Week of May 22-26

Dear families,

I hope you are having a lovely weekend! What gorgeous Spring weather!

This week we started a mini art inquiry on The Group of Seven ("G is for Group of Seven") in our inquiry on Canada. We are learning more about nature and the seasons from their beautiful paintings. If you have a chance to take your children to the McMichael Gallery in Kleinburg, or to the AGO, they would be able to see the real paintings of colouring they did themselves. The children learned about the WHO, WHAT, WHERE, WHEN WHY and HOW of the Group of Seven, and many of them know and have been to parts of Ontario where the Group painted (Algonquin Park and Georgian Bay, for example). We talked about why they painted nature, how they traveled to the north, how they camped, and the children tried to figure out how they made such big paintings there (they didn't - they traveled with a small box with slats for wood panels that they painted on both sides, and chose ones they liked the best to replicate on large canvasses back in Toronto). The children practiced simple coding exercises by following step-by-step instructions to colour Lawren Harris' "Mountain and Lake" and and Tom Thomson's "The West Wind." They then did a step-by-step painting in the style of Tom Thomson's "Northern Lights." Hint! Father's Day is coming!! The children watched a beautiful video about what the Aurora Borealis (Northern Lights) is on the Smart Board and did a colouring sheet about it. We also read two books about the Aurora Borealis Indigenous myth. Next week we will learn about indigenous painter Norval Morrisseau whose works are also at the McMichael Gallery. He painted in vibrant primary colours, which the children will love. We will also learn about symmetry from his paintings.

Next week we will continue our ABCs of Canada and will talk and write about where we have traveled in Canada and/or where we are going to travel in Canada this summer!

Thank you so much to Alex who brought in wonderful books about Canada and a beautiful map book. Thank you as well to James' and Hudson's moms who helped with Friday's pizza lunch.

Our Caterpillar larvae have arrived! We read The Very Hungry Caterpillar, and will be learning all about the life cycle of the butterfly. They will start to form their pupas in about two weeks. It will be very exciting when we have butterflies to see and release into the yard!

Thursday was a very special day because Terry Fox's brother Fred came to LKS to participate in our assembly. Our class was Team Orange and had fun cheering on their team's tricycle racers!

It was also our May Sharing Assembly, recognizing the TDSB Character Trait of "Integrity." Congratulations to Nathan, Mia, Kate and Maddie who received certificates!

Last week was also the Book Fair in the Library and the children enjoyed shopping for books!

In the Computer Lab with Miss. Santiago the kids have been working with the program ABCya.com.

That's the news from Room 166 this week! Next week we will continue learning about Canada and Butterflies. :)