Our First Art Project! (shared writing post)

Did you know you can make Art out of anything?  We chose initial Art!  Initials are the first letter of your first name and the first letter of your last name.

This is how you make the Art.  You take the paper and put your initials on one end of the paper and keep doing it as you turn the paper.  Then we went over our lines with black pastel.  Then we coloured the shapes in with pastel.  It looks cool!

Written by Room 20

Reviewing Important Math Concepts

Over the past several days, we have been reviewing some important Math concepts from Grade 2 that we will need to be successful in Grade 3.

We began with reviewing Even and Odd numbers.  Many of us have quite a developed understanding of these but needed a refresher.  We spent a couple of classes reading some Math stories about odd and even numbers ("Even Steven and Odd Todd" and "One Odd Day"), and we did a couple of activities to practice using these numbers.  

One activity was playing a game based upon Even Steven and Odd Todd.  Students rolled a di and could only move their game piece if the number matched their character.  So if they were Even Steven, they could only move if the number they rolled was even.

 Today, we began reviewing another important concept, Place Value.  Students worked with a partner to roll a two-digit number using place value dice.  They would then build the number using their digit cards and tent cards.  

Over the next few days, we will continue reviewing place value.

On another note, today Mrs. Deyoe completely forgot about doing our agenda note!  If it wasn't for Kiera's reminder at the end of the day, we would have all gone home with nothing written!  Unfortunately, not everyone had a chance to write it down.  If you missed it:

Tomorrow is our first early dismissal of the year.  Students are dismissed at 2:55 pm.

Sorry!

Learning Our Routines

We've now completed 3 full days of school!  Even though we haven't really been here long, we've had enough time to learn and practice some new classroom routines.  On Friday we discussed most of them and then yesterday we began actually practicing them.  

During our Morning Routine, two students do our calendar routine for the day.  This routine is done on the Smartboard, and we take it up as a whole class after lunch.  Every other student is responsible for doing their daily Math Journal work.  Each day there is an activity that needs to be glued into their journal and completed.  Once everyone has had a chance to work independently, we take up our Math Journal question together.

Today we talked a lot about how reading and literacy activities would be done in our classroom.  The first thing we discussed was how do we know when a book is a "Good Fit Book".  We came up with three things to help us:

1) We find the book interesting

2) We can read most of the words

3) We can understand what we read

Using this as a basis for book choice, we began the process of looking through our classroom library and choosing books for our personal book bins.  Each student could choose five books for their bin, three of which had to be good fit books.  We later came up with an additional rule, no more than two chapter books at a time.  After we found our books, we had a chance to enjoy reading them.

We also practiced our independent jobs during our literacy time.  While Mrs. Deyoe is reading with students, the class will be working on improving their reading as well.  Students may choose to read independently, read with a buddy, or listen and follow along to a story at the listening center.  Once our iPads are up and running, students will have a couple of technology choices to choose from as well.

 We also spent some time today discussing what a great classmate is.  Together we made an anchor chart for our classroom detailing what a great classmate is, does, says, and is not.

A Great First Day!

Our first school day has come and gone and overall I think we all had a lot of fun.  We spent time getting to know each other, learning our new classroom routines, and building classroom community.  I must say, even though it was just one day, I am ready for the weekend!

After our introductions we played a game called "Find Someone Who..."  Students had to go around and find a classmate who fit what they were looking for.  Some of the questions were: "Find someone who went camping this summer", or "Find someone who has a pet cat or dog".  Everyone was able to complete their recording sheet with only using each person once.

We then headed outside for recess.

After we learned some new classroom routines and did a classroom scavenger hunt to familiarize us with the different items and placement of materials in our classroom.

Next was lunch.  We were all getting quite hungry!

We talked about and brainstormed some ideas around what our ideal classroom would look like, sound like, and feel like.  Next week we will use this chart to help us when making our classroom beliefs.

We had a lot of great ideas!

Following afternoon recess, we had a chance to bond with our new classmates during some choice time.

I know we will have a fun year learning together!

  

A New School Year

Welcome Back!

It's exciting to be back at school and beginning a new school year!  I look forward to reconnecting with last year's students and meeting all our new friends to Room 20 over the next few days!

I know we will once again have a wonderful year together!