Our First Tribes Assembly!!

Good evening!

I thought I would share with you some details and pictures about our first Tribes Assembly :) I was a bit nervous since this was our first time breaking off and going to different classrooms, but for the most part it went smoothly! After 2nd nutrition break, the Kindergarten team took students to their designated room and they began their activities. The grade 7 and 8 students ran 4 different games for students in that sub house. It can be challenging creating a game that works for both JK and Grade 6 students, but they did a great job! Then we all went to the gym to recognize our award winners and talk about next month's character trait which is Independent Work. 3 more students will be chosen in October who demonstrate excellence in this trait :) 

A big congratulations goes out to Owen, Hailey, and Juliette for winning this month's award for Organization :) Owen is a great help in the classroom and takes great pride in tidying up and making sure our classroom is neat and organized for our next play block. Hailey is demonstrating some great emergent organization skills by tidying up after herself and staying on task. Juliette also does a great job of tidying up after herself and her friends- Congratulations you 3!!

Can we talk about how amazing Izze's shirt is!? She came up to the SMARTboard during our daily poem and I was gobsmacked! So cool :) She was even spotted out on our playground by our VP Mrs. Sweeting who took her into the staff room to show all the teachers. We love the enthusiasm and school spirit! A lot of students came dressed in their Tribes color to show school spirit, so thanks!! I really need to buy some red clothes!

Have a wonderful evening everyone. A post will be up tomorrow evening about our exciting week :)

~ Miss Pliura

Terry Fox Run!

Hi all!

Today at Gatestone was our Terry Fox Run! The whole school went outside during 5th period to run around the field. It was the perfect day for it!! So beautiful outside :) We started out by walking around the field and then we ran around it a couple of times. Students were so excited to go on the big kids field! We were outside for approximately 30 minutes. We sure hope the students had fun! Here are some pictures!

A class photo after the run :)

A couple of pictures I was able to snag! I love Lara's face in the bottom picture ;) heh

We didn't discuss who Terry Fox was- Mrs. Tortola and I decided it may not be appropriate for our students. However, they do know that the run was for a good cause :) Just to clarify, we didn't send home a note about donations (in case you were confused!), but we thank those who did donate!!

Have a wonderful evening!

~ Miss Pliura & Mrs. Tortola

Literacy Fun :)

Hi families!

On Monday, we started our new and exciting Literacy Activities! These are fun activities that students are engaged in every morning after our literacy lesson to reinforce important reading skills. This month, we are focusing on name recognition, letter recognition, and letter-sound correspondence. 

Today's lesson was on initial sounds. Our JK students had the chance to choose which letter their name started with, and therefore which sound their name started with. As we learned in the Letter Factory, every letter makes a sound! We will continue to do this for the rest of the week :)

We have created some activity bins and have also infused literacy into some of our regular learning centres.

During literacy activities, students can choose a literacy game on the iPad, SMARTboard, or computer. Marko and Izze were on abcya.com putting the letters of the alphabet in order :) They can also use the letter stamps at play-doh- so much fun! As you can tell, they sure had fun stamping in their names! One of our bins includes cookie sheets and magnetic letters. Nathan was spelling his name- awesome job!

Every day, Mrs. Tortola reads the students a book after 1st recess- the perfect way to settle down after some running about outside :) Today's book was "Why Should I Listen?" by Claire Llewellyn. We're really focusing on our listening skills in room 110. Mrs. Tortola and I often like to say random things when we're talking like "Purple Monkey" and then ask students what animal we said- it really checks if they're listening! Good listening means sitting still, criss-cross-applesauce, looking eyes, and no talking :)

We were SO excited to open the listening centre today! My hard work of reading into my computer over the summer really paid off ;) These girls were pros at finding the right track number on the CD to the matching book- they sure must have been listening when we introduced it! 

Just a reminder that our "Snuggle Up & Read" Home Reading Program will be beginning soon! We're aiming for the first week of October. Today we sent home some yellow forms about DRA levels- please make sure you read through them as they are very important. As I like to say, this isn't just Kindergarten..... it's Kindergarten- they're the most important years of your child's education because you're setting the stage for their academic career. In order for students to take school seriously, we need to treat it seriously by modelling it's importance.

More to come on Literacy fun!

~ Miss Pliura & Mrs. Tortola

Tribes Assembly Update

Gatestone is a Tribes TLC (Tribes Learning Community) School. Tribes is a program used at Gatestone that aims to create a positive school and classroom environment to improve behaviour and learning. To learn more about Tribes, you can visit their website at http://tribes.com/about/

Last year, Gatestone created a Tribes Committee, and the committee created Houses within the school (think Harry Potter!). The goal of creating Houses was to bring students from all different grades together to participate in community-building exercises. Within the school, there are 6 Houses and each House has 4 subgroups. Once a month, the whole school participates in some afternoon fun by meeting with their House and participating in games. It's a great way to bring students and staff together to become more of a "community".

Every month we have a Tribes focus. After our House activity, the school has an assembly to celebrate students who have demonstrated excellence in our monthly character trait. The character trait we are focusing on for September is Organization. We've been working hard in room 110 to learn how to be organized. Organization is a skill that needs to be taught, and we think our students are all doing a great job at staying organized. 3 students will be chosen every month and will receive a certificate at the assembly (students are just asked to stand up for recognition and a picture is taken with all the winners after the assembly). We will let you know if your child has been chosen for that character trait in case you want to come to the assembly :)

Each student has been assigned to a House. The Tribes Committee has tried their best to put siblings in the same house. As of now, each student is in the following house.

Victoria

Alma, Carter, Malik, Mohit, Ashlyn

Dundurn

Kevin, Gurshan

Alexander

Hailey, Imran, Alex, Andrew, Giulia, Lilly H., Victoria

Griffin

Lara

Wentworth

Nathan, David, Aaron, Vienna, Nevaeha, Milorad, Marko, Izze, Ethan, Alyssa

McMaster

Lily W., Courtney, Daryl, Juliette, Owen

We always recommend that students try to wear clothing that matches their House color. Our students will also receive a name tag-necklace that has their name, House, and Homeroom # in case they get lost (They won't! The older students will help them go where they need to).

Our first Tribes assembly is Thursday, September 25th from 2:30 - 3 pm. We hope that makes sense!

Best,

~ Miss Pliura & Mrs. Tortola

A Fun Week!!

Good evening, families!

We hope you're having a great night and are looking forward to a 3 day weekend :) (still 2 for us!). We've got lots of fun pictures and exciting things to share with you from this week. Although it was a short week (that seemed to fly by!), it was still very busy in room 110 :)

Weekly Happenings

In our last post, we mentioned the new learning centres we were opening this week. It's great to have more learning centres open so that students have more centres to choose from and each centre is a little less crowded. 

We opened our Paint centre on Wednesday and it was a huge hit! Who doesn't love to paint!? Mrs. Tortola and I went through very explicitly how to set up and clean up the Paint centre so we can keep it looking neat. I have to say, this group of students is pretty amazing at tidying up after themselves! We've been super impressed. Cleaning up after yourself is one of our rules! Here are some friends enjoying themselves at Paint :) We're just starting off with some water colours as it's easy to clean up. Soon we'll be using different kinds of paint and tools to make some really neat art projects! Nice paintings, boys and girls!

Puppets, Puzzles, and Science were also opened this week! We have some really neat puppets to play with and a brand new puppet theatre! We discussed how we can make our own plays or reenact a story we already know :) The Science centre was a lot of fun, too! We can see from the pictures below that the students were exploring different kinds of rocks and shells and were trying out the magnets! The boys and girls decided to make their own "Letter Factory" using the hollow blocks- so creative! Read more about the Letter Factory near the end of this post :)

Ahh yes, technology. Students were SO excited to finally use the computer, iPad, and SMARTboard. On the computer and SMARTboard, students can choose a game from abcya.com to play with, and on the iPad, they have certain apps they can choose from. Mrs. Tortola have chosen educational games for students to play with (so they aren't playing Flappy Bird at school ;)). We are slowly introducing 2 new apps everyday and showing students how they work. They have shown a great deal of patience! Great job!

Here are some more pictures from this week :)

Courtney was sorting the farm animals based on colour- fantastic initiative, Courtney! The boys sure seem to enjoy the lego- I don't blame them!

We also introduced the Water centre today- so much fun!

After 2nd nutrition break, we do 5 minutes of independent reading. I love seeing them all read!!

Literacy Update

• We've been watching Leapfrog's The Letter Factory to help us learn our letters and sounds. We will continue to use these characters as they really seem to click with the children. You can watch the whole video here :) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yzH4QjsTmwc
• Literacy Bins will begin next week! Stay tuned to the blog next week to see what these are :)
• SK DRA (Developmental Reading Assessment) testing is finished. Parents will be receiving their child's DRA score shortly. JK parents will also receive an information package regarding this when Home Reading begins.

Other Updates

• We are planning a walking trip to Fortinos in October.... more to come on that later!
• Parents who volunteered to come in and talk about their hobby or occupation will be receiving some papers in their child's important bag next week
• Please remember to bring in Special Events money and Pizza Money ASAP. Late orders on Pizza will not be accepted. Thanks for bringing in cheques and exact change!

Have an amazing weekend and we will see you Monday!

~ Miss Pliura & Mrs. Tortola

Monday Update!

Hi everyone!

We hope you had a great weekend! We're excited to be back for another fun week in Kindergarten :) It's so nice to hear that you are enjoying the blog, so thank you for sharing that with us!!

Here are a couple updates you should be aware of:

The Terry Fox Run

Please read the note below regarding the Terry Fox Run :)

The Terry Fox Run is fast approaching. On Wednesday September 24th, Gatestone School will be participating in the run. The Kindergartens will also be showing their support by participating in our own walk/run on the same day. We will be heading out to the back playground and will walk/run the perimeter of the field (how many times will be up to the kids – we plan to set a goal this week).

Thank you for your support!

~ The Kindergarten Team

VIP Starting

Next week we will be starting VIP- Very Important Person, of course! Please read the note below to inform you of VIP. Your child's VIP week will be listed on the monthly calendar. 

Click Here to View

Weather

Cold weather is approaching (unfortunately!) so please make sure your child is dressed appropriately for the weather. Also, we're noticing students having difficulties putting on their sweaters or jackets when they're inside out- if you could practise this at home, that would be great!

I believe that's all for now! Please keep checking the blog for more updates! I hope this scratchy throat of mine doesn't mean I'm getting sick- uh oh! Time will tell!

Have a great night!

~ Miss Pliura

I just had to include this picture! :) PS: Rhyming is an incredibly powerful reading strategy- does your child know how to rhyme?

Our First Week Together!

Hello everyone!

We've finished our first week together in Room 110! It was a week full of emotions and lots of transitioning, but we managed to get through it together :) This week was all about getting used to routines, classroom expectations, and learning how to behave in the classroom.

Here is what our days have looked like over the past week:

• Students complete their 5 jobs and find a table or carpet activity to play at until announcements and O'Canada
• Students continue to play until we tidy up and meet at the carpet for our Morning Routine. Our morning routine includes: attendance, good morning song, monthly poem, and reviewing our classroom rules
• Afterwards, we've been going through each learning centre and reviewing how to take care of the materials and how to tidy up
• We began watching "The Letter Factory" to begin to learn the sounds of the alphabet. Next it's time for our first Nutrition Break!
• After students come in from outside, we go off to learning centres for one period and then students either go to the library or to the gym. Lunch time!
• Students reenter from outside where we take attendance again and find a quiet spot in the room to read independently for 5 minutes
• Afterwards, students come back to the carpet and then go off to learning centres once again
• We meet on the carpet to reflect on the day and talk about things we did well and things we can do better next time
• Students get packed up and ready for home!

The next two weeks will be very similar to the schedule above, except we will be having different Literacy lessons, starting VIP, and learning about new learning centres! To download a copy of our Weekly Schedule, please click on the link below.

Weekly Schedule

IMPORTANT: Students have Library 4 times a week. However, they will not be doing book exchange every day. Mrs. Barber and Mrs. Moore will be doing Music, Drama, and Character Education with them as well. They have a lot planned for our little ones and we are super excited :)

This week, the following learning centres were open:

Sand, Creative, Play-Doh, Dramatic Play, Blocks, Building, Book Nook, and the Work Bench

Next week, we will slowly begin introducing the following learning centres:

SMARTboard, iPads, Computer, Listening Centre, Science, Puppets, Puzzles, Paint, Water, and Tinker Table

There will be so many new learning centres for students to explore- we can't wait to introduce them!

Here are some pictures from our week together! :)

We were super impressed with Marko's cutting skills on the toilet paper roll! "I made a slinky!". Great job, Marko! Dramatic Play continues to be a big hit with the boys and girls- so many fun things to do :) (I think I've had more cake and orange juice this week than in my entire life! heh :) )

The Creative centre has been a lot of fun- students are using all sorts of craft materials to make everything from pictures, cards, flags, to musical instruments! Owen wrapped up his musical instrument to take home- he made a shaker using toilet paper rolls and beans. Cool!

The boys (and girls!) have really enjoyed using the toys we keep in our large storage unit. We have everything from gears, lego, lincoln logs, and k'nex! Blocks has been a lot of fun as well- students have been creating towers and experimenting with the different types of blocks.

Andrew looks really comfy reading his book at Book Nook! We're happy to see students choosing to read during learning centres. A fine choice, young man! Daryl and Owen built an amazing tower using our new hollow blocks. We're excited to start using these to explore Mathematics and Science concepts such as height, angles, and gravity!

We caught Hailey cleaning up her spilt sand during learning centres- way to go, Hailey! Following our classroom rules like a pro! Izze made an awesome tower using our wooden blocks- looks like a small town :)

Play-Doh has been a very popular learning centre. We're practising keeping the colours separated- mixing them last week turned the Play-Doh grey and wasn't as fun to use! Bright colours are way more exciting. We still need to work on this! Victoria and Lily were exploring the stickers and small decorations available at Creative. Woohoo!

Overall, a fantastic week for our JKs and SKs, and it's only going to get better! Here are a couple of updates to be aware of:

• Library exchange date has changed- this means the days will have changed on our monthly calendar- we will keep you posted
• There is a new page available on our blog called Important Documents- please look through this to find things from calendars to class lists :)
• We are still waiting on 21 family pictures for our family tree- please bring them in ASAP!
• If your child is VIP in September, expect to be receiving information in your child's important bag next week
• We started Reading Buddies today! Students were paired up with a 5th grader from Mr. McCormack's class. We will be having Reading Buddies once a week for 25 minutes (half a period) 
• Documentation for students will allergies will be in our classrooms before Sept 19th
• September 19th is a PA Day- no school!
• Our classroom is being used for before and after care

Have an amazing weekend and we will see you again on Monday. Take care!

~ Miss Pliura & Mrs. Tortola