply 2-digit factors. There are a few that still need extra support/practice at home. Please consult your child’s Seesaw account to see if your child has met expectations or if they need extra practice at home. How to support at home: You can give students two 2-digit factors (like 24 x 79) to calculate. I’m hoping that the practice at home will reinforce strategies they have learned at school and will contribute to their familiarity to such process. We started our unit study of division and our goal for students by the end of this unit is to be able to divide 3-digit dividends by 1-digit divisors. In science we continued our studies of weather by looking at how clouds are related to weather, the difference between climate and weather, and how some human activities can affect weather. We then had a discussion on what constitutes a “fair test” and students have begun designing fair tests to do next week that are related to weather and clothes they wear. Looking ahead: mental math interviews, division, and fabric testing. Dear Parents,
We hope you enjoy a restful break. We appreciate your support over the past months and look forward to an amazing new year when your child returns to the classroom in January. We have a field trip to the Glenbow that first Friday back. There is a form on Powerschool that needs to be signed and we could use some volunteers. Please email [email protected] or sign up on Better Impact. When we return from the break we will also be welcoming 2 student teachers, from Mount Royal University, into our classrooms. They will be with us until April 9th. Mr. Fong will be joining Mr. Sonico and Mrs. Sterling will be in with Mrs. Stevenson. The students have met both teachers and we look forward to the partnership. Important Dates Dec. 21- Jan. 5 - Winter Break Jan. 6 - Classes Resume Jan. 10 - Glenbow Museum - VOLUNTEERS NEEDED - Please email your child’s homeroom teacher if you’re interested. Peace Festival and #12daysofcreativity: Students enjoyed several Peace Festival events. We watched “Wild Constructs” on Monday, skated on Tuesday, and enjoyed the Parnival on Wednesday. Students have also used their creativity to complete several holiday challenges. They have used their ipads to create snowglobes, animated cards and mini movies. Some even tried out garageband and wrote songs. Many of these mini projects can be viewed on Seesaw. Humanities: Students spent some time wrapping up some tasks for the Amazing Race this week. We did some review work with longitude and latitude. We started our Mock Caldecott Unit and read several books that have won the medal. We searched for evidence in each book that meet the Caldecott criteria. Once we are familiar with what award winning books look like, we will examine books that are eligible for this year’s award and see if we can predict the winner. Math & Science: Students worked on an assignment where they had to predict what areas in a given space - a classroom, for example - would be warm or cool and provide a reason behind their hypothesis. Then, we used our observations this week about the weather to inquire and discuss what chinooks are and what causes them. In math, multiplication quiz results were given; re-tests will be granted once students feel prepared, i.e. they’ve done some studying at home too. Due to the busy week we had with Peace Festival activities, we didn’t quite get to the multiplication mental math interviews (2-digit by 1-digit, e.g. 37 x 8). The mental math interviews will be conducted after winter break in January. Important Dates
Dec. 16-18 Peace Festival Activities Dec.19- Potluck Lunch and Gift Exchange (see below) Dec. 20 - No School Dec. 21- Jan. 5 - Winter Break Jan. 10 - Glenbow Museum Humanities: Students completed the detour tasks for the Great Lakes region this week. We then moved on and learned about the Canadain Shield. Students completed sketchnotes as they learned about geography, resources and climate for the largest region in Canada. Students should be finished the roadblock task. The detour for the Canadian Shield will be wrapped on Monday. Math & Science: This week we learned how to mentally multiply using strategies learned in class. One such strategy for 95 x 7 for example is to multiply 100 x 7 (which is 700) then subtract 5 x 7 from the product (which is 35) and they get 665. There are plenty of other strategies out there, but this is to illustrate the fluidity of numbers and how we can use alternative strategies aside from the standard algorithm. Results for the check-in will be communicated next week. In science, we graphed our temperature measurements using Lego bricks. We then discussed interesting things we observed from the graphs, such as patterns (if any), potential sources of error - all part of the nature of science. Looking ahead: warm and cool air movements and mental math interviews (2-digit by 1-digit) minimum Peace Festival Week
Important Dates
Dec. 9 - Hour of Code Lunch is NOT provided Dec.19- Potluck Lunch and Gift Exchange (see below) Dec. 20 - No School Dec. 21- Jan. 5 - Winter Break Dear Parents, Canada Learning Code week takes place next week Dec. 9th to 13th. The grade 5 students will be joining 120 000+ students across the country when they participate in an hour of code. Teaching coding is more than teaching our students how to write lines of code to build awesome algorithms. It allows us to teach skills like critical thinking, problem solving and teamwork. We are excited to participate in an hour of code activity on Monday, Dec. 9th. We are participating in an as an Apple Distinguished School, and Apple will supply the students with a pizza lunch. However, we WILL NOT be having the pizza on Monday, as was previously communicated. The students will need to provide their own lunch on Monday. Please enjoy the video attached to see some of the many reasons learning to code will benefit your child. https://youtu.be/yyTbo0wre4M Math & Science We completed our weather instrument construction. Students showed tremendous creativity in problem-solving and perseverance in this activity. Students then created videos, answering questions from how it works to measure a particular part of weather to how the experience was like collaborating with someone. In math, students learned how multiplying by base ten numbers (10, 100, 1000) and multiples of these numbers (20, 30, 200, etc) by using special number properties and how they can be easily used to estimate products. You can check out the lesson here: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1m0YuYV5p3ACZKQYbN9x-l63VyFDQQxnp3WE3_5Q2qcM/edit?usp=sharing On Wednesday next week (Dec. 11th), we will have a multiplication check-in/quiz. I’ve encouraged students to study on a nightly basis - about 10 minutes - and review one of the many ways to multiply. Please use the email I sent yesterday to support your child at home in preparing for this. Looking ahead: graphing our weather observations, predicting cool and warm areas in a room, problem-solving activities and mental math interviews. Humanities: This week we finished up with the novel study one pagers. Students worked hard to demonstrate their understanding of the novel through graphics and print. In social studies we discussed the Great Migration and began learning about the fur trade. Coming up we will learn about the Underground Railroad and start our Mock Caldecott unit. December Activities- There are some fun activities planned for this month before break. The Peace Festival will take place, more details will be provided as we know them. We are participating in an Hour of Code activity with all the grade 5s. As Connect Charter is an Apple Distinguished School we will be taking place in a coding challenge. The last day of school we will have a potluck and a Secret Santa gift exchange. Please sign up for a potluck item here. Please see the attachment for additional information about the gift exchange. Dec. 6 - No School
Dec. 9 - Hour of Code Pizza Lunch Dec. 20 - No School Dec. 21- Jan. 5 - Winter Break Dear Parents, Please enjoy this look into our week in grade 5! We were busy as we prepared for Student Led Conferences. We enjoyed seeing families at student led conferences. If you were not able to attend our student-led conferences, your child will be able to lead a conference with you at home. Please see attached document as your guide. Math & Science: This week, I shared with students three online resources/apps that they can use to help them with their math work and can be used for extra practice.
If students have access to a device (laptop, desktop, or table) at home, they can work on any of the above resources. They won’t need to take their school iPads home unless you want them to. With all of the above resources, students need to just log into their Google accounts to access all the work that I’ve assigned for them to do. Looking ahead: more practice with multiplication using different strategies: array and lattice. In science, we started our study of weather by identifying concepts/ideas that are relevant to weather. One common misconception was how students thought tsunamis were related to weather. Looking ahead: predicting areas of hot and cold areas in a given space and tracking temperature over a given time. Humanities: This week the students completed the detour and the roadblock for the Amazing Race Atlantic Region. You will be able to view these on Seesaw next week. We were able to start our learning of the Great Lakes Region. Students have learned that this highly populated region is small in area, but large with people and resources. Students also revisited a blank map of Canada and filled in all that they know. They compared this map with one they completed in August and reflected on their growth. Coming up next week we will continue learning about the Great Lakes and some of the history in that region. Dec. 6 - No School
Dec. 9 - Hour of Code Pizza Lunch Dec. 20 - No School Dec. 21- Jan. 5 - Winter Break Dear Parents, Please enjoy this look into our week in grade 5! We were busy as we prepared for Student Led Conferences. We enjoyed seeing families at student led conferences. If you were not able to attend our student-led conferences, your child will be able to lead a conference with you at home. Please see attached document as your guide. Math & Science: This week, I shared with students three online resources/apps that they can use to help them with their math work and can be used for extra practice.
If students have access to a device (laptop, desktop, or table) at home, they can work on any of the above resources. They won’t need to take their school iPads home unless you want them to. With all of the above resources, students need to just log into their Google accounts to access all the work that I’ve assigned for them to do. Looking ahead: more practice with multiplication using different strategies: array and lattice. In science, we started our study of weather by identifying concepts/ideas that are relevant to weather. One common misconception was how students thought tsunamis were related to weather. Looking ahead: predicting areas of hot and cold areas in a given space and tracking temperature over a given time. Humanities: This week the students completed the detour and the roadblock for the Amazing Race Atlantic Region. You will be able to view these on Seesaw next week. We were able to start our learning of the Great Lakes Region. Students have learned that this highly populated region is small in area, but large with people and resources. Students also revisited a blank map of Canada and filled in all that they know. They compared this map with one they completed in August and reflected on their growth. Coming up next week we will continue learning about the Great Lakes and some of the history in that region. |
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