Safety Village and Halloween

Safety Village
It was a dark and stormy day when we headed out to Oakville to visit Safety Village. We listened to information about street signs and traffic rules. We learned that signs that are yellow mean 'caution' and red signs mean ' stop or danger'. Then it was off to drive those jeeps! 

This is us learning about driving on the right side of the road. Easy if you know your left from right. Not so easy for all of us :)

Here is the mini- village where we rode our jeeps. It had real working traffic lights and even a railroad crossing complete with a working crossing arm that came down in front of the jeeps (thankfully no train drove through!).

Our next trip will be on November 15th to Mohawk college to see the Boris Brott orchestra. This is a fun trip as they usually combine their music with art and drama. A purple permission note went home on Thursday October 27th. Mrs. Kirk our music teacher organizes this for our students and it is a wonderful opportunity!

Hallowe'en at Florence Meares P.S. 
So in keeping with our FM tradition, we will begin Monday, October 31st with a costume parade for staff and students from K-5. Teachers and students in Grades 6-8 are more than welcome to dress up, if desired, and are encouraged to line the hallways during the Hallowe’en parade. Costumes should be appropriate, respectful, and promote the fun and pro-social aspects of Hallowe’en celebrations. As you can appreciate and understand, costumes should not incite fear or anxiety in any way. 

Students will begin the parade usually right after announcements 
(9 ish). The upstairs students (my grade two class) will parade in the upper hallway and do two loops around the hall. If parents wish to visit and take pictures you are most welcome to do so. You will need to sign in at the office prior to coming upstairs. The parade is over quickly though so timing is everything! Students are asked to come to school wearing their costume over their clothes or bring a partial costume that is easy to assemble. The parade is optional so wearing Halloween colours or not dressing up is fine. 

Report Cards
Progress reports go home on November 14th. As you can imagine this is a busy time as I am doing a lot of skills checks, conferencing and testing with students. Not to mention getting my Hallowe'en costume ready! I'm also spending a lot of time on the computer. So, I might be a little late updating the blog but I'll be back soon. 

Have a Happy Hallowe'en (even on a Monday night...yikes, that is scary in itself!). Also, thanks to Hugh's Mom for helping take pictures at Safety Village :). Another thanks to all the parents who volunteered.

Developing Empathy, Art and adventures.

Developing Empathy
Many small issues that arise in a primary classroom are due to students needing to further develop their understanding of 'how others may feel' or 'identifying their own anxious feelings'.We have been learning about 'Empathy' through the new series out by Class Dojo. We have watched series one and two and look forward to the final chapter next week. We are all wondering how the character 'Mojo' will solve the problem of being in the 'Maze' (or how will he handle his frustrations with his friends and still keep his friends?).
Here is the link if you would like to view it with your child at home.

Empathy series Class Dojo 


Eventually we will be using Class Dojo as a communication tool between school and home. I had great success with using it last year and look forward to refining the process this year. I will not be using the point system individually but will be using them collectively (e.g., I will not be taking points away instead we work towards a class goal). Don't worry, it is a lot of fun for the students and highly motivating if used properly. 
More information to follow :) 

Fall Art and the Open House
Here are some pictures of our work and activities.

A well attended Open House! Our turkeys graced many Thanksgiving tables and the students told me the cider was the best part. Thank you for attending :)

Getting ready for the Terry Fox run. If you look at the wall you will see Grade 8 students. These are our FM ambassadors. They led us through a warm up activity and then we were off and running (or in my case walking). The students did a great job and thank you for sending in a Toonie for Terry. 

Learning how to shade and create a composition. These were supposed to just be fall pumpkins and the next thing I knew Jack-O-Lanterns were popping up everywhere. 

Investigating nature on one of our 'Walk and Talks'. We discovered a pile of rabbit poop, a dragonfly that followed us our whole walk, Sumac trees and of course so many grasshoppers. We discovered that grasshoppers eat grass...hence the name. We also decided that if birds don't eat sumac berries then probably they are poisonous and that nature has a great way of figuring things out. We will be doing some art with some of the finds we discovered in the outdoors behind our school.

Quick overview
Mr Cann the science man, is starting his 'Liquids, Solids and Gas' unit. We are learning about 'Recount' writing during Writer's workshop. In math we are developing better answers when we interpret and compare graphs. Our next unit will be developing addition strategies for number sense. 



Please check the Homework section for weekly updates. Have a great week!

Terry Fox Run

Due to poor weather conditions we were not able to hold our annual Florence Meares' Terry Fox walk today.  Although our original rain date was Friday September 30, the weather forecast is calling for rain all day.  We will be rescheduling our Terry Fox walk for Wednesday October 5 at 1:40, and our new rain date will be Thursday October 6.  Parents are welcome to come join in, or cheer from the sidelines.  Please help your child to remember a water bottle and dress for the weather.

Patterns, Upcoming events and more!

We have been off to a great start in Grade Two! 
In Math we have been making patterns, learning about a pattern core and understanding the ways in which a pattern can change! 
Of course we enjoy the 'hands on' building part the best! 

Being Mindful!
We are working on ways to solve problems and understand how to work through difficult tasks. Each week we have watched a part of the 'Growth Mindset' movies. They are only a few minutes long and really helpful for students to change the way they think about learning. Instead of saying "I can't..." students can say "I can't.....yet". In this way they are changing their 'Fixed Mindset' to a 'Growth Mindset'. 
Here is the link if you would like to view them! The characters are very engaging for students!
Growth Mindset Class Dojo movies 1/5

Walk and talk - I love the outdoors and hope my students will as well. We try to walk at least 2 times a week. This gives us an opportunity to get fresh air and exercise as well as talk to friends and make new ones. The students now look outside and say, "it's a beautiful day can we go for walk and talk". We found a whole field of grasshoppers, crickets and dragonflies and discovered the subtle fall changes that are beginning to show. Taking a walk shows students how to take a break, clear our heads and come back energized for our school work!

Upcoming events:
Re-scheduled to October 5th - Terry Fox Run (1:40 start)
October 4th- Open house (meet the teacher)
October 7th - P.A. Day
October 21st - Grade two Safety village trip (no charge for this one)

Please check out the Homework section. I will update this weekly.

Welcome to a new school year! 2016/17

                                         Getting ready!

Welcome :)
I have been busy setting up the classroom for another school year. 
Each child has their own desk (with an inside to place our belongings). I've put the desk groups in 4 to start the year. Later, we will decide together on good working groups and make changes so students can make and meet new friends throughout the year. 

You can see our class Smartboard with the overhead mounted projector! Florence Meares P.S. has access to chromebooks and I often use the Smartboard to teach technology skills as students follow along. 

Our carpet area where I teach focus lessons is along the window side of the classroom this year. As well the talking word wall (smartpen activated) is near for our use when reading.  

This is the view from the window of the classroom. Normally, during school hours the field is full of children at play :)

My desk area in an unusually clean moment. The blue table is a guided reading table where I can work with students on developing reading skills. 

Book area! I buy a lot of books for my classroom...what can I say...

ROUTINES
Starting a new routine is exciting! Some students find it helpful to know what will happen ahead of time. Here are some items you can 'rehearse' with your child.

First day: Students and parents will find their teacher (me) on the blacktop. It's a busy time. I will ask you how your child will be going home (bus, pick up, after school care etc.).  If it is raining the grades 1 and 2 will meet in the small gym. Students will have to wait a few minutes as we gather students and make sure they are in the correct lines.

We will go to our upstairs classroom and find our lockers. I will have them already labelled with each name. No one has to share, each child gets their own locker. Students can put away coats, backpacks and lunches.

Students will then enter the classroom and find their labelled desk. 

We will do some 'get to know you' activities and meet teachers who will be working with our class. Mr Cann will be teaching my class science, three times a week and Mrs Mucaj will teach French on Fridays. Mrs Kirk will be covering music on Wednesday. We will be sharing Gym classes with Mrs. Lee's class. This is a great opportunity to see our friends! 

What to bring! Please don't spend a lot of money on school supplies! Some students like to have their own items or special things which is great. Please label items! It really helps. 
Many items are provided by the school and please don't worry if you haven't picked anything up yet. 
Here is a list of suggested items:
- glue stick
-running shoes to keep at school for gym
-skinny markers (optional, I always have crayons)
-pencil crayons (with a small sharpener or pre-sharpened)(optional but some students are ready to do more detailed work)
-labelled pencil case
**Consider providing extra socks or pants in a labelled bag to keep in your child's locker. It saves me having to call home if your child finds a mud puddle :)
**Primary students do not use locks on their locker. We will provide a 'Carabiner' to keep the locker closed. 

The school will provide you with an agenda for the year. This is a great way to communicate with me. I look forward to meeting everyone. I hope you find this blog helpful!
Enjoy the rest of the long weekend and see you Wednesday :)

Bitstrips for Schools

Bitstrips
Our Ministry contacts have alerted us that Bitstrips for Schools has suddenly decided to cancel their web product as of August 31st, 2016. (However, they seem to have disconnected it earlier!) The ministry hopes that Bitstrips may re-consider providing an Educational solution in the future. For a comparable program, students in Halton have been using the Google Drive connected app Powtoon for Education and also, using comic strip templates in Google Drawing. 

A quick note from Ms Fink: 

I understand that at some point teachers will get an archive of past student work from Bitstrips. If that happens I may be able to send some information to students. I suspect that Snapchat recently buying Bitstrips may be responsible for the sudden end of this program. 

If you are a new parent checking out this blog. I will have information posted soon for you! Have to set up the classroom first :)

Burlington Art Centre trip, Butterflies fly away, Summer Reading

Burlington Art Centre Trip
Our trip to the Art Centre was a great success. We toured the facility and looked at the exhibitions and the gardens with sculptures. Some of us visited the pottery studio first and began shaping our clay into butterflies. 

Later we visited the weaving studio and made bracelets on these looms. They were so organized and all set up for us. 

Here is a video of how our looms worked. What a great idea!

(I would highly recommend this trip to any local elementary teachers out there who are reading this)

Butterfly Release
Our real 'Painted Lady' butterflies left us one sunny day. It was a lovely release. The butterflies stayed in the meadow and even landed on the children. I was able to get some great pictures! 

              This shot of the butterfly entering the JAWS shirt! Yikes! 



Summer Reading
Mr Cann our wonderful librarian posted a great link for summer reading ideas! Here is the link:
Summer Reading 2016

Of course your Raz kids account will work all summer so please take advantage of that. 

Burlington Public Library Summer Program
The Burlington Public Library's theme for this year's Summer Reading Club is "Go Wild" and it runs from July 2nd to August 27th.  All of the details can be found on page 19 of the BPL's Summer Guide.  Check it out!


Have a wonderful summer holiday! This class has been a very special group and it has been a privilege to get to know all these little beings. As for my summer,  I am looking forward to hanging out with friends, working in my garden, creating art, trying new recipes, travel and watching the hummingbirds. Ok, maybe a rock concert or two as well, I'm not that boring :)
Reminders: 
Reports go home: June 29th
Last day and early dismissal: June 30th at 1:40 p.m.

Caterpillars, Butterflies and Google Classroom

It is that busy time of year when there are so many things to do and so little time! It is also a special time for a teacher, when you feel you have gotten to know your class and developed a bond. 

Here are some things we have been up to in the last little while....

Caterpillars!

They arrived on May 18th and have grown like crazy! Here are some of my boys helping me put the food in the containers and making sure there are air holes!

                         The little wiggly critters after 2 days

Same caterpillars after the long weekend (7 days)

(See those little round things under the caterpillars? ...yep that's poop)

Butterfly Art

Wax paper Raindrop Art (April showers bring May flowers) - see the flowers and bird inside the raindrops?

                        It's supposed to look like raindrops :)

Google Classroom

We have been working on a special project involving Google Classroom. Your child should be fairly adept at logging into their classroom account. Ask them to show you! Eventually, it may be the way your child will access homework assignments in the older grades. Using Nearpod lessons we have been working on assignments on-line. It has been quite the learning experience (for me too). When there was a technology problem yesterday and I had to problem solve on-line with the on-line support, one of my students said, "Don't worry Ms. Fink, you're in the dip but you can get out"! Of course this is a reference to our Class Dojo movie ...

Here is the link:

Class Dojo movie 'Katie discovers the Dip'

Mathies website, The Power of YET, Mosaics

Mathies
Are you looking for math games to play with your child to help them improve their math skills? Then 'Mathies' is for you! You can play games on-line as well as download game cards and activities to play with your child. When I am looking for great sites for children, I always play them first and see if they are useful. As well, I look for websites that have minimal to no advertisements. I think you will find this site very useful.
MATHIES WEBSITE

The Power of Yet
We have seen the last (Part 3) in the Class Dojo series! We really hope they produce more this year. The discussion around 'getting out of the dip' when we face challenges and 'reflecting' on our work to help us improve has really done wonders in our way of thinking about learning. I have seen a real difference in the 'self talk' my students use to handle a difficult task and overcome frustration. Here is the last Dojo movie in case you haven't logged on to the 'class story' section and viewed it. You will see at the end of the 'Art show' that there are examples of student work. We entered the drawing competition and sent our art into Class Dojo. We aren't sure if we won but it is kind of fun to see some student art in the animation of the movie!
Part 3 Growth Mindset Movie 'The BIG show'

Here is an example of the bulletin board we created for the 'Mountain of Yet'. Students re-created their Class Dojo monsters and brainstormed things they 'can do' already and things they 'can't do yet' but ultimately will succeed at doing. For example one student wrote, "I can tie my shoelaces into double knots but I can't ride my two wheel bicycle YET." Another student wrote, "I can skate really fast in hockey but I can't score a goal YET." It is interesting to see students read the bulletin board and then use the expertise of other students. When one child had trouble doing up their shoes, they simply looked at the bulletin board to find the student who put 'tying shoelaces' as their expertise.

Did you know? 
Mosaics
The big unveiling of the school mosaics will be at an assembly on May 5th. This has been a two year culmination of effort by artist 'Heather Vollans' and our students. The mosaics were made with small pieces of cut glass and each grade had a character trait as the theme to their artwork. Here is a sneak peak picture from upstairs through the window. You can't really see the colours and can only guess at the size but they are most impressive and will really give our school a creative, colourful and welcoming atmosphere.

Butterflies
We have ordered a class set of Butterflies (or larvae) that will arrive on May 18th for us to study and watch grow. Some students may have had the benefit of watching this 'life cycle' process if they were in a split grade last year but I think they will still enjoy it again. We are very lucky that our administration allows funding for this project in 'Grade Two'. Once again we have ordered 'Painted Lady' Butterflies from Boreal Laboratories as we have met with good success each year. Here is what they will eventually look like...

Art Gallery of Burlington trip
There will be a note coming home mid-May about our final trip of the year to the Art Gallery of Burlington for an all day trip. The students will do a tour of the gallery and see whatever exhibit is on display for the month of May, followed by a Pottery class and a Weaving class. The A.G.B., has offered to do a butterfly theme for our pottery experience so this should be a lot of fun! The trip is on May 30th!

There are many school activities coming up! Be sure to monitor the 'twitter feed' to the right of this blog for all the excitement. Dance-a-thon and Music Monday are happening soon! There is always something happening at FM!

Math Investigations, Growth Mindset movies, Spirit Days

Math Investigations
Our school recently purchased some math kits 'Context for Learning' that promote the application of math in conjunction with a literacy component. First we read a book about organization and how running a small t-shirt business involves mathematical reasoning to keep organized. Student have been working in small groups to organize bundles of 10 and figure out what remains for their individual businesses. It has been a big learning curve for many of us...learning to work in groups, listening to various opinions, consolidating ideas, understanding there could be more than one way to solve a problem...and so much more!
Here are some pictures:

                                                  Figuring out our inventory!

Naming our t-shirt factory, finding out our mystery sizes and doing more inventory! Owning a business involves a lot of math!

Growth Mindset videos!
Our Class Dojo continues to motivate my students to do their very best work! Please consider logging on to your child's student account to see how they are doing. There is a new series of videos that have just come out April 4th. I really find they provide a lot of discussion for students and enable them to understand that we all struggle at some points in our lives. Learning resilience is the key to success. Click here to view Growth Mindset movie

Spirit Day
We have had lot of fun with Spirit Days at Florence Meares! 
                                         Hat Day! 

           Oh, and this class loved to fool me on April Fool's Day!
             I was offered a plate of Brownies...get it ...Brown E's

                   And the scary spiders! Yes, that happened!

Did you know...
Lastly a big shout out to our School Parent Council who purchased four chrome books each for our primary classrooms. We have used them so much and it really helps to keep our Daily Five reading centres up and running. Thanks so much !

Pinwheels, Colour Theory, Schlegels Gymnastic centre and knitting.

Just a quick update to let you know all the great learning activities that we have been doing this month!

In Science, we have started the new unit 'Air and Wind'. The students made pinwheels and have been learning about how wind can be a source of power. 

In Art, we learned about Colour Theory. As a review, we discussed primary and secondary colours by watching an interactive slide show on the smartboard. We were able to sort colours by moving them on the smartboard and discussing our choices. We learned about 'high pigment' colours and that black is a shade, white is a tint and grey is tone! Then we created our own colour wheels by putting our theory into practise. The students really enjoyed this 'hands on' way of learning about colour. 

Our trip to Schlegels Gymnastic centre was great fun! The students had an hour and a half of a straight full body workout. They had small groups with qualified instructors and a very well planned curriculum. Did you know that Elfi Schlegel herself was an Olympic gymnast? It's pretty exciting to get such instruction from someone so qualified! 
Here she is holding the Olympic torch.

Knitting club has grown a lot this year! We have knitters of all ages who meet with us on Friday (on my lunch hour) to knit, chat, learn new stitches or get started on a new project. A few people have asked me what kind of needles to buy. I usually start students out on a corking project to give them some success with knitting. Once a child becomes adept at this or has become hooked then we can gauge their interest level accordingly. If you think your child is ready for the next challenge then I would suggest wooden needles (instead of the old fashioned steel ones). Stitches seem to hang on better to wood instead of slipping off. Size 5 or more is great to start. Really big needles need chunkier wool. The really thin wool is often a bit difficult for a new knitter. Try to avoid the really fancy wool with lots of loop or fluff but choose as much crazy colour as your child would like!  If you have any questions just drop me an e mail and I will try to help. 

Class Dojo, Snowman art, Read alouds and Reports

Our class 'Dojo' account
Perhaps you have already logged in to see your child's account! I would encourage you to view the videos that are on youtube about 'Growth Mindset'. Link to Chapter 1 Growth Mindset movie. This is derived from the work of Carol Dweck whom I have written about previously on this blog feed. The new Dojo on-line program has provided a child friendly way of thinking about 'how we learn'. Many programs teach a student 'what' to learn but usually ignore the 'how' part. I believe that teaching students how to become resilient learners is a very important part of the education process.

Each week, our class watches a 5 minute video that discusses how our brain grows 'like any other muscle' when we experience new learning. Sometimes frustration happens when we experience a challenge.Strategies are explained to provide students a more positive way of thinking. Next week we are looking forward to the video 'The Power of Yet'. As in..."I can't do multiplication....yet" What a difference a simple word can make when articulating a more positive approach to learning!
Here we are watching the character Mojo!

There have been many activities happening this month. Here is a a picture montage to give you a glimpse into our classroom.
Our new bulletin board...Snowman portraits! Don't you love how each child interpreted the task differently. What results!

Smartboard centres!

Guided Reading with Ms Fink! (empty chair as she is currently taking the picture)

Daily 5 Reading Centres
Using the school chrome books to read

Learning about Tricky Y!

Read alouds
You may have heard about the stories we read in class. Currently we are reading THE BFG by Roald Dahl. We are also reading 'OWLS IN THE FAMILY' by Farley Mowat. I do allow the students to knit or draw when I read so this is a nice time to activate different parts of our brain. I have posted previously about the benefits of reading aloud to a class. If you have time, here is the link to that post. Why Read Aloud?

Reports - I will be working on reports in the next few weeks. Of course this will mean lots of skills checks and gathering data from the students. Reports go home at the end of February.