Happy Valentines Day! Hope you're able to spend today with family, friends and loved ones!
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| Thank you to all the families who brought in delicious Valentines treats for us to share! |
We had a short, but busy week!
A reminder that tomorrow (Thursday, February 15th) and Friday, February 16th, there is no school for students because of Teacher's Convention. Monday, February 19th, there is no school because of the Family Day holiday. Enjoy your long weekend! Fingers crossed the weather stays beautiful!
Grade 2s started the week by doing their first ever Buddy Testing! We ran out of time at the end of last week with the early dismissal and Olympic Sports Day, but students still carried their understanding forward to this week. Students did not choose 5 new words this week because of the short week. We will resume our regular Independent Spelling Program schedule on Tuesday. Please look for new words coming home with your child then.
As we work towards developing our skills in accurately spelling high frequency words, I am not only looking at their weekly Buddy Tests, but also looking to ensure the correct spelling of those words is being transferred to their everyday writing.
In math, students continue to explore number sense and mental math strategies with daily warm-ups (we're calling them "energizers"!) and number activities. With the Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, it is also the perfect opportunity to explore data management!
Students have been exploring different ways of recording data through numbers, symbols and pictures. Using the current medal count for the top 5 countries, students transferred the data into a new table and used an alternate representation to record the information.
After learning about the Olympic mascots, students conducted a survey that asked, "Which Olympic mascot do you like best?" We found out that most students in our classroom like Soohorang the best.
We have also been examining existing graphs, and answering, "What question do you think the survey asked?" and "What information does the survey give us?"
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| Soohorang (the white tiger) and Bandabi (the Asiatic black bear) |
In preparation for our upcoming Artist in Residence, Jennifer Stables, students chose a Canadian animal for an ongoing inquiry which includes mask making. We look forward to creating these masks and incorporating them into folktales and performances to share with you at March conferences.
We started exploring the art mannequin as a simplified approach to figure drawing using basic 3D cylinder shapes.
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| Students worked on capturing a variety of different poses. |
With the beautiful sun and warmer temperatures, we have spent a lot of time outside this week! First, we spent Tuesday afternoon outside snowshoeing with our buddies. This was many students first time snowshoeing, and they all thoroughly enjoyed it. If you would like to explore snowshoeing as a family, there are so many family friendly opportunities in and around Calgary: https://www.calgaryschild.com/family-fun/1229-snowshoeing-family-friendly-affordable-and-easy
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| Our buddies helping us get our snowshoes on. |
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| Off we go! |
Winter Walk Day was still warm, but maybe not as lovely as snowshoeing. We still had mild temperatures and enjoyed being outside for a break. Participating in Winter Walk Day supports students exploring ways to lead a healthy, active life, even in our wintery climate.
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| Winter weather for our Winter Walk Day! |
Have a wonderful long weekend everyone! See you on Tuesday, February 20th!
Ms. Thomas
