The last two weeks we have spent a lot of time talking about having a growth mindset. This is the mindset that we can ALL grow and learn new things…our abilities are far beyond what we think they are. We have learned that our brain is a muscle that can grow…that when we make mistakes the synapses in our brain are firing and working…our brain is growing and getting stronger. We have also talked a lot about turning our negative thoughts (fixed mindset) into positive ones. If we learn to work through failures and challenges, believing that we CAN do things and understand things, that is when true growth and learning will happen!
We have also worked on setting goals for this year – one long term and one short term goal. The students wrote their goals on hand templates, decorated them and then cut them out. Below I have a picture of the bulletin board we made with our goals…it is true, together we are a masterpiece!
Enjoy your weekend!
We are now finishing up our first full week! Things are well underway in the grade five classroom! It has been fun to get to know the students and work with them these last two weeks! I can tell already that we are going to have a great year!
Here are a few items for you to be aware of:
- Just a reminder that next Monday we have our Parent Welcome Night. This event starts at 7pm…we look forward to seeing you there!
- Next Thursday we will have our first Bible Memory Verse quiz. Under the Bible Memory Tab you will find the two verses that students will learn for next THURSDAY.
- On Wednesday, September 30th we will have our first Knight’s Day. Students are able to wear their Knight’s shirt & casual pants. More information to follow on purchasing Knight’s shirts…
- Spelling words can also be found on spelling city. There is a link to this on the right side of the blog, under the tab Websites to Check Out. If your child completes the test on spelling city and gets 20/20, please write a little note in their planner and they will get a bonus mark on their Friday quiz.
Here are our next spelling lists:
List 1 Words:
almost, again, also, daily, rarely, month, sound, true, truthful, solid, born, enter, died, regret, collect, sow, does, says, driven
List 2 Words:
whose, quick, entire, terrible, prompt, wonderful, select, calm, smooth, private, branch, primary, factory, murder, gentleman, self, calf, command, beggar, property
And I think that is it! Enjoy the weekend!
Individual School Photos will take place this Wednesday, Sept. 16th. All students should wear FULL DRESS UNIFORM.
Girls: black shoes, socks/tights, skirt, button up blouse, cardigan
Boys: black shoes, socks, pants, dress shirt, cardigan
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
