Sunday, December 12, 2010

Reflection on Teaching Grade One

What an exhilarating learning experience! I thoroughly enjoyed teaching the Grade One class over the past 4 weeks. I taught a unit on the Human Body for Science and a mini unit on graphing in Math along with a series of lessons in Language Arts on Retell. Other lessons I taught included Painting with Primary Colours, Calendar and DPA. My class ranged in ability from low level learners and ELLs to quick learners with a few behavioural problems along the way. I obtained some sound experience in keeping routines on a daily basis. I struggled with teaching some of the students who just wouldn't focus and experienced many frustrations that Teachers go through from Technological difficulties with videos to photocopiers to running out of handouts and endless sharpening of pencils. I came to love the students out of a love of learning to teach. They will always hold a special place in my heart as they are and always will be the first class with which I had experience teaching.

Friday, December 10, 2010

Thank you!

Thank you so much for the beautiful booklet of all of your hand drawn pictures of so many meaningful times. I am grateful that you all put in such a wonderful effort to express your thanks to me for being your student teacher in such an original way. This booklet will help me remember each of you as I will be able to remember your work as well as you from the picture. Also, thanks again for the wonderful "Children Around The World" book and the calendar etc. It is all greatly apprciated. Mucho Gracias!!!

Tuesday, October 5, 2010

Mathematics

HI KIDS!!! Have some fun! Try this new game http://www.ixl.com/math/practice/grade-1-counting-review-0-to-10  Would you like to sharpen your skills in counting? Just count the number of things on the page and enter your answer where provided then click on "submit" to continue. When you are ready to quit just click on "submit and finish" to get your score! It's easy - give it a try!!!

When you are ready and want to challenge yourself try this one http://www.ixl.com/math/practice/grade-1-counting-by-twos-fives-and-tens . Just enter your answer in the box provided and click "submit" to see the correct answer. To quit just click on "submit and finish" to see your score! Good luck!!!

Parents: By the end of grade one, according to the Ontario Curriculum students are expected to be able to "count forward by 1s, 2s, 5s, and 10s up to 100 using a variety of tools and strategies."  These games are a good way for the students to help develop counting skills and they have immediate feedback because they get the answer right away.

Monday, October 4, 2010

Language Arts

HEY KIDS! Would you like to get excited? Would you like to have some fun?  How about playing a game? Here is a great game that you can play, http://www.askkids.com/games?gmid=11&pop=1 and click on the "Super Hyper Spider Typer". Click "how to play" to learn how to play the game.  Then click on "start," choose "medium" level, and see how high a score you can get. If you're really good you can try the hard level!

Parents: As part of the Ontario Curriculum, by the end of grade one students are expected to know "how to spell some high frequency words correctly." You may want to help them with their spelling!

Field Trip to Andrews Scenic Acres

Wowee! What a fun day we all had at Andrew's Farm. I was happy to see everybody having fun watching the animals and experiencing new things. My favourite things were picking raspberries because I had never done that before and walking through the haunted house because it was so creative. I liked the humour in the grave yard head stones that said "Here lies Bert in Dirt" and instead of Rest in Peace it said "Rest in Pieces." The witch's house and the eyeball yard were very scarey; I hadn't seen that before, it was so creative! I like to visit the scarey game website http://www.onlinescarygames.net/ this time of year to see scarey things.  A site that I like to visit to keep me informed of current issues is http://www.canoe.ca/ and just for laughs I sometimes visit http://www.youtube.com/ .

Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Reflection on my first day with Grade 1 class

What a terrific introduction to Churchill Meadows with the Terry Fox run! I was able to get acquainted with many of the students in my class as well as other Teachers! Churchill Meadows is a very active and participatory school. I was happy to see so many students excited to learn in Miss C.'s class. You seem to be a great bunch of kids who are happy to learn new things. You all seemed to like the Poem and reading aloud, especially when one side of the class got to perform and say it aloud to the other side of the class. Good work! Something that you will find helpful is an online dictionary to help you with the spelling of new words that you are learning. You can find it at http://www.dictionary.com/

Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Hello Class

Wow! This is great to be with you even for the short time that I will be in your school. I am looking forward to our time spent together. I hope you will visit my blog every once in a while to keep up with it. That's great that Churchill Meadows is participating in the Terry Fox charity event! Good luck to all of you! It is a great cause and one that is supported by many people including Canandian basketball star Steve Nash. I wish you luck with your school work and I hope we have lots of fun!!!

                                         @ 2009 Karen Plumb