Sunday, 27 October 2024

 October 28 - November 1, 2024



Halloween will be on Thursday, October 31st. I hope everyone enjoys a safe and fun Halloween! Please remember to save the candy/treats for home consumption as we will be focusing on healthy eating in class as part of our healthy eating unit.

We will continue with our St. Gabriel Halloween Spirit Week this week until and including Halloween, which is next Thursday, October 31st. Here are this week's special themes and activities:

Monday, Oct. 28 - Mad Scientist Monday 
Tuesday, Oct. 29 - Twisted Twin Tuesday
Wednesday, Oct. 30 - Wacky Witch and Wizard Wednesday
Thursday, Oct. 31 - Halloween: Wear your costume or dress in orange, black, green, or purple colours


School Halloween Guidelines:

- Simple costumes, no accessories, no costume mask
- Culturally-sensitive costumes only
- No changing clothes at school
**Please do not send in Halloween snacks to be shared at school

Important Message From the Principal about Culturally Sensitive Halloween Costumes: 

Please make sure to consider a thoughtful approach about whether the costume is culturally sensitive and appropriate. According to the Cambridge Dictionary, cultural appropriation is, “the act of taking or using things from a culture that is not your own, especially without showing that you understand or respect the culture.” Halloween is a fun event and with some creativity and imagination, parents can help their child(ren) with deciding on a costume that aligns with a culturally sensitive Halloween. Being proactive can help all of us to avoid uncomfortable situations at school and in our community and can help us ensure that Halloween is a fun event where all students feel safe and honoured.Looking forward to seeing all the creativity!


Our Learning This Week

Language:
In Writing, we will practise our recount writing skills again this week. On Friday, the students will be asked to recount their Halloween experience if they participate, or another personal experience (e.g., a birthday, a special family experience, a time they got hurt, the St. Gabriel Halloween Dance, one of our spirit days from this week, etc.). We are working on adding more adjectives and details to our writing to 'bump it up'. 

In grammar and word work, we will continue to learn how to use adjectivesOur next UFLI phonics lesson will be about another consonant digraph sound. A consonant digraph is two consonants that come together to make one sound. This week, we will learn about voiced /th/. Voiced /th/ comes at the beginning of a word, such as in the words then, that, this, them. **For a more detailed explanation of the voiced /th/ sound, please have a look on your child's English October Hapara Workspace at the top, where a variety of resources are posted.

New heart words: she, we, they, their

Please have your child practise the heart words we have learned so far in class: the, I, a, said, to, do, of, see, he, be, me, from, you, what, have, look, book, are, was, your, want, go, no, so, goes, says, *she, *we, *they, *their.


Spelling Check-In:

We will postpone our next spelling check-in until next Monday, November 4th. You can help your child learn how to spell each of the heart words "by heart". The spelling check-in will also include words with the spelling patterns we have recently learned: -ck, -sh, and -th.

Math:

Over the next couple of days, we will finish up our unit about place value and representing numbers in different ways. We will soon begin our new number unit, Estimating and Comparing Whole Numbers. In Grade Two, we will learn several strategies to compare numbers less than 100 and learn how to locate numbers on partial number lines. We will also learn how to use place-value to order and compare 2-digit numbers.


Homework:

This week, your child will bring home some homework. Your child's homework will be due back at school on Monday, November 4th

The Grade 3s will be given a homework sheet about adjectives. The Grade 2s will be given a homework sheet that is a follow-up to our UFLI phonics lessons from last week.

Other homework ideas:
- Daily reading out loud to a parent for 10-20 minutes (students can access extra books via Sora on their Student Portal). A good suggestion is for you to "take turns" reading aloud with your child - for example, you read a couple of pages, then your child reads a couple of pages. Your child will benefit from hearing you read aloud as you can model what fluent reading sounds like. 

Math Information Session for Parents: Building Strong Math Foundations
On November 7th, parents/guardians are invited to an informative virtual math session with Dr. Christine Suurtamm on how children learn mathematics and how families can best support their learning. The session focuses on Kindergarten to Grade 6 learning. Please find more information linked here.


Looking Ahead:

Tuesday, Oct. 29: Gr. 2/3 library books due & pizza lunch
Thursday, Oct. 31: Halloween
Friday, Nov. 1: All Saints Day & Photo Retake Day
Sunday, Nov. 3: Daylight Savings Day - Turn back clocks

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