We only have 1 day left in November! Can you believe it? Our year together to moving very fast and we are now well into our practice for the Christmas Concert which will take place on December 16th (Snow date: December 17th). Students have received their roles and their scripts and should be spending some time at home reviewing and memorizing their lines. As I mentioned in an earlier post, we will need some help collecting costumes for our play. If you are able to help out in this area, please let me know 🙂

Our Home and School Christmas tree fundraiser continues this week. Please make sure all tickets and money are returned to the school by Thursday, December 3rd.

On Friday, December 4th, teachers and staff will be attending PD activities and thus, there will be no classes for students that day.

Here is a look at the learning that will be happening in our classroom this week…..

Dictée-Everyone is doing so well with using their Bescherelles, so much so that this week we will move on to another concept in grammar: les expressions avec avoir. There are many expressions in French that use the verbe avoir instead of être. We will discover some of them over the next few days and practice using them in our writing. As always, practice is also encourage at home 🙂

French-During our reading blocks this week, we will review how to back up our opinions and ideas about what we’ve read using examples from the text. We will practice doing this together with stories we’ve read together and students will then have an opportunity to practice using their own books. We are also hard at work in our guided reading groups, working on the goals we’ve set out for the coming weeks. Students should spend some time each evening reading, especially out loud, in order to further develop their vocabulary and fluency in French. We have also started a new read aloud novel “Des amis pour Léonie” and Mme Cynthia will present a new story for our reader’s theater this week.

This week in writer’s workshop, we will revise, edit, and publish our procedural texts. We will be polishing up not only those pieces we’ve written in French class, but also our procedural text on how to create our musical instrument for Science class. We will also get the opportunity to do some free writes, working on our learning goals.

Math- This week we will continue to look at estimating. We have now reviewed several different strategies that we can use to estimate sums and differences and we will put them to use during our math classes this week. We are also taking a few minutes each day to review our multiplication and division facts and the concepts we’ve studied so far this year. Work on these concepts should also continue at home 🙂

Science/Social Studies-This week we will finish up our unit assessment, our instruments and and our unit on Sound and we will start our new unit in Social Studies on communities. We will spend some time in the next few classes discussing what a community is and the role our communities play in our lives.

Grade 7 Science
This week we will have our final evaluation in our unit on the Earth’s Crust and we will start our unit on solutions and mixtures. We will begin by looking at the particle theory and at the differences between solids, liquids, and gases.

Grade 8 Science
This week will have our final assessment for our unit on Fluids and we will begin our unit on Optics.

Have a marvelous week!

Mme MacNevin

I was so pleased to see everyone last week at our student-led conferences. It was such a joy to see my students share their learning with you and I am thankful to have such a supportive group of parents as part of my team this year. I would encourage you all to remind your son/daughter of the goals they’ve set for themselves and to help them in any way possible to reach these goals. I am always available to lend a hand with any extra resources you may need to assist you in this process and I look forward to sharing lots of improvements when we meet again in March 🙂

It’s hard to believe, but Christmas is only a month away and this week we will start to prepare for our annual Holiday program here at Gulf Shore. This year, we will be working together with the other Grade 5 students in Mr. Holmes’ class and we will be spending some time over the next few weeks practicing for our presentation on December 16th. Once students are assigned their roles, we may need a little help gathering costumes and props, so be on the look out for more information about this project in the coming days 🙂

Now let’s take a look at what’s happening in our classes this week…

Dictée-Our dictée focus this week will continue to be on how to properly use our Bescherelle. I am very impressed with how quickly everyone is catching on to using their tool to improve our writing 🙂 Keep practicing 🙂

French-During reader’s workshop this week we will finish up our look at how readers read between the lines. Time will also be spent this week reviewing our reading goals, as we return to our guided reading groups and to a more regular routine following our preparation for our student-led conferences over the past few weeks. We will also finish up our read-aloud novel “Ça roule avec Charlotte and will work in groups to discuss our thoughts and opinions about what we’ve read, as we practice our speaking and listening skills.
During our writing periods this week we will continue our study of procedural texts. Students are now well into writing their own procedural pieces, both during our writing blocks and through the creation of their instruments in Science class. As we journey through this unit, we will also take some time to review the writing process, which should provide a great opportunity for students to work on the writing goals that they set out during our conferences last week.

Math- This week in math class we will begin to explore our third foundational outcome: N2-Using estimation to solve problems. Over the next few weeks we will review strategies for
estimating sums and differences with whole numbers, and learn when to apply these strategies in ways that are appropriate and effective.

In this unit, your child will:
• Estimate sums and differences, and select and use estimation strategies to determine if his or her calculations are reasonable.
• Pose and solve problems using whole numbers.

Students are encouraged to use a variety of estimation strategies to add and subtract depending on situation and context. Calculating with number sense means that children look at the numbers and operations involved and choose the most efficient strategy. Ask your child to show you some of the different estimation strategies that he or she uses.

Here’s a suggestion for an activity you can do at home:

Newspaper Numbers
Take a page each from a newspaper and circle all the numbers in the articles and advertisements on that page. Then talk about the circled numbers. Which are estimates? Which are not? How can you tell? Next, both of you choose one number and describe it to one another in terms of its number of millions, ten thousands, thousands, hundreds, tens, and ones only. Then challenge your child to find your secret number while you identify her or his number.

We will also continue to review our multiplication and division facts and our first two foundational outcomes on fractions and decimal numbers. This week we will have our very first of many “Flashback Fridays,” where we will spend our math period reviewing concepts we’ve already studied this year.

Science-In Science this week we will continue creating our musical instruments and will have a formal assessment on the concepts we’ve studied during our unit on sound. We will then be moving on to a new humanities unit, this time in Social Studies.

Grade 7 Science
This week we will finish up our review of rocks, minerals, soil and erosion, as we prepare for our assessment on these concepts on Friday. We will also spend some time this week familiarizing ourselves with GoogleClassroom, which we will be using even more in the coming weeks to help facilitate our learning.

Grade 8 Science
This week we will finish up our unit on Fluids, as we prepare for our assessment on buoyancy and pressure.

Have a fantastic week!

Mme MacNevin

We have arrived to the middle of November and we are so excited to share our learning with everyone this week as we take part in our Student-Led Conferences on Thursday evening and all day Friday. Time sheets were sent home last week and I appreciate everyone responding so quickly. We have a tight schedule both days, so please make every effort to arrive on time for your conference. I am so excited to see everyone and the students and I will spend some more time this week preparing and practicing for our presentations 🙂

Our annual Book Fair will be open during conferences from 6:00-8:30pm on Thursday and from 8:30am-3:00pm on Friday. We will also have some time on Thursday to visit as a class. This is a great way to get some new reading material and maybe some suggestions for Santa, all while supporting our school library, as a portion of the proceeds remain here at Gulf Shore. Mrs. Gallant has told me that there will be some selections in French as well 🙂

Here’s what will be happening in our classroom this week….

Dictée-For our dictée this week we will be learning how to use a very important tool to help with our writing: our Bescherelle. This is a fabulous resource to help facilitate proper verb conjugation when writing in French. We will spend some time this week discovering it together and some activities will also be assigned for practice at home.

French-During our reading blocks this week we will continue to look at inferences and reading between the lines. We will examine some texts together and attempt to discover what the author infers with his/her words. We will also practice reading between the lines in our own books. Work continues in our “Carnet de lecture.” Students are reminded that they should be keeping track of the books they’ve read in their reading journals and that they are responsible to write me a letter in their “Carnet” each cycle. We have also started our new read-aloud novel “Ça roule avec Charlotte.” This story is about a young lady in a wheelchair and her determination to be seen like everyone else and should make for some great discussions as we read together during snack time.

During our Writer’s Workshop this week, we will continue our shared writing of some procedural texts. We will then start to brainstorm some ideas for our own procedural texts. As we prepare for our conferences, we will also take some time this week during our language arts blocks to formulate our learning goals for the next term in reading, writing, speaking and listening.

Math- As we missed some class time last week due to our Remembrance Day activities, we didn’t get a chance to completely finish up our unit on fractions and decimals. We will do so this week, and we will also take the time to think about our learning goals in mathematics for the coming term. If time permits, we will move on to our next foundational outcome on estimating. I highly encourage continued practice at home on both the multiplication and division facts as well as on equivalent fractions, comparing fractions and changing fractions to decimals. For example; give your child a fraction (ex. 2/4) then have them find 3 fractions that are equivalent to that fraction and have them change the fraction to a decimal number. Then give them a series of fractions and have them put them in order of smallest to biggest by finding equivalent fractions with common denominators. I have also made some practice problems available to students to take home. This process should only take a few minutes each evening, but can go a long way to helping solidify you child’s understanding of these concepts 🙂

Science-This week in Science class we will spend some time working on our final project; creating our own musical instruments. Students are asked to take a look around the house to find items that they may recycle to use to create their project.

Grade 7 Science
This week we will finish our exploration of the different components that make up soil and we will begin to prepare for our formative assessment on these concepts.

Grade 8 Science
This week we will finish up our study of buoyancy and pressure. We have been using GoogleClassroom to help facilitate our learning and students should continue to check their classroom site regularly in order to maximize their learning.

Have a marvelous week!

Mme MacNevin

This week will be one of reflection, both on the lives who fought for our freedom, as we mark Remembrance Week here at Gulf Shore and on our learning, as we continue to prepare for our Student-Led Conferences that will take place next week. Please be on the look out for conference time sheets that will be heading home with students mid-week.

Picture envelopes are now overdue. If you have any questions please contact Martin Caird at Sandpiper Studios. All forms, regardless of whether or not you’d like to order, must be returned to the school as soon as possible.

On Tuesday morning, we will hold our annual Act of Remembrance in the multipurpose room beginning at 10:40. Community members and parents are welcome to attend. Also, as we take the time to remember our veterans, there will be no classes for students on Wednesday, November 11th.

Now let’s take at look at the learning happening in our class over the next few days….

Dictée-For our dictée this week we will finish up our study of adjectives. It is important that students remember that in French, adjectives change according to gender and number. Daily practice will be assigned each evening and students should continue to use adjectives whenever possible to further enhance their writing.

French-During Reader’s Workshop this week, we will continue to discuss digging deeper into ours texts. This week we will be looking at inferences and what it means to “read between the lines.” We will also continue to explore the author’s message, and we will discuss how the message can sometimes mean different things to different readers. We will begin to reflect on our reading progress thus far as we “mine” through our reading samples and our “Carnet de lecture” to select some pieces to share with you at our conferences. This week we hope to finish our re-aloud novel “Julie le visiteur de minuit” and start our next novel “Ça roule avec Charlotte.”

This week during our writing blocks we will continue to explore procedural texts, developing criteria as to what a good piece of procedural writing looks like. We will then write some procedural pieces together as a class and in small groups. We will also continue to work at forming sentences that are properly structured in French and we will begin to select our writing samples for our learning conferences.

Math- This week we will finish up our first foundational outcomes on fractions and decimals and have a quiz on these concepts. Even after the quiz, this learning will not be far from our minds, as we continue to work hard at mastering these outcomes throughout the year. Practice is encouraged at home, not only on multiplication and division facts, but now on fractions and decimals numbers. I will be sending home some work to help facilitate this practice in the coming days. There are also lots of great online resources and apps to help students practice these outcomes. Mathplayground.com is a wonderful website with lots of games to help students review their math at home and one we often use during our computer blocks together 🙂

Science-With our field trip and other presentations happening last week, we missed some time in Science, so this week we will finally take a look at how sound travels differently through different materials and through different states of matter. We will also begin to brainstorm for our final project of this unit; the creation of our own musical instrument.

Grade 7 Science
This week we will continue to look at soil and erosion, in particular weathering and erosion and at the different layers and components of soil.

Grade 8 Science
Our work will continue this week on buoyancy and pressure. We will experiment with these concepts and learn about Pascal and his formula to calculate pressure.

Have a fabulous week!

Mme MacNevin

 

I hope everyone had a fun Halloween weekend! What great costumes we saw on Friday 🙂

November has arrived and we are only a few weeks away from our first set of Student-Led Conferences. The children and I will be spending some time over the next few weeks reflecting on our learning in preparation for our conferences with you later on this month. Conference time sheets will be sent home soon. I look forward to seeing everyone and sharing all the wonderful things happening in our classroom 🙂

I apologize for the short notice, but we received word late last week that we are able to have a class field trip this week to Charlottetown. We will be attending three performances (one at François Buote and two at Confederation Centre) all with links to our Social Studies and Language Arts programs. Notices went home with students on Friday with all the details, but please feel free to contact me if you have any questions. We will be eating lunch away from the school on Tuesday, so please make sure that your child has something that doesn’t need to be heated, as we will not have access to a microwave.

Picture envelopes also went home on Friday. If you have any questions please contact Martin Caird at Sandpiper Studios. All forms, regardless of whether or not you’d like to order, must be returned to the school on or before Thursday, November 5th.

On Friday, teachers will attend their annual Provincial Learning Day and thus there will be no classes for students on November 6th.

Now let’s see what is happening in our classroom this week…

Dictée-For our dictée we will continue our study of adjectives. It is important that students remember that in French our adjectives change according to gender and number. Daily practice will be assigned each evening and students should now have a copy of their “dictionnaire des adjectifs” both at home and at school.

French-During our reading blocks this week we will continue to look at ways to improve our reading comprehension. We will also take some time this week to discuss how to go deeper with a text, not only reading the words on the page, but analyzing the author’s message. We will continue to review our guiding reading books and we will work on answering questions about the books we’ve read both orally and on paper. Work also continues on our re-aloud novel “Julie le visiteur de minuit”.

We have now finished up our monster paragraph project, but as writing as good paragraph is a foundational concept of the Grade 5 French program, we will continue to look at paragraphs throughout the year. Our focus in Writer’s Workshop this week however, will shift to procedural writing. We will spend some time looking at a variety of procedural texts including recipes, directions and other instructions. We will also start developing our criteria for what makes a good procedural piece of writing.

Math- We are still working hard on our first foundational concepts in fractions and decimal numbers. This week students will use equivalent fractions to compare groups of fractions, placing them in ascending and descending order. We will also spend some time this week looking at how to use equivalent fractions to change fractions to decimal numbers.

Science-This week and next we will explore how sound travels differently through different materials and through different states of matter. We will also begin to brainstorm for our final project of this unit; the creation of our own musical instrument.

Grade 7 Science

This week we will look at soil and erosion, as we explore how erosion impacts that earth’s crust.

Grade 8 Science

This week we continue to explore buoyancy and pressure.

Have wonderful week!

Mme MacNevin