This week will start some of our regular routines. Today we introduced our first spelling words to the students. Mondays will be the day new words are introduced and Fridays will be the day that they are tested. We generally do not have spelling on short weeks.
This year we have a very large range of spelling abilities. As one of our classroom goals is to provide opportunities for success for every child, we have decided to have two different spelling lists. We do not feel like it is fair to either the struggling spellers or the proficient spellers to have them complete the same list. One group will not be challenged and the other group will have little chance for success. We want to help develop strong spellers and to do so, we need to start at where the kids are, not necessarily at where they should be. Once a term we will complete diagnostic tests to ensure that the students are progressing and make adjustments to the lists as necessary. If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to talk to either one of us.
List 1 words:
army, both, breakfast, climb, happen, children, grass, broad, noise, ready, brought, below, while, mountains, monkey, pull, beside, eagle, thunder, picture
List 2 words:
claim, measure, represent, position, suppose, arrange, similar, continue, appoint, touch, action, importance, justice, section, connect, connection, field, direction, term, veil
IMPORTANT NIGHT COMING UP:
Enjoy these these pictures from our first week!
We survived the first week back at school! It was hard being inside this week with the gorgeous weather beckoning us outside! We had a great few days together and it was fun seeing the classroom dynamics and begin getting to know the students.
Here are some things we did this week…
- We did a fun team building activity where the students had limited supplies to try and build the tallest tower
- we joined Mr. Hancock’s class for some exploratory Math lessons
- we started to learn about our brain and how it is like a muscle – the more we practice the better we will get at something. Our brain was designed to learn and we shouldn’t quit or give up when things are hard…after all, we can all do things now that we couldn’t do 5 years ago!
- We lerned about the importance of setting goals and will be setting some short and long term goals next week.
- we learned the difference between real reading and fake reading. We learned a big new word called Metacognition – thinking about your thinking! We made a ‘real reading salad’ to demonstrate that real reading includes both text and thinking!
- we reflected on the tragedy of 9/11.
- We had a special guest do a cooking demonstration on building the ultimate burger. This was compared to building the ultimate paragraph! Did you know that the top portion of a burger bun can be compared to a topic sentence? True story!
I will try and get some pictures of our first week to you in the next several day! Have a fantastic weekend!
Mrs.Goosen
Hi everyone! I wanted to let you know that we are waiting for an upgrade to our blog – one that gives us a pretty background and more features, like the subscribe button! Once you are able to subscribe I will have the students put a note into their planners.
Thanks for your patience!
Welcome to Mrs. Goosen and Mrs. Derksen’s grade 5 class blog. We are so excited to be starting a new year with you and look forward to getting to know you and your families.
On the first day of school a letter will be sent home for parents. It will be one of the last paper newsletters that you will see, as all class information, notifications, assignments, important dates, etc will be posted here during the year.
Please subscribe to our blog (on the right hand side bar) so that you will receive an e-mail when we make a new post. Looking forward to a great year together!
It’s hard to believe that another year has come to an end. We feel so honored to have worked with such a wonderful group of students this year. We wish you all the best! Have a wonderful summer and don’t forget to pop in now and then next year to say hello. We’ll miss you! Love Mrs. Derksen & Mrs. Goosen
I just wanted to send a few last reminders for this week:
Wednesday – noon dismissal
Thursday – CLASS PARTY!! Mrs. Derksen will supply the plates, napkins, pop and cups. If students could bring a snack to share (cookies, chips, popcorn etc.) that would be great.
Friday – year end assembly in the morning with students dismissed afterwards.
Enjoy the few days before summer break!
Mrs. Goosen
Just a reminder of our waterslides fieldtrip tomorrow. We will be leaving the school at 9:00 and returning at 3:30. Students going on the bus can meet in the front foyer of the school. If you are planning on meeting us there, please wait at the main gate for us. Parents and siblings 4 and under who wish to come along may pay $10 at the park. In order to respect our grade specific fieldtrips, please do not pull other school age children from class to go to the waterslides. In bathing suit selection, please refer to our non-uniform standard (p3). Please err on the side of modesty to help make staff, parents and students feel comfortable. In the event that a child’s bathing suit does not meet these standards, they may be asked to wear a t – shirt. You should also bring the following:
- sunscreen
- hat
- towel
- lunch/lunch money
- snack
- change of clothing
Looking forward to a fun day.
Yesterday was a project building day…and it was exciting to see the students projects take shape! The groups were all very engaged yesterday afternoon and it was great to see the progress that was made. Some groups quickly realized that what they had planned was not going to work, so modifications had to be made! There are a few groups who are completely done and ready to go, while some others will need to meet before Tuesday and modify their machines. A reminder that both the actual structure and the written work/blueprint are due on Tuesday afternoon. We will have about 90 minutes on Tuesday to finalize our projects and work out the small kinks or finish up our written work.
Mr. Hancock and myself will be judging these machines on Tuesday afternoon at 1:30. You are welcome to come and join us and see some fantastic, balloon- popping Rube Goldberg Machines!
Mrs. Goosen
Here are a few reminders for this week:
Wednesday is our sports day! Dismissal is at noon and students should dress in their team colours! Teams are below:
Red – Jacob, Matthew, Della, Halle, Elijah, Austyn,
Green- Alison, Lydia, Roan, Carys, Kaetlyn, Annie
Grey – Brock, Brooke, Jenna
Black – Shaelyn, Ivan
Yellow – Felicity
Blue – Lukas, Annika
Also a reminder that the field trips for both Britannia Mine Museum and Cultas Lake Waterslides need to come in this week!
Friday, June 12th we leave bright and early for the Brittania Mine Museum
Monday, June 15th – Cultas Lake waterslides
Enjoy the sunshine this week!
