Wow!!! The month is quickly drawing to an end and soon it will be November! Wednesday is Hallowe'en and we will be celebrating the day dressed in our costumes, dancing in the gym, and parading throughout the classrooms. Please ensure that your child is dressed in their costume at home and that it 's costume comfortable for them to move in. Please refrain from sending in masks that compromise their ability to see. Merci !
We have been engaged in many wonderful learning activities this month! The students are becoming more and more comfortable reading and responding to our daily morning message. For example, "Bonjour ! Comment ça va ? Ça va bien ? Ça va mal ? Ça va comme-ci comme-ça ? or Quel temps fait-il ? Il fait chaud. Il fait froid."
To reinforce the French vocabulary chaud et froid (hot and cold) we did a small experiment with crayons. We examined their cold state and noticed that they remained the intact. We next glued them onto a canvas board and made predictions as to what would happen if we were to heat them up with a blowdryer. When the crayons heated up, they began to melt.
In language we continue to learn a letter each week, along with French vocabulary related to each letter. They are getting so good at remembering all of the items in our letter buckets. So far we have studies the following letters: A, S, T, M, L, & I.
The letter I is always a difficult one in French, as it sounds like the English letter E. Using our new words, we created a simple story and the children about a mouse and an iguana. They each created illustrations to glue onto our storyboard. With this story, they have been practicing reading concepts, such as directionality, letters create sounds and words, words placed together create sentences, and how we use illustrations to help us remember words in our story. Bravo, les amis !
Math is all around us! The shapes we sees, the patterns in nature, symmetry when experimenting with visual arts and music, counting chairs and lunch boxes, building with blocks, puzzles, and creating exciting Duplo/Lego vehicles and villages. Another fun way of learning math concepts is through board games. The newest board game we have been playing with is called "Sum Swamp". We have introduced Rekenreks to the children to assist them with visually learning addition and subtraction concepts.
http://www.edugains.ca/resources/LearningMaterials/ManipulativesSupport/TipSheets/Maniplatives_Rekenreks.pdf
Another way that math and French language concepts are taught to the children is through various gym activities. Our warm-up activities always involve songs to get us moving (e.g. Hokey Pokey, Tête, épaules, Belle citrouille, etc...) and to reinforce newly acquired French words. As we run around the gym we incorporate the letters that we have been focussing on by reciting the letter poems and acting out the vocabulary (e.g., avion, araingée, serpent, tigre, muffin, etc...). We have also been expanding our ability to create French sentences as we play, "Traverse le Canada". If a child is wearing a colour that we say, they need to reply in French and tell us where the colour is on their clothing (e.g., J'ai blue sur mes souliers). Moving and learning is so much fun!
Throughout the month, we have also incorporated various Hallowe'en songs and poems during our learning time and built our French vocabulary through books (e.g., fantôme, chat noir, sorcière, balai, chauve-souris, chouette, hibou, citrouille-lanterne). We also decorated the classroom with spiders, webs, witches, ghosts, and pumpkins.
Outside Forest play continues to be a highlight of the day! The children have noticed many seasonal changes throughout the last two months. With our science buddies, we have been learning about decomposition, log hotels, leaves, different types of trees and different shapes of leaves, seeds, caterpillars that we see in the fall, mushrooms, and so much more. We planted a sunflower seed and are watching it grow! A month ago, we found a dead skunk and we have been watching how its body continues to decompose and become part of the earth.
Thank you for dressing your child in layers and for dressing them warmly. Although the sun is out, it can be quite cool outside. Hats, mittens, warm coats, splash pants, and boots are so important for the children to bring (extra ones too please in case they get wet). This makes outside time so much more enjoyable! Merci !
Our trip to Chudleigh's was a big success! We learned so much about pumpkins and apples! The swings, slides, and bails of hay were so much fun! It was interesting to learn about the bees, trees, and a bit about our First Nations people. Thank you so much to the parent volunteers who helped us out! Without your assistance, we would not be able to do these things! Merci ! Merci ! Merci !
Have a wonderful day!!!!!!