Math rules!

We all put a math sentence on the board. - Joey
Our number of the day today was six. - Cam H.
We played the Power of Ten game with a partner. - Jenna
The math card game we played was almost like the game 'War'. - Robyn
Today is Braylin's birthday! - Tyler
We had Gym and Health for the first time with our new teacher Ms. Beach. - Cam H. and Taylor
We played 'Ultimate Chicken' in Gym. - Gal
This week, we started Magic Object Cleanup at the end of the day, after Agendas. Whoever finds the mystery piece of garbage gets to pick a prize from the prize bin. - Marcus

I love teaching Mathematics - it's probably my favourite subject to teach (just edging out Science)! One of the reasons I love teaching Math is that there are almost always multiple ways to get the correct answer, meaning that everyone, no matter their proficiency, can succeed. One of the ways I get to see this on a regular basis is when students share their number sentences (or 'equations') with the class. As part of the Number of the Day exercises that the students complete on a daily basis, they have to come up with a minimum of five number sentences that end in (or 'equal') our Number of the Day. When it is time to share, they each have to add one sentence to the board, and it has to be different from any of the number sentences already shared. As the year progresses, it is so exciting to see the growth in EVERY student's Math skills, as they share their increasingly complex number sentences, and learn from each other! Check out this photo - not too shabby for the first day of sharing number sentences in Grade 3:

Just another Tuesday...

Lots going on in and around room 18 today (just like every day!) - here are some highlights that the students wanted write about:

There is a big pile of wood chips on the basketball court. I think they are going to use them for the new playstructure. - Gal
We went to Music for the second time. - Kaynen
We had our first Social Studies class. We learned about rights and responsibilities. - Sydney
We got to use the SmartBoard in Math this morning. - Braylin
We read a new book for CAFE. - Jenna
We got two more marbles. - Joey

The new play structure is almost done!

Well, after one last blast of summer on the weekend (and a very disappointing loss by the Blue Bombers!), it was back to work today for our first five-day school week of the year. Here are a few things that the students thought we should mention on our blog today:

The new play structure is almost built! - Jenna
We are getting a new gym teacher. Her name is Ms. Beach. - Cam H.
We had our first Grade 3 Choir period today. - Kaynen

We got to meet our school's new Phys. Ed. teacher today - her name is Ms. Beach. She is going to be teaching at Radisson for the next few months, while Ms. Hanna is away. We are going to miss Ms. Hanna, but Ms. Beach seems really nice, so we are looking forward to having her as our teacher!

We are all very excited about the new play structure being built at our school. We have one of the best views of the construction in the whole school, because it's happening right in front of our classroom windows. It is going up quickly, and it should probably be ready by the end of the week - yay!

The Third Day Of School

We had a fire drill this morning. The bell was really loud, and it made us jump! - Jacell and Cam H.

We had Math this morning, and worked on our Number of the Day books. Today we worked on them by ourselves. - Markus

We started reading on our own for the Daily 5 today. It was really quiet and calm in the class, and it was a lot of fun. - Dasia

We got to do Art today! We got to draw something really fun we did in the summer, and we wrote about it, too. - Robyn

Phys. Ed. was awesome! - Joey

We had another great day at school - it's hard to believe that the first (albeit short) week is over already. We had an action packed day, complete with Math, Reading, Art, Phys. Ed., and a fire drill! Over the last couple of days, we've talked about the three ways to read a book (read the words, read and talk about the pictures, retell a previously-read book) - we practiced these skills with the book 'Peg and the Whale'. We also talked about how to read to yourself independently, and why all of these things are important for becoming a better reader. After a fire drill caused us to pause our learning for a few minutes, the students started practicing their read-to-self skills. I was so impressed with the great job everybody did - you could have heard a pin drop in the room! It's going to make it so much easier for everybody in the class to improve their reading (and enjoy it more!), and for me to work with students one-on-one or in small groups, if the students can keep creating a calm and quiet environment like they did this morning. We're going to be working at building our stamina in reading independently over the next few weeks, in order to achieve this. I'm so proud of the students in Room 18 - keep it up!

Excitement on the playground

It was the second day of school today, and we had a lot of excitement revolving around happenings out on the playground. Here's a recap, in the students' words:

We finally got our recess equipment bag from Ms. Hanna today. It has a soccer ball, a four-squre ball, a basketball, frisbees, and skipping ropes inside. Recess is a lot more fun now that we have stuff to play with. - Gal

Today was a great day. We had a lot of fun outside. We got to use the slide on the wooden play structure one last time. - Alexandra

We are getting a new play structure. The old play strucure was made of wood and was really old. Today they took the old one down. There were a lot of wasps in it, and one of them stung Joey. We are excited to get the new one! - Tyler

Here are some pictures of the workers tearing down the old structure:

The First Day of Class!

Well, it finally came - the first day of class! It was exciting to hear the students say that they liked being in our classroom, and that it was a lot of fun. I asked them to describe our first day of school, and this is what they said:

- We have 24 students in our class, and two of them are new to our school - their names are Mikayla and Dasia
- When you get to Grade 3, you get to play on different play structures than you did in Kindergarten, Grade 1, and Grade 2.
- We had an assembly this morning, to welcome everyone back to school (but the Kindergarten students weren't there, because they only start school on Friday).
- The students got their new school supplies (which they loved!).
- The students got to know each other again by doing an activity where they asked each other a lot of interesting questions, such as trying to find out which of their classmates like to eat liver, have milked a cow, have seen a rainbow, or are left-handed.
- We started reading a chapter book - it was the first book of Gordon Korman's "On The Run" series.
- We got to use the SMARTBoard - we saw how it worked, and then we used it to start making our classroom rules.
- We started learning about blogs.

After we made our list, the students were surprised at how much we did today. Just like most first days, it went by way too quickly, and we didn't quite get everything done that I had hoped to. That's ok... we've got almost 200 more to go, so we should catch up :)

The Last Sleep

It's the last night before the first day of classes. I know that a lot of my students are probably pretty excited right now, but are probably feeling a little nervous, too. They're probably wondering things like which of their friends will be in their class, and what will it be like to have Mr. H. as a teacher. Well... guess what?! Mr. H. is also pretty excited tonight... but a little nervous, too! It's always exciting to get ready for a new school year when you're a teacher - you get to buy new school supplies for the class, set up the room, plan lessons, and so on. However, as a teacher, there are things I get nervous about at this time of year - I wonder if my students will like being in my class, I wonder how long it'll take me to remember everybody's name (I have 24 names to remember this year - that's a lot!), and I wonder if I'll be able to help everyone to become the best Grade 3 student they can possibly be. When I start to think about all of those things at once, it can be a little stressful!

However, what I have to remember, when I start worrying about these things, is how much I love to teach! I think I have one of the greatest jobs in the world - I get to be an Elementary school teacher! Every day, I come to work, and help boys and girls to learn, to have fun, and to get along with each other - what could be better?! It's a lot of hard work, but it's totally worth it! But, do you know what else happens in my classroom? Every year, my students help me to learn, to have fun, and to get along with others. When I remember that, all of a sudden, a lot of those worries go away!

I hope you all get a great night's sleep tonight - tomorrow is the start of another new year... and it will go quickly, like it always does! See you outside the doors, tomorrow morning!