September 30

Learning Intentions for our day...

Math - we continue to build our understanding of number and thinking flexibly about how numbers are similar and different.  We created a bank of mathematical language we can use to express our understanding verbally and in writing.  We used this to compare numbers today.

Literacy - we continue to build a sense of what makes a sentence and how we can link a group of sentences about a similar topic to create a paragraph. We did this by reflecting on the characteristics we want to work towards creating in ourselves. We also discussed the importance of practicing reading giant expression and fluency when we read to a partner during read to self.

We had an assembly for Orange Shirt Day today where we heard Phyllis' story of the orange shirt which was taken away when she entered a residential school.  We were reminded that 'every child matters' through her story whether you are a child or an adult.

Ask me about...

the characteristic that Terry Fox has and that I want to work towards creating in myself.  Let me share some of the details I discussed in my writing.

Reminders...

• Please bring in Terry Fox money that you have collected.  We will continue to collect pledge forms and donations until Friday, October 4th.  We will make the draw for the Terry Fox T-Shirt on Monday, October 7th.  https://secure.terryfox.ca/registrant/mobile/mobileTeamPage.aspx?Referrer=%26Referrer%3dhttps%253a%252f%252fwww.terryfox.org%252f&TeamID=848952#&panel1-1
  
  
• Grade 4s are bringing home a notice re: Peace Ambassadors and Eco Club.  If you are interested in one of these clubs, please return your notice.

Friday, September 27

What a wonderful Terry Fox Run we had today!  Our pod participated well and we showed great respect for the words we have learned that describe Terry!

BRAVE

HELPFUL

DETERMINED

CONFEIDENT

BELIEVER

COURAGEOUS

REMINDER!!! MONDAY IS ORANGE SHIRT DAY!  Please try to wear something orange to show respect for the survivors of Residential Schools here in Canada.  We will be having an assembly at 2:15 Monday afternoon.

Please remember to have your child dress for the weather!  Check for winter gear as it is going to be colder and snowy next week!!

September 27, 2019

Learning Intentions for our day...

Math - we were building our understanding of number and thinking flexibly about how numbers are similar and different.  We are building mathematical language to express our understanding verbally and in writing.

Literacy - we are building a sense of what makes a sentence and how we can link a group of sentences about a similar topic to create a paragraph.

Growth Mindset - we are learning about how we can flip our thinking in order to grow and learn.  For Example:  Instead of "This is too hard." we can think "It is OK not to be perfect and I can make mistakes."  Mrs. Zwack's friend, Olympic Bobsledder Brittany Reinbold, came in to talk to us about the importance of perseverance, determination and having a Growth Mindset!  

Ask me about ... what I learned about Orange Shirt Day and why we are wearing Orange Shirts on Monday.

Videos shown today:

https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2016/09/29/orange-shirt-day-residential-schools_n_12250652.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zuRQmwaREY

Reminders...

Tomorrow is Terry Fox Run - please dress accordingly as it will go forward regardless of the weather.

Please send in donation forms/donation money as soon as possible.

Monday is Orange Shirt Day - please try to wear something orange or add some orange to your attire that day.

Sept. 25

Tonight I'm supposed to think about "What is a legacy?"

Today we got to go to the Book Truck for the first time and take out a book. We continued to talk about what a "just right" book is. Here are some photos of students reading with their choices. 

We began to practice our "read to someone" skills for Daily 5. We only got to 50 seconds but our goal for tomorrow is 4 minutes. 

In Math we had our first "Number Talk," our goals are to be accurate, efficient and flexible when we're solving them. Today we focused on using the "making tens" strategy to be efficient when solving mental math questions.  We also played count to one hundred using base ten blocks. This showed us how to regroup when we got "ten ones" and traded them for a "ten rod".

As a continuation of our "Say Something" book we discussed Terry Fox's characteristics and how he used them to have a legacy. We then identified a characteristic that we have of Terry's and wrote about a time we exhibited that characteristic. Our goal was to write a few sentences explaining our thinking. 

Reminders:

- Dress for the changes in the weather this week 

- Terry Fox run is on Friday - dress for the weather, we are collecting "Toonies for Terry", pledge forms were sent home yesterday

- Orange Shirt Day is Monday Sept. 30

Tuesday, September 24, 2019

Today we discussed the importance of having an open mind set and how it helps us to preserve when faced with a difficult task (i.e., math). We looked at the story of Gerald the Giraffe and how he showed determination to become a dancer. The students generated a list of self speak or positive thoughts that Gerald might say to himself during his journey in becoming a dancer.

Children's Book Audio Reading "Giraffes Can't Dance" by Giles Andreae and Guy Parker-Rees.

We also built numbers and represented them in expanded form. Each digit in a number has a value.

It was Photo Day today.

During literacy we continued our exploration of reading strategies. Students were given questions that good readers ask themselves to check for understanding. We also talked about picking a Just Right Book. We are getting ready to share our books on Iris.


Reminders:
Terry Fox Run this Friday (Sept. 27). Please dress appropriately.
Terry Fox Pledge Forms due next Friday (Oct. 4)

Monday, Sept. 23, 2019

We had another busy day.

We Read to Self for 10 minutes. Then we gathered in the gym for a presentation about Terry Fox and the Marathon of Hope. This was a preparation for our Terry Fox Run on Friday 27. We will be going to TMC School to meet on Friday morning and all three Tuscany schools will participate in a community Terry Fox Run. We started this tradition last year.

We read chapter 7 in our novel: Because of the Rabbit. The main character, Emma, is having some difficulties getting used to the routines of a grade five student in her new school. We began talking about about Emma's open mind set and some of the actions she might take to become familiar with life in an elementary school.

Some of the vocabulary we will be exploring: courage, determination, perseverance, problem-solving, bravery.

This words are connected to Terry Fox and Emma.

We met with our grade 1/2 Peace Buddy class.

We ended the day with math with further exploration of representing numbers in 5 different ways (expanded, standard, written, base ten blocks, and equations). Students were challenged to choose a number and express that number 5 different ways.

Reminders:
Photo Day tomorrow
Terry Fox Run Friday

September 20, 2019

Learning Intentions for our day...

• Today we focussed on community building by revisiting our Pod promise and working together in a variety of cooperative games.
• We also began to discuss strategies for introducing yourself to others.  We did this through a game called "Groups of...".  Not only did we find others with similar interests as us but we got to practice these skills as well.

Ask me about...

what I am most excited to share with you at our Open House today.

Reminders...

• No school tomorrow due to Teacher Professional Learning time.  See you on Monday and have a great long weekend!
• School photo day is September 24.

September 18, 2019

Learning Intentions for our Day...

• We revisited how a good fit book should be picked and ensured our books for Read to Self were a good fit. Some of us needed to 'book shop' which helped us to build our stamina for our round of Daily 5.
• We explored numbers and learned ways to represent numbers including in pictures, words and expanded form.  
• We finished our art work which we are excited to share with you tomorrow at our Open House.  These pieces are a reflection of who we are as learners and our interests outside of school.

Ask me...

to choose either 37 OR 123 and represent it in expanded form, in words, with base 10 blocks and in a place value chart.

Reminders...

• Tomorrow is an early dismissal (Friday schedule) due to our Open House.  
• There is no school on Friday due to a Professional Development Day.

September 17

Learning Intentions for our day...

Our goals for today focused on finishing up the work and activities that we are preparing to share at our upcoming Interviews on Thursday.  We focused on presenting our best effort and ensuring that we completed our learning tasks thoroughly.

Ask me about...

whether I put my best effort forward today, particularly in PE time.  Did I show "integrity"?

Reminders...

Choir notices are coming home tonight.  It will take place Tuesdays at lunch time.  Forms need to be returned by Friday, September 27.  Interested students took a form.  You can also access the form through the Music Blog on last Friday's Pod Blog.

Have you booked your Open House time for Thursday?  We look forward to meeting you!

Thursday is an early dismissal day because of our Open House.  School will end at 12:05.

Mrs. Zwack and Mrs. Danchuk are heading out right after school today to learn more about using the new Powerschool program.  At Eric Harvie, everyone is a learner!!!

September 16, 2019

Learning Intentions for our day...

• Writing about the books we read will be something we do all year.  Today we discussed some of the sentence starters which we can use to share our thinking about what we have read. 
• We did a math problem today that had us creating numbers and communicating our strategies for how we solved it.  Teachers are using this information to see what we know at this time and to inform next best steps in our learning.
• We continued on the next step of our art project we began last week and considered our interests, passions and dreams as we created a collage.

Ask me about...

what I wrote about in my response to our class novel, Because of the Rabbit by Cynthia Lord.  

Reminders...

• Thursday is an early dismissal day because of our Open House.  School will end at 12:05.
• Sign up for our Open House is available viva the link sent to parents last week.
• We have been going outside for Phys-ed each day.  Please dress appropriately for the weather and for being active!  Outdoor shoes should be appropriate for running and moving.
• Orange Shirt Day Alberta 2019 – September 30
  
  
  If you wish to purchase an Orange Shirt Day t-shirt for you and/or your family, Eric Harvie School will be placing an order.  The cost is 20.00.  Please send a cheque, payable to Eric Harvie School, in an envelope to school indicating your family name and the size of t-shirt(s) (youth s, m, l, adult s, m, l, xl, 2xl, 3xl, 4xl).  Please note that 2xl, 3xl, and 4xl shirts will be 25.00.  The deadline for ordering is 11:59 p.m., September 18. 
  
  
  Orange Shirt Day honors the legacy of Residential Schools, Survivors, Intergenerational Survivors and those that did not survive as an act of Reconciliation. Orange Shirt Day honors the legacy of the 2013 St. Joseph Mission Residential School commemoration event, held in Williams Lake, B.C.  It grew out of a former student’s account of having her brand-new orange shirt taken away on her first day of school.
  
  
  Wearing an Orange Shirt is meant to recognize the harm done to Residential School students, and show a commitment to the principle that every child matters.
  The official Orange Shirt Day date is September 30th. A date in September was chosen because it is the time of year when children were taken from their homes to Residential Schools, and because it is an opportunity to set the stage for policies and resources that support diversity for the coming school year.
  
  
  Orange Shirt Day is an opportunity for First Nations, local governments, schools, and communities to come together in the spirit of reconciliation and hope for generations of children to come.
  
  

Friday September 13, 2019

Learning Intentions for Day...

• We continued to practice our routine for 'Read to Self' for Daily 5.  We continue to grow in our stamina and independence as we become better readers and enjoy books.
• We learned to create a 'wash', a water colour technique, and created 'blackout poetry' as part of a reflective art piece about ourselves. 
• Mrs. Kinsman came and read the book, The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr. Morris Lessmore.  Using this book as a metaphor, she reminded us of our beginnings at EHS and helped us to think of our future, as students at Eric Harvie School.

Ask Me About...

• what a 'blackout poem' is and how you create it.

Reminders...

• We appreciate the magazine donations for our project.  Please continue to bring these in as we are going to use them on Monday.
• Our Open House is next Thursday.  Online sign up becomes available this weekend.  Details were emailed home earlier this week.
• Please check out the music blog (https://ehsmusic.blogspot.com​​ ) and our Physical Education ( http://ehsphysicaleducation.blogspot.com/​​ ) blog each day.

Sept. 12

We had a few more firsts today.

Our walk to the coulee this morning was beautiful. We were very focused during our observation activity. We used our senses to write down everything we could see, smell, feel & touch in our sit spot. We saw many interesting things like nests, slugs, bees, birds and spiders. The students were very good at focusing and journalling.

This afternoon we had a visit from Sa'akokoto. He told us about connecting with birds and showed us some pictures. Ask me what I learned from him....

We also had our first trip to the learning commons. We each got to check out one or two books and explore all the books our school has.

We continued to work on building our read to self stamina so that we can be focused readers during our literacy times

Reminders:
- we still need magazines for early next week

Sept. 11

Today we worked on finishing up a few of the projects and tasks we started over the last few days.

First thing this morning we had phys. ed. and our first CCT time. We were in the maker space. 

We continued to brainstorm and write about characteristics we want in a best friend based on our read aloud book "Because of the Rabbit." Ask me about the characteristics I want in a best friend. After finishing our responses we read chapter 3. 

 Mr. Kelly taught us how to look at a leaf and sketch all its details.  We were very careful and we are not finished. Ask me about which art element we started with....

We prepared for our walk to the coulee tomorrow morning. Which included talking about expectations and tasks we will complete. 

In math, we finished writing about the strategies we used for our roll the biggest number game yesterday. It was a little bit tricky to write about our thoughts and strategies using math language, we will continue to practice this throughout the year. 

Our first Daily 5 session was today, we reviewed what "read to self" looks like and why its important to build our stamina and become better readers. Each day we are hoping to read for longer and more focused stretches of time. 

REMINDERS:

- Tomorrow we are walking to the coulee for the morning. Please make sure you are dressed for the weather (it'll be cool) and wear comfortable walking shoes. A hearty snack and a bottle of water would be helpful. 

- Picture Day notice was sent home today

- We still need magazines for our art project next week

September 10, 2019

September 10, 2019

Challenge of the Day: Play Roll The Greatest Number with your patents.

Mr. Neily was not here today. He was sick.


We started our day with shopping for books. All students were given an opportunity to select two books to read. We then put them in our new  book bins.

We and music and P.E. today.

As a group we discussed what the word characteristic means. Many students recognized that the word comes from a smaller word character.

This list was used to complete a personal character web in our visual journals.

In math we played Roll the Greatest Number. Students were challenged to make the largest number possible based on a set number of rolls. Students discussed possible strategies and recorded their thoughts in journals.

We are starting to build our math vocabulary.


We continued to read from our class novel Because of the Rabbit. Just like Emma, the main character in the story, students created a Best Friend Checklist. We used our characteristics list as a reference.

We are asking students to bring magazines for an upcoming art project.

The Kindness Pod is planning a trip to Twelve Mile Coulee Thursday morning (weather permitting). Students are asked to dress appropriately for the weather and to bring a water bottler and a healthy snack.

September 9, 2011

Blog

Question of the Day: Where is Maine?

We had a very busy day.

Today was the first our pod had P.E. with Mr. Der or had music with Mrs. Janelle

We continued to add tools to our Good Reader Tool Kit by sharing three different ways to read a book.

Good readers: 1) Read the Pictures

                        2) Read the Words

                        3) retell the Story

Mr. Kelly was very impressed when Yanni told the story of Where The Wild Things Are by reading the pictures.

We talked about the importance of predicting.

Liam said, Good readers “make predictions to help figure out what the story might be about.”

We started our book called, Because of the Rabbit by Cynthia Lord. The story takes place in Maine.

On the last night of summer, Emma tags along with her game warden father on a routine call. They're supposed to rescue a wild rabbit from a picket fence, but instead they find a little bunny. Emma convinces her father to bring him home for the night.

                                                                       

https://www.goodreads.com › book › show

The main character, Emma, is experiencing mixed emotions about the first day of school.

We discussed what having mixed emotions feels like.

In math, we built numbers. Student were challenged to build numbers using base ten blocks and demonstrate their understanding by representing the number with simple illustrations.

In art, we started we continued exploring lines by painting lines in our visual journals. This will be a part of a project that will ask the question: What are my best qualities?

September 6, 2019

Learning intentions for our day...

• We read the book, Another Way to Listen, which set the stage for how we can be mindful and really take in our environment.  We practiced journaling through drawing and focussing on our 5 senses within our school yard.
• We met Hope, EHS' therapy bunny.  We learned about rabbits' adaptations and how they help them survive as prey within the natural environment.  We also learned about how Hope can help us manage our emotions and how we, in turn, can help her manage hers.
• Using base 10 blocks, we were challenged to show 'how many different ways we could build a number' as we begin to represent and communicate our mathematical thinking and understanding of number.

Ask me about...

how many different ways I built the number I chose today in Math.

Reminders...

• Please return the envelope of forms that was handed out.
• Child Safe pamphlet sent home
• Please check out Mr. Der's PE blog here:  http://ehsphysicaleducation.blogspot.com/​ 

September 5

Learning intentions for our day...

• We began to get ready for Daily 5 literacy routine by exploring our classroom library and choosing 2 books that we will use when we build our reading stamina next week.
• We continue to build our classroom community by reading a variety of picture books focussed on  peace, kindness, community and belonging.
• We reviewed how to play 'Roll to 100' and talked about different strategies we used to continuously add numbers.
• 
  

Ask me about...

which books I chose from our classroom library.  I'll tell you why I chose them.

Reminders...

• Please return the envelope of forms that was handed out.

September 4, 2019

Learning intentions for our day...

• Using the book 'Say Something' by Peter Reynolds as a provocation, we considered what type of pod community we want to create.  We represented the words we wanted to include within our pod agreement' through a drama (tableaux).
  
  
  
  
• We began creating name tags for our literacy bins using our understanding of 'line'.

Ask me about...

how my group and I represented our ideas for our classroom community.

Reminders...

• Please return the envelope of forms that was handed out yesterday.