October 27 - October 31, 2025

Halloween will be this week on Friday, October 31st. The students are invited to dress in their costumes on Halloween. We ask that no scary or violent costumes be worn. Also, no props, weapons, or masks at school please. If your child wishes to include face painting with their costume at school, we ask that the paint is minimal and does not cover the entire face. These costume details are fun for trick-or-treating after school but not appropriate for school. You are strongly encouraged to label your child's Halloween costume pieces in case something is misplaced during the day. If you are concerned about damaged costumes, your child is invited to dress in Halloween colours (orange, purple, or black) instead of a costume.

Important Message 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) choose 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!

Halloween Treats:

In addition, please do not send in edible treats to be handed out to the students due to allergies and many students' dietary limitations. Remember to save your child's candy/treats for home consumption as we will be focusing on healthy eating in class as part of our healthy eating unit. I hope everyone enjoys a safe and fun Halloween! 

Our Learning This Week

Language:

In Writing, we will continue to practise our recount writing skills. Next Monday, 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, 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 adjectives. Our next UFLI phonics lesson will be about another consonant digraph sound. A consonant digraph is two consonants that come together to make one sound. Our next UFLI phonics lesson is about the -nk sound pattern, as in the words sank, thank, drank, bank, think, pink, sink, honk, sunk, junk, plunk, stunk.

New heart words: there, where

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, they, their, were, talk, walk, could, should, would, or, for, *there, *where.

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. In Grade 3, we will learn the same skills but with numbers to 1000. 

Spelling Check-In:

For each spelling check-in (Mondays), you can help your child learn how to spell each of the heart words we have learned this year "by heart". The spelling check-in on Monday, November 3rd will also include words with the spelling patterns we have recently learned: -ng, -nk.

Homework:

This week, your child will bring home some homework. Your child's homework will be due back at school on Monday, November 3rd. 

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. 

Looking Ahead:

Friday, Oct. 31: Halloween - dress in orange, purple, black or costume

Friday, Oct. 31: Gr. 2/3 library books due

Saturday, Nov. 1: All Saints Day

Sunday, Nov. 2: Daylight Savings Day - Turn back clocks