English Reading Homework
Your child will be bringing home a book to read tonight. The children are so excited!The book bag should be in their note tote. Your child should read the book and then record the title on the reading sheet (great printing practice). Please return the book tomorrow so your child can get a new book.
Happy Reading!
If for some reason the note tote does not find its way home tonight you can read a story online with this link
Collaboration is a learning skill that all grade one students work on throughout the year. Working and communicating with different partners and small groups takes lots of patience.
Teachers help students navigate any problems or conflicts as they arise. They arrange for students to work with different classmates throughout the year to practice communicating and collaborating.
In Social Studies, students started creating maps with a partner. Each group created a community map and presented it to the class.
The class had so much fun creating their communities that we decided to work all together to create one community. Each student chose a specific community helper to research. They also needed to make the community building each helper worked at. The ER doctor built a hospital, while the principal and teacher made a school and playground together.
| Student | Zev | Delilah | Rachel | Levi | Ilay | Aliyah & Maia | Miles | Nate | Emma |
| Community Helper | Vet | Vet | Postmaster | Farmer | Chef & Restaurant Owner | Teacher & Principal | Policeman | Firefighter | ER Doctor |
| Community Building | Animal Hospital | Animal Shelter | Post Office | Barn&Farm | Restaurant | School & Playground | Police Station | Fire Station | Hospital |
The students researched and wrote about their community helper’s role and responsibilities. They presented their findings to the class. They designed and created community buildings. Together they decided on symbols for the map key and worked on mapping the 3D community.
The collaboration I have seen over the last few weeks has been terrific. The children have been so supportive and encouraging with each other. Best of all, the children had so much fun.
Memories of our year in 1A
It was a wonderful year in 1A! The Grade One team loved teaching these amazing students.
Here is a link to the Summer Learning Resource page
From Ms. Karissa
The school is buzzing right now! There has been so much activity lately at the school, and students are shining. Kids enjoyed spending a morning with their grandparents doing fun activities in all three languages, and they proudly showed them their work. For Mother’s Day, they made beautiful cards with wishes in French, and we read how people celebrate this special day in other countries. They keep practicing their reading and writing skills through reading buddies and playing games so that they can review all the new vocabulary, such as spring, the parts of the body, and animals. We are currently learning about animal habitats like the sea, the jungle, the farm, and the type of food they eat, and of course, as the weather steadily improves, we spend some time outdoors. As the end of the school year is getting closer, I insist on reading with the children daily so they can finish Grade 1 positively and successfully.
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1A had fun reading The Three Little Pigs recently. After reading the story, I challenged the class to build three solid houses that the big bad wolf couldn’t blow down. The requirements were that each group needed to make a straw house, a stick house, and a brick house. The students got excited and started to build. The Big Bad Wolf/Mrs. Bennett came calling.
I huffed and puffed, used a hair dryer, and made wind with a plastic top. As much as I huffed and puffed, I could not blow the houses down. All the structures were stable and standing: the children were so happy.
The class wanted to write a new version of the Three Little Pigs. Listen to the children read their story of The Three Little Pigs.
Listen to the stories we wrote and recorded. We hope you enjoy them.
We had so much fun in the Makerspace last week. Mr. Ray challenged us to make a Scribble bot. He told us that we would need to use our engineering skills to make a moving robot. He told us the materials for building would be three markers, a plastic cup, a motor, a battery pack, and lots of tape. First we made a plan of what we wanted to build.
The next step was to start building. It took lots of patience to attach all of the parts. We had to tape our markers inside the cup, making sure everything was stable. There was a lot of trial and error with attaching the battery pack wires to the motor. Mr. Ray helped us problem-solve and get our scribble bots ready to scribble.
The scribble bots started to move and scribble. It was so exciting to watch them move and scribble on the paper. Take a look at them in action below.
There was a special surprise in the library today. Melanie came to enthrall us with her performance of Opera Mouse.
After two months, 1B has finally crowned a winner for Munsch Madness. After reading 16 different Robert Munsch (some of the books 4 different times) we finally decided on an overall winner.
So, the book that 1B chose as their favourite Robert Munsch book is….
“I Have To Go”
After reading all of the books, and crowning a winner, the students then wrote letters to Robert Munsch. The students had wonderful questions and such nice things to ask/share with him about their experiences reading their books.
1B are now HUGE Robert Munsch fans and have been finding Robert Munsch books that weren’t included in Munsch Madness to read with their friends and as a class. We had so much fun reading the books and narrowing down our favourite one.
Happy May! A new month means a new homework choice board. Students were sent home today with the choice board and a collection of activities and sheets that can be done throughout the month. Just a reminder that students are not expected to finish ALL of the homework activities in one day/one week and that this is something for them to work on throughout the month.
A few differences this month are that I have started to send books home. When the students are done with these books they are encouraged to bring them back to school so I can switch them and give them new reading material.
Our new goal for BINGOs is 50 as a class!
It was a special week at school. On Yom Hazikaron, we remembered the brave Israeli soldiers who fought for Israel.
Yom Ha’atzmaut was a day full of celebration on Israel’s 75th birthday. We started by decorating our classroom doors and lockers in blue and white. We think we did a pretty good job, don’t you?
All the classes had the opportunity to visit different stations. We learned a special dance, played Twister with JNF, sang karaoke, played musical chairs, and did Israeli Just Dance.
At lunch, we ate delicious falafel. Special Thanks to the parents for helping make the falafel!
We finished the day with the whole school in the gym doing the special dance we learned in the morning. A birthday cupcake was the special treat we got to eat. It was such a fun day!
JNF Art Contest
The Jewish National Fund has created an art contest that students and families may participate in. Check out the pamphlet below to learn more about it!
Contest:
Our Innovation Day projects have been inspired by the book Make Way for Animals! A World of Wildlife Crossings by Meeg Pincus.
The students’ challenge was to design and build a structure to help animals cross busy roads. All projects needed to be strong enough to hold 100g, and at least 30 cm long.
The class got busy planning, designing, cutting cardboard, and gluing. Many designs changed during the building process, but ultimately they all worked. Students practiced their patience and perseverance and were proud of their accomplishments.
Innovation Day was exciting. Showing the projects to the parents and other classes was lots of fun. Now the students want to keep building and planning with more STEM challenges. As a teacher I have to admit these challenges are so much fun.
This year for Innovation Day, the grade 1s were inspired by the story “Make Way for Animals” by Meeg Pincus. Students were so excited and interested in learning about different bridges, underpasses, and creations that help animals to safely cross the road so we thought why not create our own inventions!
The challenge: design and build a structure to help animals safely cross the road. Students were challenged with having their inventions stand by themselves and hold 100g. Students got busy planning, designing, cutting cardboard, and gluing. Many of their designs changed throughout the process, but in the end they all created amazing structures!
Innovation day came quickly and the students were so excited to show off their projects to teachers, parents, and other OJCS students. We even got to tour the school and learn about the different projects other students did as well. It was so fun to explore the projects around the school!
This past week we celebrated the 100th day of school. In General Studies, we read 100 words, worked on 100 math problems, and wrote the 100th-day news. We counted to 100 en français and wrote 100 words in Hebrew. The highlight was making Fruit Loop necklaces with 100 Fruit Loops. The students had fun snacking as they counted and made their necklaces.
100 Hebrew words
In Social Studies, the students worked on personal timelines. Seeing all the beautiful pictures of children of different ages made everyone smile.
Friday was our kickoff for the love of reading. We made reading forts in class. Reading in forts was a big hit. It was our surprise for our homework bingos. One of the students said, “It is a dream come true!” He had wished only a month ago that we could make forts in school.
A few children also enjoyed some quiet reading after story time in the library today.
Hebrew with Moreh Saar
Hey there Grade 1,
It’s almost Pesach and I figured a bit of showing off our conversational skills is in order.
As a part of my methodology I find it extremely important to anchor the learning in real life, as language is a “use it or lose it” skill. That’s why I decided to connect Hebrew studies with Israeli culture. As you might know, the students surely realized it by now, Israelis are loving, passionate and welcoming, however they are also loud and full of Chutzpah!!
Taking this into consideration I decided to teach the kids several different ways to ask and answer people “how are you doing?”, some are formal, some are good old fashion cheeky!! Please feel free to listen to them answer about their day and ask me how I’m doing. It was a calculated risk, but boy am I bad at math, the kids can definitely talk, but now I got a classroom full of cheeky Israeli sounding kids.
Have a great Pesach vacation,
Saar
La beauté de la langue française!!!
Alors les amis, why celebrate la Francophonie? I can think of thousands of reasons why but it comes down to one thing: we love the french language because it is smooth, rich, and flowing: we love speaking french because, with its nasal vowels and melodious intonation, it sounds very musical to a non-native ear. We want to learn French because it is also called the language of love, cooking, fashion, theater, visual arts, dance, and architecture.
During la francofête at our school, we had the pleasure to admire all the students from JK-grade 8 sing, dance, act, and recite poems in french!!!! All the teachers worked hard to make that happen. The students were proud of themselves, and their energy and passion were evident throughout the afternoon. During the week of the francophonie, they read books, heard stories, watched movies, played games, learned the ten magic words, and tasted french treats. Alors mes amis as the legendary teacher Dorothy Grace Boyajian once said, “Let us keep the flame of knowledge alive so we can light the candle of our children.”
A très bientôt!
A Virtual Author Visit
JK to Gr. 2 students got a virtual visit from Lark the Shark author Natalie Newman from her home in the U.K. The story and presentation helped our students learn about sharks and their role in the ocean ecosystem. Natalie shared how she wrote the book with her son and her son after learning about pollution in the ocean in his Grade 2 classroom. The students were curious about the publishing process, and Natalie talked about how they wrote the book. I think some students will be writing their books one day.
Math Olympics
In honour of Pi Day on March 14th, students celebrated a love of Math by participating in the first-ever 1A Math Olympics. The children picked their teams a chose a name. The Marvelous Mathers, Math Detectors, and the Air Force A Math AA teams problem-solved, collaborated, and had fun with Math.
Congratulations to the Marvelous Mathers for winning the 1A Olympics!
Take a look at our opening ceremony
La semaine de la Francophonie
La semaine de la francophonie was lots of fun. The students loved all the French activities on Wednesday afternoon. The first stop was visiting the Makerspace cafe for croissants and hot chocolate. Obstacle courses, word searches, and bingo helped the children review all the French they are learning this year.
1A enjoyed a workshop with Quinn, our school social worker. Quinn taught about empathetic and active listening. The children practiced using listening skills by playing a few games. The students will continue to work on these skills throughout the rest of the year.
