Happy Halloween!

Good evening everyone, and Happy Halloween!!!

I hope everyone is having tons of fun trick or treating in the neighbourhood :) Remember to brush your teeth! I am so sorry I couldn't post on Wednesday or Thursday.... that sure does leave a lot to post about today! It was a pretty crazy week, but I'm glad I now have the time to sit down and share everything with you :)

Wednesday

Where do I even begin! I suppose I'll start with our Fall Walk on Wednesday :) It was the perfect day for a stroll around the neighbourhood. We started off by visiting the infamous "Kindergarten Tree". We noticed that the tree still had a lot of leaves on it. Students knew, however, that they would be falling off soon.

When we were walking toward Eringate Park, we noticed some trees didn't have any leaves! I wonder why this is? We weren't sure whether or not we were in Gatestone Park or Eringate Park, so we had to use our Lips the Fish strategy to help us :) Once we got to Eringate, students each received a Ziploc bag and began collecting leaves and twigs that we will use for crafts next week :) Students had so much fun on the walk!

Once we got back to the classroom, we began to carve our pumpkin- yuck! Haha. I think I may be allergic to them! Anyway, as a class, we decided on a face using abcya.com and got to work on it. Not too shabby, I must say! Students also did some marble painting- looks awesome!!

Thursday

On Thursday we had our Tribes afternoon. Students got to go to their 'house' classroom and play some fun games with students from other classes. We'd like to congratulate Ashlyn (not pictured), Nevaeha, and Lilly for demonstrating exceptional Independent Work skills. Way to go, ladies!

We also started to get our goodbye card ready for Mrs. Tortola! :(

Friday - The Big Day!!

Let me begin by describing the day with a short video I took ;)

Yes, that was pretty much the vibe for the whole day, heh :P We started off by doing our regular morning routine followed by some learning centres, since we knew we wouldn't get a chance to go to them later! It took me almost an hour to do the important bags- stuffing them with treat bags, candygrams, home reading books, oh my! You will also get some treats on Monday from Victoria- we didn't see them until the end of the day- sorry Victoria! 

After recess, we had our party- woohoo! Lots of delicious yummy treats. A big thank you to those parents who did bring in treats as requested (this month's treat team). We really appreciate it and the kids loved them!! While students were eating, we called over a couple of students at a time and helped them get their costumes on. Everyone had a costume and everyone looked great!!! 

And Izze :) Sorry we couldn't fit you in the collages cutie!

We had our very own cast of Frozen in our room- amazing!

We stayed in for recess since we didn't want to get our costumes wet. Once recess was over, the parade began! I hope you all enjoyed seeing our smiling faces and costumes. The kids had a great time- we felt like celebrities!!

Last but not least, we had to say goodbye to Mrs. Tortola :( There were lots of smiles but also some tears. Her genuine kindness, love for the children, and hard work ethic made her an exceptional asset to our class. I know the students will miss her dearly, as will I. I admire her passion and I know she will make a phenomenal mother. We wish you the best of luck on your pregnancy and hope that you come visit us soon!! This isn't really 'goodbye'.. it's a 'see you later' ;)

Here is a whole-class photo of us in our costumes :)

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!! 

Have a great weekend :)

~ Miss Pliura

Welcome to Gatestone's Jr. Dance Team!

In October of 2013, I created Gatestone's Junior Dance Team. It is composed of approximately 60 dedicated students in Grades 4, 5, and 6. On a weekly basis, I run 1 of 3 different types of dance classes: Jazz, Hip Hop, and Lyrical/Contemporary (a mix between Jazz and Ballet). I'm so happy to have started this team, for it is a great deal of fun for me. I have 14 years of dance experience and danced competitively for 10. I have been classically trained in Russian Ballet, along with Jazz, Lyrical, Tap, Acro, and Musical Theatre.

For me, dance was a creative outlet that helped me become a more confident person. It challenged me  in many ways, and I am so appreciative to have had the experiences I did. I am absolutely thrilled to have started a Dance Team at Gatestone. I can only hope that the students I teach have as much fun as I do! It brings me so much happiness to share this with them.

I'd like to thank all the girls and boys on the Junior Dance Team for their hours of hard work, commitment, and perseverance. It is a lot of hard work preparing for our year end show and you did amazing! I am so proud of all of you!!

~ Miss Pliura

"Some people don't believe dancers are athletes. We know better."

- Unknown

Performances

Please click on the links below to watch our performances!

Jr. Jazz "Black and Gold"

Jr. Hip Hop "Shake"

Jr. Lyrical "Wrecking Ball"

Tuesday October 28th Update

Good evening everyone!

I thought I'd do a quick post on a couple of things!

Tribes

I forgot to put it on the calendar, but our Tribes assembly is this Thursday, so wear your house colours! I've put it on the calendar for the rest of the year; it's the last Thursday of every month :) Also, Gatestone has "Tribes Tuesdays" where students can wear their house colours and receive a token. Mrs. Tortola and I have decided as a team to not hand out tokens. Tokens are given out when a student demonstrates great behaviour or wears their house colour on Tuesdays. We are focusing on students being intrinsically motivated to demonstrate exceptional behaviour because they want to; not because they get a token. We aren't trying to go against school practice, but we feel as though this is the best fit for our students. Sorry for any confusion!

Homework!?

I told the students today that they had some homework to do tonight (or in the next couple of days). This stems from our V.I.P. Every student who has been V.I.P so far starts with the letter A. On Tuesdays, the V.I.P writes their name on the SMARTboard and draws a picture of something that starts with their "special letter". 5/6 students drew an apple, even after we had a discussion of drawing different things. Today during our V.I.P, I asked students, "What are some other things that start with the letter 'a'?", and the immediate responses were "apple tree" and "apple juice", hehe. Although humorous, I challenge every student to think of 5 words that start with the /a/ sound or the letter a :)

Math - A Sorting Game

Today during math, we practiced sorting students based on one rule. I started out by having some girls stand in one group and the boys in another group and asked students "How did I sort our friends?". Students quickly realized the boys were in one group and the girls were in another. We sorted by gender, or, by boys and girls :) Then, I grouped some blondes in one group (both boys and girls) and some brunettes in another, and students were thrown off. Some students said, "But there's boys and girls in that group". This tells me that we need to practice sorting using different rules. We will continue to practice this during our math lessons using objects next time instead of people. At home, practice sorting objects based on one rule. Example; by size, colour, shape, toys with wheels or without, etc. Have fun with it!

Introducing the Word 'an'

Today during literacy, we met a friend of mine named Dan! Watch the video below to learn about our literacy lesson- I thought I'd do it a bit differently this time! :)

Thanks for reading!

~ Miss Pliura & Mrs. Tortola

November Calendar

Hi everyone,

If your child brought their important bag to school today, then you would have received a copy of November's calendar. Here it is just incase. It's also available to download under "Important Documents".

Cheers,

Miss Pliura & Mrs. Tortola

A Fun Monday :)

Good evening everyone!

Before you read about the fun learning that took place today, please remember that:

• Parent Observation forms were due today. I will ask you tomorrow if I see you, otherwise, you will not be scheduled in for a time
• Please put all library books etc. in your child's important bag- we don't go through their backpacks to check anymore
• Please go through your child's important bag every night!!!

Special Guest - Pet Groomer!

Today we had our first special guest of the year, and she came in to talk to us about her job as a pet groomer! She brought in all of the tools they use to groom both cats and dogs. It was really fun to see all of the steps involved in grooming an animal! We had some great conversation about what types of animals she grooms, how many she grooms in a day, etc. Perhaps this will be inspiration for students to start their own pet shop/vet clinic at school :)

We look forward to our upcoming guest speakers - a Registered Nurse and a Soldier!

Reading Strategy - Lips the Fish

Today we learned our 2nd reading strategy out of the 8 we have. The character we learned about today is Lips the Fish, and he uses his lips to say the beginning sound of the word! Lips the Fish and Peeking Pig are two strategies that go hand-in-hand. We must look at the pictures but also look at the beginning letter of the word and say the sound it makes :) Here is a great example:

We read some sentences together as a class and used Peeking Pig and Lips the Fish. We know this word isn't just "fish" because it starts with the /g/ sound, and by looking at the picture, we know this word is goldfish!

Guided Reading

Today we started guided reading! This is where I take a small group of students and focus on certain skills particular to that group. Then, we read a book together using those skills. I will be taking a group every day during literacy centres. We will sit on cushions in the hall because the classroom is quite noisy. Mrs. Tortola will be supervising students inside the classroom. I take 3 students a day... so with 30 kids, that means I get to see your child once every two weeks. As much as I'd love for it to be more (guided reading is actually my favourite thing to do!), it simply isn't feasible. Keep reading at home!!!!!

See you tomorrow!

~ Miss Pliura & Mrs. Tortola

Friday Update - October 24th, 2014 - Apple Madness!

Good evening everyone :)

We hope everyone is doing well. It's been a crazy couple of days with the happenings taking place in the community and we understand the concern and anxiousness you may be feeling. Please visit Gatestone's Website for more information on this matter.

We had a super fun week in Room 110 with lots going on! A field trip, art projects, and some homemade cooking! We hope all of the students enjoyed the field trip. We thought it was super fun and a great experience :) I was finally able to get the video posted of them pounding out their pizza dough. Enjoy! (I have to remind myself to start taking videos with the iPad horizontally :P)

Apple Printing

We used the apples we bought at Fortino's to make some apple prints using paint! We cut the apples in different ways to see the different kinds of designs they made. Some students even made patterns with them- cool!

Apple Taste Testing

As a class, we tried 4 different kinds of apples; Granny Smith, Pink Lady, MacIntosh, and Golden Delicious. Each student chose their favourite one and we graphed it. Unfortunately, the computer crashed and we weren't able to retrieve the file, but we can tell you that Golden Delicious won by a land-slide! Pink Lady was the least popular!

Applesauce

Perhaps the most exciting activity we did this week as a class was make our very own applesauce!! I can't even begin to tell you how excited they were. It was awesome to see so much enthusiasm! We told the kids that we will definitely have to do more cooking together :) 

We started off peeling some of the apples with our funky apple peeler/corer. We added our apples, some cinnamon, brown sugar, and water and put it in the slow cooker for 3 hours. Let me tell you- with 4 Kindergarten classes all making applesauce, the Kinder wing sure smelled amazing!

Unfortunately, some of the students didn't like it, but most of them did :) We had a chat before we ate it to remind students that if they didn't like it, they can politely dump it out- no need to announce it to the world ;) It tasted super yummy! This was so much fun, and we can't wait to cook more things together :)

Learning Centre Fun (and Sadness)

This week we had to close Dramatic Play for a bit because of the condition it was left in. One of our classroom rules is to tidy up after ourselves. We talked about how our decisions can make an impact on our friends. When we opened the cupboard drawers, we found our toys tossed in and not put back in their proper baskets. We hope we don't find Dramatic Play looking like this again! :( 

The ladies below asked if we could take a picture of them and their animal house for the blog- how could we resist! Looks awesome girls :) Awesome teamwork!

 Updates

• November calendars will be going home next week
• Guided reading will begin on Monday October 27th :)
• Our Halloween party is on Friday- please see the note in your child's important bag that explains everything. Remember that some of you are on this event's treat team! Click here to read Halloween Note
• Please send in the pink Parent Observation forms A.S.A.P, as many of the time slots are full
• Mrs. Tortola's last day is on Friday, October 31st, when she will then be going on Maternity leave for her new baby girl :) We welcome Miss Lyndsey Smith who will be filling in for Mrs. Tortola for the rest of the year!

Thanks for reading this entry, and we hope you have an awesome weekend!

~ Miss Pliura & Mrs. Tortola

Our Trip to Fortino's!

Hi everyone!

I'm sure you're all very excited to read about and see the pictures from our first class trip :) We had such a great time! It was a great experience and the group did an amazing job. A big thanks to all of the moms who volunteered- you were great and we wouldn't have been able to do it without you! Another thanks goes to Mrs. Tortola who drove our apples and pumpkins back to the school for us :)

We left the school at 9:20 and made our way over to Fortino's :) We took some pictures outside of the supermarket with an awesome background full of pumpkins!

Once we arrived, we broke into groups and headed into the community room to make our pizzas :) We washed our hands, wrote our name on our parchment paper and started to get all the bubbles out of our pizza dough! We had a range of items to choose from to put on our pizza including tomato sauce, mozzarella cheese, pepperoni, green peppers, pineapple, and mushrooms!

Once we were done, the pizzas were put into the oven and we started the tour of the store :) We learned that the perimeter of the store has the healthiest food options. Our tour guide Lucy taught us different things, like the bulk area is where you shop when you only need a little of something, and the organic section is for people with allergies. We then visited the fish and meat department where we were introduced to Harry the lobster! 

We knew our pizzas were close to being ready because we could smell them from far away :) Our stomachs were growling- time to eat!

After we were all finished eating, we needed to pick up a couple of things. Later this week, we're going to make our very own applesauce, so we needed some apples! We're also going to do apple-print painting and some taste testing! This turned into a mini math lesson :) We estimated how many apples were in the bag and counted the apples we were selecting. We even added the apples together to count them all up! Awesome and authentic math is the best!!

We then went outside to pick out a pumpkin for our classroom :) We picked two pumpkins and then decided that a fair way to pick one would be to vote (great idea, Lara!) We made our very own human bar graph to decide which pumpkin was most popular- the bigger pumpkin won!

Then, we walked back to the school and finished the day off with a reflection of the day and some learning centres :) What a fun and exciting (and exhausting!) day! I hope the boys and girls had as much fun as I did and that they enjoyed the treat bag they received from the Fortino's staff! What a great first trip in Room 110 :)

Have an awesome night!

~ Miss Pliura & Mrs. Tortola

Friday Update: October 17th, 2014 :)

Good evening everyone :)

We hope everyone is enjoying their Friday night! This will be another quick/random Friday update since we've been trying our best to stay on top of the blog throughout the week. We are very happy to hear that so many of you are enjoying the blog. It takes a lot of time to do outside of the school day and it's nice to hear your appreciation. We love doing it and sharing our learning journey with you and knowing that it's being used means a lot to us! So thank you :)

Students had a great day today! If you read on our twitter, you'll know that the photographer said that we were the best behaved JK/SK class he's ever worked with- wow!! What a compliment!! We've been working super hard in the classroom on using our manners and following the rules- looks like it's starting to pay off!

Interactive Spelling

For our literacy lesson on Thursday, we did interactive spelling; there's a picture on the SMARTboard that we have to try to sound out and spell using our sounds. For example, we needed to spell the word 'lips', so as a class, we stretched the word out to try to hear each individual sound. When it is said back to students, they can easily hear the sounds- but can they do it themselves? Keep practicing at home! Writing is just as important as reading :)

Marko is helping to spell the word 'wet'; Gurshan is helping to spell the word 'hat', and Alex, Juliette, and Daryl are writing the letters they hear in the word 'lips'. 

Learning Centre Fun

It seems like every week the students are finding fun new things to do during learning centres. It's really neat to watch students take control of their own learning through play :) Here are some pictures! 

Raz Kids

Please remember to take advantage of the school's subscription to www.raz-kids.com! Your child can read, listen to, or record themselves reading books online. One of the COOLEST features if that I can hear their recordings and respond with some feedback! This is such a great way to get insight into your child's reading, because with 30 students, I can't read with each and every one of them as often as I would like. I love listening to them! If you have lost your raz-kids logon info, just send me a message on twitter or write us a note. I'll try to respond to many as I can (I can even record a message back!). The more you read, the more stars you get to spend on your robot! Don't forget to add your raz books to your home-reading log- a great way to pick a prize after reading 30!!

Have an awesome weekend and we will see you on Monday for our trip to Fortinos!

~ Miss Pliura & Mrs. Tortola

An exciting Wednesday :)

Good evening everyone :)

Today we had a special art activity planned for our students: corn painting! We used fall colours and brushed paint onto cobs of corn and rolled it onto paper- it made a really neat design! One of the coolest things that came from this activity is when students mixed red and yellow together on their paper or hands and discovered it made orange! Maybe it was a good thing we didn't have any orange paint ;)

Popcorn Words: Round 1!

There was a lot of learning going on today during our literacy centres! We introduced our first round of popcorn words today :) We introduced the words a, it, is, in, big, and yes. These are the first popcorn words we introduce because they can be sounded out. We encouraged students to make some popcorn words at their literacy centres :)

Lily made the word 'in' using her play doh; Courtney and Nevaeha used the word wall to spell Vienna's name; Andrew used his sounds to spell the word 'sing'; Mohit was finding all the letter M's which is his special letter; Marko spelled the word 'a' using magnets :) Great job friends!

At Home

At the beginning of the year, every family received a copy of the popcorn words. However, sometimes things can go missing, so here is a copy if you need to download it. Please practice these words at home as frequently as possible. If you click here, you can download a copy of the Letter Factory sounds, cut them out a home, and work with your child on pushing them together to make words :) Start with the first round of popcorn words, CVC words, and your child's name :)

Have a great night!

~ Miss Pliura & Mrs. Tortola

Literacy Update: Reading Strategies & Letter Reversals!

Good evening everyone :)

Today during our literacy lesson, we learned about our first reading strategy. We will be learning 8 of them throughout the year. These are strategies we will practice in class and hope that students use on their own when reading. We've made each strategy into an animal character. Today, we learned about Peeking Pig!     

Peeking Pig is the first and easiest strategy to use for beginner readers. The strategy is quite simple and self-explanatory: look at the pictures to help you solve difficult words. This strategy ties in nicely with the next strategy we will be learning about which involves looking at the first letter of a word. Please try and reinforce this reading strategy at home during your Snuggle Up and Read time. Using the pictures in a book is a very important and helpful reading strategy :)

Letter Reversals

We've already learned a way to differentiate between b and d. The other two letters that often get confused are q and p. Here are the songs we learned to help us remember the difference :)

Pickle and pizza both start with the /p/ sound :) Remember to reinforce writing from left to right and top to bottom (ex: draw the "pickle" first and then the "pizza" to the right of it so they don't get confused).

This one may be a bit tricky for students to remember since they may or may not know what a quarter or a quill is, but with some practice, they'll remember! Remember that these are just helpful tips that can be used if you're finding your child is getting confused between the letters. 

Stay tuned for more updates!

~ Miss Pliura & Mrs. Tortola

Friday Update! October 10th, 2014

Hello everyone!

This post will be really short (and random) because we've been updating quite a bit throughout the week :) But we hope you enjoy it anyway!

Family Tree

I'm so glad to finally have our family tree filled up with pictures :) (it was so bare and sad at the beginning!) It's great for the kids to see their families throughout the day and they like seeing their friends' families as well. I'm glad my mom and dad's old artificial tree is being put to good use ;)

          

Mr. Giggles

This week, we introduced our new class mascot - a cute little monkey named Mr. Giggles! He didn't always have that name though. As a class, we voted on our favourite name. The three names we had to choose from were: Captain Bananas, Mr. Giggles, or Mr. Monkey Man. We turned this into a fun math lesson and graphed our votes!

Mr. Giggles won by a landslide! We are excited to have him be a part of our class community. We will soon be introducing him as the captain of our "Friend Ship" - a character education program we will be implementing soon!

Creativity at Creative!

The spotlight is on Giulia this week for creating some really awesome crafts at the creative centre, including a person made out a toilet paper roll and a crown! She also wrote the names of her family members on foam paper. Great job, Giulia!

Thanksgiving

At the end of the day, we had a community circle where we shared what some of our plans were over the long weekend. Apparently a lot of you give them presents on Thanksgiving!!! It was fun to listen to :P As soon as one person said they were having 3 Thanksgiving dinners, they wanted to one up each other. I think we got up to 6 Thanksgiving dinners before we said enough was enough, haha. Here are some examples: 

Andrew: "I'm having Thanksgiving dinner with my family."

Aaron: "I'm going to my cousin's house for a sleepover!"

Gurshan: "I'm going to see a movie!"

Nathan: "I'm going to my Grandma and Grandpa's house."

Carter: "I'm going to the movies with my dad."

Alyssa: "I'm going on a walk with my mom, dad, and baby sister."

We hope everyone has a safe and happy long weekend, whether or not you celebrate Thanksgiving :) I know that I'm very thankful for having a wonderful teaching partner, a great class full of awesome kids, and to be teaching at a school as great as Gatestone.

See you on Tuesday!

~ Miss Pliura