Dear families,
I hope you are enjoying the mild Fall weather today.
Last week in Numeracy we focused on the number FIVE. When learning about numbers, we learn about: Conservation (understanding that the count for a set group of objects stays the same whether they are spread apart or close together); Stable Order (understanding that the counting sequence stays consistent i.e. 12345 not 12368); One-to-One Correspondence (understanding that each object gets only one count); Movement to Magnitude (understanding that as you move up the counting sequence the quantity increases by one; Order Irrelevance (understanding that the counting of objects can begin with any object in a set); Abstraction (understanding that the last count of a group of objects represents how many there are); and Unitizing (understanding that in our base ten systems, objects are grouped into tens once the count exceeds nine).
The children learned about the number 5 by exploring and playing with dice, beads, Fall objects, rocks, counters, cube-a-links, pine ones, and magnets. They also explored and practiced numeral formation and base ten by drawing on clear tablecloths I made on their tables. They traced numerals and played with base ten frames. Ms. Santiago had a great idea of painting the children's fingers and thumb with Halloween colours to show addition i.e. 2 black fingers + 3 orange fingers = 5. They'll make this "high five hand print" into a little Halloween monster. Cute!
The Halloween Party and Parade are on Monday at 1:30 and 9:00 respectively. Please remember that the children can bring masks but cannot wear them during the school day for safety reasons (tripping etc).
This week we celebrated two birthdays! Congratulations Elea and Henry!
The children did their "This is me in October " picture and sentence and their October calendar which are used for assessment purposes. I can see a lot of progress already!
On Monday we went on an Autumn Scavenger Hunt in the school yard and in the shale pit. The children had to find several signs of Fall using their 5 senses. They loved it!
Thank you to Ella's dad who was our Mystery Reader, and to Ethan and Kate's moms who helped with pizza lunch. Thank you Ruby for preparing the next Scholastic order, which will go home next week. It will be due on November 22.
In Art, the children made a "funny mummy" and in Science we weighed our little class pumpkin and we will count the seeds by 10s on Monday. Thank you Rielle for cleaning out the pumpkin! We also learned about how pumpkins grow; we watched a video called "A Season for a Pumpkin" and then sequenced 6 pictures of pumpkin growth from seed to pumpkin. We also practiced the poem "Five Little Pumpkins" which the children recited at Friday's Sharing Assembly. Congratulations to Lucas, Ruby and Sebastian who received certificates for Responsibility.
The children read, traced the words and coloured Halloween pictures in a booklet, and are making another booklet called Halloween Colours" with their Reading Buddies.
We also started our next inquiry which is on Feelings, and read "It's OK to Make Mistakes " and "I'm not Scared" by Todd Parr. All of Parr's books are wonderful in how they promote individuality and self-confidence.
That's the news for this week. See you tomorrow!
