Well, in spite of our best efforts, our teachers have managed to keep us busy since the break. We’ve been solving up a storm of equations in mathematics, seeing a storm of romance and deception in Romeo and Juliet, and read about the storms of war and the plight of child soldiers in English. In Social, we finished with the Romans and are studying medieval times. Health has seen us examining the evolution of the tobacco industry. We’ve been skating and curling in Phys. Ed. IA has us welding and putting together engines, while we’ve been studying measurement in Home Ec. (but we really just want to make soup). Science has us studying cells and various forms of reproduction. We’ve been making our own personal Coats of Arms in Art. And finally, we’re looking up various careers on the internet in Careers! Happy Saint Patrick’s Day! Special thanks to Kaitlyn and Nickole and the Peanut Gallery.

In Social Studies we are looking at Canadian identity and our knowledge of Canada as if we were immigrants ourselves. In Physical Education we are finishing winter activities at the Skating and Curling Rinks. We start Fitness testing next week! In Math we are working on Probability right now. While in English we finished the novel “The Giver” and we will start some wrap-up activities for it. In Art we are doing some Drama now. In Industrial Arts, we are drafting BIG Isometric drawings. Finally, in Home Ec., we are working finishing our Foods and Food Safety Unit.

Students have been enjoying the warm weather as of late; as a result, they have had the opportunity to venture out to the curling rink and arena in their Phys. Ed. Classes. In ELA, we have just finished reading the book, Dust, and will be completing assignments which explore the elements of the novel. It was quite the entertaining story! In math, we have just written our unit exam in Measurement. Please expect to see your child’s exam shortly. I would ask that you review it, sign it, and return it to the school. In Health, the students continue to explore the Seven Habits of Highly Effective Teens.

Winter Carnival activities are taking place on Friday, March 18. This is a day when we can all get together and enjoy each other’s company, engage in some friendly competition, and appreciate the fabulous weather. Please remind your child to dress appropriately as we will be spending most of the day outside.

Interim reports will be mailed out on Thursday, March 17. If you have any questions in regard to your child’s progress, please feel free to contact me at the school at any time. Additionally, Parent-Teacher Interviews are scheduled for next week. Please feel free to contact the school to make an appointment.

We have moved…again…back into our freshly painted classroom! The grade 3/4 class did an amazing job at being flexible and adaptable during the painting process! We are glad to be back in our spiffy new digs! Here’s a peak at what else we’ve been up to…

ELA: We finished up Mr. Popper’s Penguins! A special thank you to the grade 4s for working with their grade 3 partners. You did an amazing job! We have been working very hard on our creative writing, and will be beginning a new novel study, soon. In grammar we have been learning about pronouns and fine-tuning our proofreading.

Math: Both the grade 3s and 4s are working on measurement units right now. Please help them to practice telling time on an analog clock, counting forward on backward on the calendar by days, weeks and months and using a ruler.

Science: We’re still working on rocks and minerals. We also have a wonderful field trip coming up on the 24th to the Little Green Thumbs Expo!

Arts-Ed: We have made some wonderful studies in contrast lately, as well as building some amazing leprechaun traps.

We are really looking forward to demonstrating some our skills at our student lead interviews next week. This is a new interview format for us should be interesting!

Happy St. Patrick’s Day Everyone!

In Grade 12, we are pretty busy finishing up tests and learning new stuff. In Calculus, we just recently finished a stressful test, and to relieve this stress, we celebrated pie day on March 14th (3rd month, 14th day = 3.14 =pi. Get it?). The pumpkin pie was sooo good. We have also decided to bring pie for the rest of the week. In gym class, we have been perfecting our badminton skills, while in English, we will be starting a novel called Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley. In Chemistry, we just finished writing a test and will be starting reaction rates. Lastly in Physics, we just started Acceleration and Velocity Time Graphs.

In math, we are working on polynomial and rational expressions. In ELA, we have just finished reading Of Mice and Men. In PAA, we are doing commercial cooking, and just finished a food handler’s course. In IA, we are finishing drafting our floor plans of our dream homes. In Wildlife Management, we just finished sleeping in our Quinzees. In Phys. Ed., we just started badminton. Last but not least, in Social Studies we are talking about the five main social institutions Government, Business, Labour, Media and Military.

Thank you to all parents and students for being so accommodating and coming in early for your interviews! I really enjoyed the student led parent-teacher interview, and think that it put an interesting spin on the whole process! Just a reminder to dress appropriately for the Winter Carnival on Friday….layers are probably a good idea.

Not much has changed in our class since the last newsletter! The grade one’s are wrapping up their math unit on measurement and will soon begin learning about numbers to one hundred. The grade two’s are nearing the end of their very long unit on addition and subtraction to eighteen, and are moving on to measurement. The students are really enjoying our ELA centers, where they move from different stations each day. Some of the stations include guided reading, independent or buddy reading, computers, phonics, listening stations, spelling, and so forth. We are also learning about different strategies in our Fairy Tale unit, such as sequencing, blends and digraphs, antonyms and synonyms, and word families. We have also started some creative writing, where we are using our imaginations to write own stories. We are almost done are dinosaur unit in science, and are still working on a healthy body in health and gymnastics in Phys. Ed.