There was a great turn out last Tuesday for the first meeting of our Astronomy Club. Unfortunately, the cloudy weather didn’t make for much stargazing 🙁 However, there are still lots of great opportunities to come with our new telescope, so keep your eyes peeled to our school’s website and newsletter for more Astronomy club events in the near future 🙂

There will be no classes for students on Friday, January 30^th, as teachers and staff will be busy learning and a collaborating together.

Here is what is happening inside our classroom this week…

French-For this week’s dictée, we will continue to study verbs in the present tense. Students are becoming familiar with how to use their Bescherelle to conjugate these verbs and at recognizing and conjugating verbs with different endings. Continued practice at home is recommended to help solidify our work together in class.

This week during our reading periods, we will finish up the novel “Noémie-Le Secret de Madame Lumbago.” We will then spend some time critiquing the author’s work and we will begin to discuss and prepare for our literature circles, which should start sometime next week. Our literature circles are comparable to a book club, where groups of students read, respond to, and discuss the same novel. All of our literature circle selections were written by Gilles Tibo, the subject of our author study. This is always an exciting activity as it helps us grow not only as readers, but also as writers and speakers!

This week, as finish up our poetry study, we will finalize our revisions and corrections to our work and will publish our finished poems. We will then present our best pieces to our classmates at our poetry café 🙂

Math-This week in math class, we will continue to explore two-digit by two-digit multiplication. We have learned many strategies to solve these problems. This concept can be challenging for many students, so I would encourage continued practice of both two-digit by two-digit multiplication and basic multiplication facts to 81 at home 🙂

Social Studies-This week we will continue to explore commerce in our region and will take a look at some of the products and services available here on Prince Edward Island and in our specific communities. We will also start preparing the plan for our own fictitious community, which will demonstrate our knowledge of the concepts studied in this unit.

Science-We are now well into our Science Fair prep. Last week, a calendar of important dates was sent home, along with an outline of the scientific method. This week students should all have their questions ready and we will begin to form our hypothesis and research our topics. We will also take the time to review our procedural writing skills, as we will start to write our procedure for how to conduct our experiments.

Grade 7 Science

Students should now have an idea for their Science Fair project and should be working on developing their question and hypothesis.

In class, we will finish up our review on solutions and mixtures and we will write our quiz on these concepts later in the week.

Grade 8 Science

This week we will finish up our study of refraction and will explore how the human eye works. We will be treated to a presentation from an optometrist, who will help us understand the complexity of our eyes and how we can use different types of lenses to correct our vision when we have problems with our sight.

Students should now have an idea for their Science Fair project and should be working on developing their question and hypothesis.

Have a fantastic week!

Madame Walker

Things are shaping up for another busy week here at Gulf Shore!

Tomorrow evening (Tuesday, January 20^th) we will have the first meeting of the Gulf Shore Astronomy Club. Our school was a lucky recipient of a telescope through the “Scopes for Schools” program. Our first meeting will consist of the presentation of our telescope and hopefully (if the weather permits) a little star gazing. All are welcome to attend 🙂

Our next Home and School meeting will take place on Wednesday, January 21^st at 7pm in the Science Lab.

As we’ve had a number of cold days lately, this is a reminder that we are always outside for recess unless the temperature reaches -20 (with or without the wind chill). It is very important that students are dressed for the weather this time of year and that they have some extra mittens or gloves in case theirs get wet in the snow 🙂

Here is what is happening in our classroom this week…

French-This week we will be studying verbs in the present tense for our dictée. We have already studied the verbs “être” and “avoir” earlier this year and over the next few weeks we will be looking at other groups of verbs.

During our reading blocks this week we will continue to explore the novel “Noémie-Le Secret de Madame Lumbago.” I am very impressed with the students’ interest in this series! It is wonderful to see everyone so excited about reading! We also continue to work on our individual reading goals and I have started meeting with students one-on-one to evaluate their reading progress.

As we continue our study of poetry, this week we will be writing some free verse poems and we will start to revise and edit the poems we’ve written as we prepare them for publishing.

Math-We have finished up our formal study on equations, but as this is a foundational concept for Grade 5, students should continue to practice their strategies for solving equations both in class and at home. This week we will start to explore our 5^th foundational outcome; multiplying two-digit by two-digit numbers.

In this unit, your child will:

• • Recall basic multiplication facts.
• • Use different strategies to estimate products
• • Multiply numbers mentally.
• • Multiply a 2-digit number by a 2-digit number.
• • Pose and solve problems using whole numbers.
• • Solve problems with more than one step.

Students are encouraged to use a variety of different strategies to multiply whole numbers. Calculating with number sense means that children look at the numbers and operations involved, and choose the strategy that is most efficient. You may want to ask your child to show you some of the different strategies he or she uses.

Here is a suggestion for a game you can play at home:

Duelling Products

• • Remove the jokers and face cards from a deck of playing cards.

Use aces as 1 and tens as 0. Shuffle the cards and divide them equally between you.

• • Each player turns over 2 cards and multiplies the numbers.

The player with the greater product takes all the cards.

• • If both players get the same product, leave the cards on the table.

The winner of the next round takes all the cards.

The winner is the player with more cards after all the cards have been turned over.

Social Studies-This week we will continue to explore how natural and man-made structures shape our cities and towns and the advantages and disadvantages of some of these structures. We will also explore commerce in our region and will take a look at some of the products and services available here on Prince Edward Island and in our specific communities.

Science-Our Science Fair prep continues this week. Students are now in the process of brainstorming for ideas. Over the next few weeks, I will meet with students to discuss their ideas and help them to develop their research questions.

Grade 7 Science

Students should continue to brainstorm ideas for their Science Fair projects. Final ideas must be submitted by the end of next week and I will be meeting with individual students and groups to discuss their ideas this week and next.

In class, we will continue to explore techniques to separate mixtures, will take a detailed look at many common uses for solid and gas solutions and will begin to prepare for our quiz on these concepts.

Grade 8 Science

Through our study of light and optics, this week we will continue to examine at two important properties of light: reflection and refraction.

Students should also continue to brainstorm ideas for their Science Fair projects. Final ideas must be submitted by the end of next week and I will be meeting with individual students and groups to discuss their ideas this week and next.

Have a marvelous week!

Madame Walker

We had a great first week back to school! It was so nice to be back into our classroom routines and to see everyone after the holidays 🙂

Book orders went home on Thursday. Order forms and money are due tomorrow, Tuesday, January 13^th, for anyone interested in purchasing items.

Our next Home and School meeting will take place on January 21^st at 7pm in the Science Lab.

Here is what is happening in our classroom this week…

French-For our dictée this week we will continue to study singular and plural nouns. As always, students are reminded to go over these concepts and complete the assigned exercises at home, in preparation for our quiz on Day 1(Thursday).

In reader’s workshop this week we will continue to explore how readers read between the lines. We have also started our author study of Gilles Tibo and are reading “Noémie-Le Secret de Madame Lumbago” together as a class. Lots of great discussion is happening around this book and its characters 🙂 We also continue to work in our carnet de lecture and in our guided reading groups on our individual learning goals.

We are well into our study of poetry during our writing blocks. We have explored lots of haiku poems and their structure, have written a few as a class, and have started to write some on our own. This week we will finish up our haiku writing and begin to examine other types of poems and their structures.

Math-In math class this week we continue to write and solve equations with one variable and to practice our foundational concepts and math facts.

Social Studies-This week we will continue to look at urban, rural and suburban communities and we will begin to explore how natural and man-made structures shape our cities and towns.

Science-Our school Science Fair will take place on March 11^th. Students have started to brainstorm ideas and possible topics both in class and at home. Later on in the week or early next week I will send home a detailed letter and schedule explaining the Science Fair process. Most of the preparations will happen in school at the Grade 5 level, although some minor work may be required at home.

Grade 7 Science

Students should now begin brainstorming ideas for their Science Fair projects. I will be sending home a detailed list of dates and deadlines for this project later on this week.

In class, we continue to explore mixtures solutions and how they are formed. This week we will look solutions can be over or under saturated and we will discover different ways to separate mixtures.

Grade 8 Science

We are moving through our study of light and optics. This week we will look at two important properties of light: reflection and refraction.

Students should now begin brainstorming ideas for their Science Fair projects. I will be sending home a detailed list of dates and deadlines for this project later on this week.

Have a fantastic week!

Madame Walker

Welcome back! I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday break and is ready to jump back into our classroom routines 🙂

Here is what is happening in our classroom this week…

French-This week for our dictée we will be studying singular and plural nouns. As always, students are reminded to go over these concepts and complete the assigned exercises at home, in preparation for our quiz on Day 1 (next week).

During our reading periods this week we will be looking at how to read out loud with lots of expression. We will also spend some time discussing inferences, reading between the lines, and how we can use the information the author has given to infer the information that he or she has not. If time permits, we will also start our author study of Mr. Gilles Tibo, a great francophone children’s writer.

In writer’s workshop this week, we will begin to explore poetry, in particular, haiku. We will spend some time reading and listening to this type of poetry and will start to discover its structure. We will also spend some time writing about our holidays in our journals and setting some goals for ourselves for 2015.

Math-This week in math we will finish up our work on adding and subtracting decimal numbers and will start our study of our fourth foundational outcome on equations. Knowing how to create equations helps your child to solve story problems.

In this unit, your child will:

• • Interpret a problem and select the best strategy.
• • Express a problem as an equation.
• • Create and solve equations using all four operations.

Here’s a game you can play with your child to help solve for an unknown.

Guess How Many I’m Hiding!

Place some objects such as coins or counters on a table top.

Keep some hidden. Tell your child what the total is. Then, have your child guess how many you have hidden and write an equation, e.g., 17 + c = 34, where c represents the hidden quantity. After playing a few rounds, ask your child to hide some of the objects while you guess the unknown quantity.

In addition to our work on equations we will continue to practice and review our multiplication and division tables and strategies, fractions and decimal numbers, and estimating.

Social Studies- As we move through our unit on community, we will explore the differences between urban, rural and suburban communities and finish up our “place in the world” project that we started before the break. This project allows students to see that they are part of a family, a community, a province, a country, a continent and the world.

Science-Our school Science Fair will take place in early March. Students may now begin to brainstorm ideas for possible projects they’d like to discover and record them in their log books, which we have started together in class.

Have a wonderful first school week of 2015!

Madame Walker