Last Week

Last week, the grade three students built towers with the help of local scientist John Wills.  They learned how to make structures more stable and tested them for strength with containers of water.  They did a great job and had lots of fun in the process.

On Thursday, 3/4N students participated in the Terry Fox run.  We ran the track with the other primary students.  Some students in our class completed the loop over 15 times!  Students were provided with stickers to write down who they were running for.  Some chose a family or friend, some chose Terry Fox.  Making this connection seemed to give them more of a sense of purpose towards the run.  

The Global Read Aloud

Tomorrow is a big day for 3/4N!  We will begin participating in the Global Read Aloud.  This is an activity where classes from around the world read the same novel, at the same time, for a month.  This year's novel is The One and Only Ivan by Katherine Applegate.  It is the story of a silverback gorilla living at The Exit 8 Big Top Mall for years, and his life suddenly has purpose when a baby elephant arrives.  The novel is fiction, but is based on true events.  The students have been watching the book trailer and have become captivated with the story.  To view the trailer, click the link below
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pYIMuxq-tL0
Through a math lesson, the students determined that when the book begins, Ivan has lived at the mall for 27 years.  Students were stunned and saddened by this fact, and have already developed empathy for the main character.  A great start to connecting with the novel!
This week, our class will read the first 78 pages of the novel.  We will correspond with two other classes via Edmodo (a social media website for teachers) and Skype.  One class is located in Houston, Texas, the other is in Stony Plain, Alberta.  We are looking forward to hearing their different viewpoints regarding the novel.

September

September is coming to a close and we have been very busy.  In Language, the class has been working on The Daily Five and developing stamina in both reading and writing.  As part of their Read to Someone portion, students have been going in small groups to read to the kindergarten students.  In Math, we are wrapping up a unit on patterning.  Students have been developing skills (counting up, using a hundreds chart etc.) to find the gap between numbers.  This helps them identify patterns and further develop their addition and subtraction skills.  In Science, the grade three students have been learning about strong and stable structures and experimenting with how to pose with stability and balance in gym.  The grade four students have been learning about pulleys and gears.

The class is beginning to work more collaboratively and students have become more confident in sharing their thoughts and ideas.

Open House

I am looking forward to seeing many families tonight at the Open House.  This is a time for students to show you all around the classroom and describe some of the activities they have been working on in the first few weeks of school.  See you tonight at 6:30p.m.!

Scholastic Book Orders

I have extended the deadline for Scholastic Book Orders until Monday, September 17th.  If you would like to place an order, please send in the order form and cash or cheque by Monday.  Thank you.
Mrs. Nolette

Milk program and cafeteria

The milk program has started at MCS.  If you would like your child to have milk at lunch time, tickets are available for purchase at the office at a cost of $10.00 for 10.

The cafeteria is open for food purchases for students in the junior grades.  This means that the grade four students in 3/4 N are able to go to the cafeteria at first nutrition break!  Items available for purchase include daily specials, bagels, pizza slices, cookies, juice, water, etc..  The grade four students will continue to eat lunch in our classroom, they will only go to the cafeteria to pick up their food items.

First Day

We had an excellent first day in room 131! We have a lovely, cooperative class. Thank you to everyone who returned their signed forms, we are only missing a couple.
The only school supply I require (other than writing tools), is a one inch binder. Please send one in over the next couple of weeks. I have some extras in the class for those who are unable to pick one up.