Miss Potter's Corner: What a Wonderful Last Two Weeks!

We have sure been busy these last two weeks, between concert rehearsals, performances and Potter Party festivities! Thank you all for your support through it all!

Language Arts

This month, we have been doing a little Author Study on Jan Brett. We have read many books by her, compared them, looked into their inspirations, made connections to self and texts, and researched Jan herself.

Initially, we started with the classic, The Mitten, and students created their own adaptations. They did wonderful with this project!

Next,we read The Wild Christmas Reindeer, to inspire our Christmas Concert art! Students used cardboard, yard, and googly eyes to create little reindeer! (We just had to have red noses, too!)

This week, we read Trouble with Trolls we looked at the folklore of trolls during some reading comprehension activities, and then learned how to draw trolls.

On KidBlog, as well as in class, students discussed which book we had read so far was their favourite. On KidBlog the expressed their opinions in paragraph format and we also made a pictograph in class.

Finally, we had to learn a little about the Author behind all these great stories! Students took sometime during WeSearch Wednesday to read up about Jan Brett, where she's from and how she gets ideas for her book. Using google drawings every student because a People Magazine editor! Creating a front page spread of Jan Brett, with some snippets and fun information! I think these turned absolutely awesome!!!!!!

Math

This week, I took some time to work with students in small groups to reinforce some concepts within addition and subtraction. When adding and subtracting, regrouping tens to hundreds, and hundreds to thousands can be a difficult concept. We will continue to work on these skills after break.

Students also participated in multiple card games, dice activities, and IXL math to strengthen their basic math skills. Lots of these card and dice games can be played at home and over the break!

Salute (3ppl)
Ask your child to try and teach you this one! It takes three players and a deck of cards. You can take out J, Q, & K. Aces = 1.

Horse Races!
This one is a bit tough to play at home, as we use 36 dies. But you could play too, first to 18 points wins!

Science 4
This week we have taken a look at packaging and its purpose. Students looked at three different brands of chips, and compared their packaging.

- What is the purpose of each type of packaging?
- Why would a manufacturer use this type of packagaing?
- How do we dispose of this packaging?
- What raw materials are used to make this packaging?
- Is all of it necessary, or can we reduce some packaging to reduce its environmental impact.

Next, we looked at how different types of packaging is made, such as cartons, plastic bottles and glass bottles. Students are creating flowchart projects where they follow a product from its source to the table, as well as the packaging's source to table!

Social 3

The focus in social this week has been on Leaders in communities around the world. We took a look at leaders in our homes, schools, communities and countries. Students worked on creating lists of qualities you would find in a leader and the type of decisions they have to make.

Looking at the leaders in India, we compared the similarities and differences of our leaders. India also has a Prime Minister of their country, as well as mayors in their cities! In small town and villages it is a bit different than ours, as they have Panchayat's (small councils that help make decisions) and a Development Officer who can have up to 200 villages to look after!

Fun Days!

We celebrated Hot Cocoa day with our hallway mates!