NOVEMBER

For the Online November calendar, please click on the link below then click 'visit'. Once you have opened Smilebox, using the arrow keys at the bottom of the page, scroll through until you come to November. [|November Calendar] DON'T FORGET TO SET YOUR CLOCKS BACK - FALL BACK!! November 3rd.

[|November 2013 Newsletter] Now available   Click the 'visit button' for a preview. __**To view all Smilebox presentations on a full screen**__ click the full screen button on the bottom left hand side of the window. To exit full screen viewing, simply press your escape key.

__**News and ** Events __ Thursday Nov. 28


 * Its taken a little while, but our salt crystals have grown into spectacular formations. See pictures below! **

Wednesday Nov. 20


 * See pictures from our visit by Mr. Johnston, a geologist from the University of Guelph, below. **

Wednesday Nov. 13


 * We were very busy in our classroom today. Click on the link below to see some of the great things we are doing. **

Monday Nov. 11


 * Information about the writing process is listed below for parents. Please take a few minutes to read the information and then visit the links. **

Thursday Nov. 7 ** Click on the Stone Soup book below for pictures of us making our Stone Soup. ** Don't Forget...Jump Rope for Heart is this Friday! Please return your sponsor envelopes by Friday at the latest. Thanks!
 * Also, Gemma made a house today and we had an instant math problem. See the picture below. **  ** AND, Kaya made a duck! Click Kaya's picture to hear Kaya's duck story. **

click [|here] to see pictures of our Kick-off Assembly. Tuesday Nov. 5 Chapters Holiday Fundraiser 6:30 - 9:00pm. This is a huge fundraiser for our library. Please come along and support us! Friday Nov. 8

Jump Rope for Heart. Please make sure that all pledge forms are returned by this day. Forms cannot be accepted later.

Tuesday Nov. 12

All Kindergarten staff will be attending a workshop.

Tuesday Nov. 19

Photo retakes

Nov. 18 - 22

Bullying Awareness Week

Thursday 21/Friday Nov. 22 PA Day. Parent/Teacher/Student interviews. Forms for interview times will be sent out the previous week.




 * QUOTES OF THE MONTH: **
 * // "Good children's literature appeals not only to the child in the adult, but to the adult in the child" //**
 * - author unknown **
 * // "The real magic wand is the child's own mind" //**
 * - Jose Ortega y Gasset **
 * // "Teach your children poetry; it opens the mind, lends grace to wisdom and makes the heroic virtues hereditary." //**
 * - Sir Walter Scott **

Growing salt crystals Although the initial solution had to be prepared away from the classroom as it required boiling water, the rest was carried out in the classroom. We had to use magnifying glasses to start with to see anything in the water, but a few days later the crystals were obvious on the string.

Our crystals continue to grow. They are cuboid in shape and twinkle like diamonds! Continuing our rock inquiry

Following our initial investigation into rocks we were very lucky to have Mr. Johnston, a geologist from Wilfred Laurier University, come and talk to us about some really cool rocks. They included sandstone and limestone, rocks made from plants and rocks with fossils, magnetic rocks and even a rock we could write with! He let us feel all the rocks and explained about how they were made and what they could do. He even brought along a special rock from Alberta which used to be a dinosaur bone!

Have a look at some of the pictures from our morning.



If you want to see the videos of the morning click here for part 1 Here for part 2 And here for part 3

November 15th The children have discovered the ice that has formed in containers in our outside play area. Some of the ice was brought inside and put in a small container. When we looked at it the following day it started a series of questions. What happens to ice when it gets warm ? Reece showed everyone the ‘ice’ in the tub. It had turned into water. What is the difference between snow and ice?

Kaya’s response: “Ice is hard and it can hurt someone. Snow is soft and it disappears when it lands on you.” “The snow comes from the sky and the ice is on the ground.” Connor’s response: “Snow comes from the North Pole. When it snowed … our whole body got wet and we had to put a towel around it.”

Mrs Metcalf wondered, "What will happen if we re-freeze the water in the tub?" Reece wondered, "Will it change its shape? What form will it take?"

We made some predictions. Everyone thought that the water would turn back into ice. Violet thought it would be heart shaped. Brooklyn thought it would be a circle. Claudia thought it would be triangle shaped. Reece thought it would be the shape of the container.

It turned out that the ice was semi-circular because there was not much water and the tub had tilted to one side. We put more water in the tub and its back in the freezer. We anxiously wait to see what it will look like next week!

A great day for camping!! On Thursday the boys and girls were making tents in the back cubby area of the classroom. They decided that there was not much room in the cubbies for what they wanted to do. After a brief session of problem solving and brainstorming, they came up with the idea of building a tent in our classroom. That led to lots of exciting things:  Kaya made a blueprint of the tent for us to follow. Ryeland and Conner gathered materials they thought we might need. Lina, Lily, Violet, Claudia, Emma and Garrett made decorations. Colton made a Canadian flag. And we ALL worked together to figure out a way to make a tent out of clothes pins and blankets in the middle of our classroom! Some of the children decided to use some of our plastic stools as 'tent poles' to hold up the middle and some of the edges of our tent. Others found various ways to stabilize the outside edges. We had so much fun cooperating and working together on this project. The boys and girls were so excited about our accomplishment that they invited Mr. Heasley, Mrs. Mullen, Mrs. Patrick, Mrs. Sibley, and Mrs. McNinch (and almost everyone walking by!) into our classroom to sit in the tent. The boys and girls listened to Miss Brown read a story about a magical tree in the tent and they had a chance to eat their snack and lunch in the tent as well. We learned about static electricity when, (as Avery described it) our hair flew into the air! We looked so funny with our wild hair. After we finished making our tent, we went into the library and played a fun math game called "Mingle". We had to count and make groups using the numbers that Mrs. Pipe called out. Click the picture below to see what our tent looked like inside.

NOVEMBER 13th - A Busy Day in KC... click the picture below to view some of the things we were doing....

**__ Your kindergartner and writing... __** (adapted from: Jessica Kelmon's article from GreatSchools.org) Writing goes from zero to 60 in kindergarten, from learning to trace the ABCs and culminating in higher level thinking skills like forming, organizing, and expressing complete thoughts. By Jessica Kelmon It all begins with scribbles. Aside from decorative swirls, a few letters, and perhaps even their own names, most kindergartners start school not knowing how to write. That’s the point of school, after all… right? In a word, yes. Kindergarten is still the year children first learn about writing, which includes honing listening, speaking, and thinking skills, along with physical writing, starting with the ABCs. __** Writing their ABCs: **__ Teachers often start the year by introducing the letters of the alphabet — literally the building blocks of writing. Kindergartners learn how to form the shapes of letters, what sounds they’re associated with, and how to combine those letters to create words. This year your kindergartner should learn to print “many” upper and lowercase letters. Part of understanding the ABCs is figuring out how letter sounds (or phonemes) combine to make words. At many schools, kindergartners are encouraged to spell words the way they sound, which is known as phonetic or “invented” spelling. For example, a student might spell the word cat by writing “ct.” When they’re first learning to write, children are often more comfortable using consonants and sounds at the beginning of words because they’re more distinct than vowels or sounds at the ends of words. Using invented spelling, children are demonstrating what they know. Research shows letting children use invented spelling (and not immediately correcting them) allows them to focus on the purpose of writing: communication. Typically, as they learn the rules of spelling, they transition to conventional spelling. (If a child’s spelling does not improve or their invented spelling is arbitrary rather than phonetic, it could be a sign of a learning issue.) By the end of the year, kindergartners should be able to: • Connect a letter or letters with most consonant and short-vowel sounds (aka phonemes). • Phonetically or inventively write simple high-frequency words they often see or hear in books. (See our [|kindergarten snap words worksheets for examples of high-frequency words to practice], and check out this real-life example of what a kindergartner's invented spelling looks like.) • Write many consonant-vowel-consonant words. • Write their own names. __** Kindergartners who can’t read or write yet, can… **__ Listen, speak, and draw! Think of these skills as big steps toward writing. Teachers will read books aloud and should ask questions — about the book's title, author, illustrator, what happens in the story, and what your child notices about characters’ actions and events. Be sure to ask some questions that require your child to read between the lines, e.g. Who are the main characters in this story? Why do you think the dog is sad? How does she feel in the end? Can you draw a picture of something important that happened in the story? You can also ask questions about the illustrations. In response to questions, your child should learn to use frequently occurring nouns (both singular and plural, i.e. dog and dogs) and verbs, and correctly use the most common “connection words” or prepositions — such as to, from, in, out, on, off, for, of, by, and with — to express their thoughts. They should also learn to answer questions using simple, complete sentences. Kindergartners should also understand and use “question words” (aka interrogatives), including who, what, where, when, why, and how, when they speak or dictate writing so they’re familiar with these words when they begin writing on their own. Kindergarten grammar All year long, whether they’re following along as adults read or starting to write, kindergartners start learning the basics of sentence structure — namely capitalizing I (when referring to themselves) and the first letter of the first word in a sentence, ending their sentences with a period (and knowing that it’s called a period), and ending their questions with a question mark (and knowing that it’s called a question mark). Does this mean they’ll be expected to understand commas or apostrophes? No! This first year of grammar focuses on just these few simple ideas. Y our child still needs to know how to write legibly — and that means penmanship matters. In kindergarten the focus is on printing upper and lowercase letters. Because kindergartners’ motor skills are still developing, the teacher will introduce handwriting with a range of approaches — finger painting and other tactile techniques, like writing in the air with a finger or tracing letters. Kindergartners should learn how to hold a pencil and practice forming letters by writing their names, which gives them practice writing upper and lowercase letters, shaping and spacing letters correctly, and writing from left to right. The following is from: http://www.learningtowrite.ecsd.net/stages%20of%20writing.htm The student: The student: The student: The student: > || The student: > || based on Richard Gentry's work Writing is a process that develops gradually; with exploration and experimentation, children will acquire the diverse skills. Children may exhibit more than one stage in a single piece of writing because it is a process and stages are connected and will overlap. As they gain more experience with reading, too, the writing growth will accelerate. Reading and writing development go hand-in-hand. **Scribbling.** Scribbling looks like random assortment of marks on a child's paper. Sometimes the marks are large, circular, and random, and resemble drawing. Although the marks do not resemble print, they are significant because the young writer uses them to show ideas. **Letter-like Symbols.** Letter-like forms emerge, sometimes randomly placed, and are interspersed with numbers. The children can tell about their own drawings or writings. In this stage, spacing is rarely present. **Strings of Letters.** In the strings-of-letters phase, students write some legible letters that tell us they know more about writing. Students are developing awareness of the sound-to-symbol relationship, although they are not matching most sounds. Students usually write in capital letters and have not yet begun spacing. **Beginning Sounds Emerge.** At this stage, students begin to see the differences between a letter and a word, but they may not use spacing between words. Their message makes sense and matches the picture, especially when they choose the topic. **Consonants Represent Words.** Students begin to leave spaces between their words and may often mix upper- and lowercase letters in their writing. They begin using punctuation and usually write sentences that tell ideas. **Initial, Middle, and Final Sounds.** Students in this phase may spell correctly some sight words, siblings' names, and environmental print, but other words are spelled the way they sounds. Children easily hear sounds in words, and their writing is very readable. **Transitional Phases.** This writing is readable and approaches conventional spelling. The students' writing is interspersed with words that are in standard form and have standard letter patterns. **Standard Spelling.** Students in this phase can spell most words correctly and are developing an understanding of root words, compound words, and contractions. This understanding helps students spell similar words. || For more information go to: http://www.pbs.org/parents/readinglanguage/writing/main.html (click on the book for writing samples) http://www.lindaslearninglinks.com/earlywrtgdev.html (more examples)
 * __ Cn u rd this? __**
 * Stage 1: Readiness
 * scribbles
 * notices print in the environment
 * shows interest in writing tools
 * likes to make marks on paper
 * begins to recognize the power of print
 * likes listening to stories, poems, etc.
 * begins connecting writing/pictures with self-expression
 * likes expressing himself/herself orally ||
 * Stage 2: Drawing and Exploring
 * draws pictures with recognizable shapes
 * captures more feeling in art through motion, color, facial expressions
 * may dictate or record stories to accompany pictures
 * begins labeling and using titles
 * plays with words and letters
 * often orients letters correctly
 * associates more letters than before with sounds
 * writes letter strings
 * feels confident to "write by myself"
 * enjoys writing
 * adds details that might have been overlooked earlier
 * uses words or pictures to express personal feelings ||
 * Stage 3: Confident Experimentation
 * feels more confident imitating environmental print
 * writes more
 * experiments with letters and rudimentary words
 * shows greater attention to detail in letters and prephonetic words
 * attempts longer expressions (two or more words)
 * shows more awareness of conventions of print: spaces between words, spaces between lines, use of capital letters, up-down orientation, left-right orientation, use of punctuation
 * begins using some capital letters, which may be randomly placed or used on words of personal importance
 * begins to experiment with punctuation, though not necessarily appropriately placed ||
 * Stage 4: Moving Toward Independence
 * becomes a keen observer of environmental print
 * feels increasing confidence copying and using environmental print
 * enjoys writing words, phrases, and short sentences on his or her own
 * expands oral stories
 * enjoys drawing pictures, then creating accompanying text
 * writes longer, more expansive text or uses picture in a series
 * asks more questions about writing
 * asks questions about conventions
 * includes more conventions of writing in own text, including periods, question marks, commas, quotation marks, capital letters - which may or may not be appropriately placed
 * likes to share - may ask others to read text
 * Stage 5: Expanding and Adding Detail
 * writes more - multiple sentences up to a paragraph or more
 * experiments with different forms: lists, recipes, how-to papers, all-about reports, stories, poems, descriptions, journals, notes
 * begins using some conventions (spaces between words, capitals, periods, title at the top) with growing consistency
 * shows increasing understanding of what a sentence is
 * adds more detail to both pictures and text
 * expresses both ideas and feelings purposefully and forcefully through pictures and text
 * shows increasing confidence experimenting with inventive spelling - especially if encouraged
 * aims for correct spelling, and uses environment as a resource
 * shows expanding vocabulary - especially if inventive spelling is encouraged
 * increasingly uses writer's vocabulary to ask questions or discuss own writing - especially if traits are taught
 * [[image:http://www.learningtowrite.ecsd.net/cb%20Writing%20in%20Grade%20One_files/LINEKIDS.GIF width="514" height="61"]] ||
 * The Developmental Stages of Writing

**__Kaya makes a duck!__** **__click the picture to listen to Kaya's story.__**

**__ Gemma's Math Problem __**  Gemma made a green house. There were 2 rooms in her house. There were 5 people who lived at her house. The boys and girls asked the question..."How are all of those people going to fit in that little house?" Violet suggested that they would need to put more than 1 bed into each room. Then Reece suggested that she could put 2 beds in one room and 3 beds in the other room. Some of the boys and girls thought that 1 room could have 2 boys and the other room could have 3 girls. Then they decided that the girls could go into the room with 2 beds and 3 boys would fit into the room with 3 beds. But, Telsche asked about a Mommy and Daddy. Avery and Claudia suggested that Gemma could put 2 girls and a Mommy in 1 room with 3 beds and 2 boys in the room with 2 beds. In the end, we came up with a number of solutions to the problem! Thanks for the great math lesson Gemma!!! We had fun trying to figure out lots of solutions.



**__ STONE SOUP __** "...Into the pot went

the butter and barley, with the bit of pepper and a handful of salt, and the juicy beef bones, and the long, thin carrots, the yellow onions, and the round, gray stone. 'Soup from a stone,' said the little old lady. 'Fancy that.' The pot bubbled and bubbled..." This week the boys and girls had an opportunity to make STONE SOUP - made with a real stone in it! Thank you to everyone who sent in vegetables for the soup pot. We read Ann McGovern's version of the book in class and the boys and girls loved reciting the above excerpt . This book, Stone Soup, tied in nicely with our current inquiry "ROCKS and STONES" and our previous inquiry "PUMPKINS, SQUASH and FALL FRUITS AND VEGETABLES".  For pictures of the boys and girls in action please click the picture of the story book above.     And for those of you who would like to make our soup....here is our recipe as described by the students!!! ENJOY!

__** OUR NEW INQUIRY PROJECT....ROCKS AND STONES **__ ** For the past few weeks, boys and girls have been bringing rocks and stones into the classroom. They have exhibited a very keen interest in finding out about rocks and what they are made from, where they come from and why some are smaller/larger than others. This interest prompted our new inquiry... ** On Mystery Monday the boys and girls arrived to find 3 large blankets covering the discovery tables. Everyone had a chance to guess what might be under the blankets. Reece noticed the large signs that were placed on the top of the blankets and...
 * We learned a new word...DANGER!! We talked about what the word DANGER means plus where we might see the word DANGER. This led to a side discussion about dangerous things such as fire, explosives and medicines. We also learned how to write the words 'rock', 'stone', 'dig' and 'excavate'. **
 * The students have been weighing, measuring and comparing the rocks. They have also been observing the changes that occur when you add water to the rocks and stones. The boys and girls discovered that the colour of the rock changes when water is added and other colours that could not be seen before... magically appear! Many of the rocks have very shiny parts that glitter when you shine a flash-light on them. And if you use a magnifying glass you can see some very small fossils embedded into the large rocks. Ryeland and Claudia conducted an experiment with the white crystal rock. They decided to leave it in water overnight to see if it would grow or change colour. The next day they discovered that this particular crystal rock does not change when left in water overnight! ** ** STAY TUNED FOR MORE EXCITING PICTURES AND INFORMATION... **  [[image:IMG_0021.JPG width="720" height="540"]] [[image:IMG_0022.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0023.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0024.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0025.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0026.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0027.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:mrspipeskindies/IMG_0028.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0029.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0030.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0031.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0032.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0033.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0034.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0035.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0036.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0037.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0040.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0042.JPG width="720" height="1005"]][[image:IMG_0041.JPG width="720" height="1005"]][[image:IMG_0038.JPG width="720" height="1005"]][[image:IMG_0039.JPG width="720" height="1005"]][[image:IMG_0043.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0045.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0045.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0046.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0047.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0048.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0161.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0160.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0159.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0152.JPG width="720" height="540"]][[image:IMG_0044.JPG width="800" height="1066"]]

__Whatever happened to the good old Nursery Rhyme? __


 *  Do you remember some of your favourite Nursery Rhymes from your childhood? Have you introduced your child to Mother Goose yet? Why not take some time to share some of those special rhymes with your child this month? **


 * Research shows that children who have memorized Nursery Rhymes become better readers because they develop an early sensitivity to the sound of language. (Marie Clay) Nursery Rhymes help children develop phonemic awareness skills,which are important building blocks that children need instruction in before they can begin to read. Rhymes are an important part of a child's journey to read simply because they have the ability to: enrich a young child's vocabulary, provide opportunities for oral language development, introduce children to basic story structure and they are FUN and ENGAGING for young children. Essential skills such as rhyming, sound/word discrimination, blending, word segmenting and phoneme (the smallest segmental unit of sound - eg. /b/ /i/ /g/) manipulation. **


 * According to children's author Beverly Cleary, "Children want to do what the grown-ups do. Children should learn that reading is a pleasure, not just something that teachers make you do in school." Children should not simply be taught how to read...it is essential that they be taught the LOVE OF READING! I encourage you to read with your child every day because no skill shapes a child's future success in school or in life more than the ability to read (Bob Riley)....Why not start today with the simple Nursery Rhymes below? **

**__Incey Wincey Spider__** // The Incey Wincey spider // //Climbed up the water spout,// //Down came the rain // // And washed the spider out; //

// Out came the sun // // And dried up all the rain; // // And the Incey Wincey spider // // Climbed up the spout again. //

Mary had a little lamb, Its fleece was white as snow; And everywhere that Mary went, The lamb was sure to go. It followed her to school one day, Which was against the rule. It made the children laugh and play, To see a lamb at school.
 * __Mary Had a Little Lamb__**



__**Hickory Dickory.**__ //Hickory, dickory, dock,// //The mouse ran up the clock.// //The clock struck one,// //The mouse ran down,// //Hickory, dickory, dock.//

** //__Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star__// ** //Twinkle, twinkle, little star,//   //How l wonder what you are!//   //Up above the world so high,//   //Like a diamond in the sky;//   //Twinkle, twinkle, little star,//   //How l wonder what you are!// __**Humpty Dumpty**__ //Humpty Dumpty// //Sat on a wall,// //Humpty Dumpty// //Had a great fall;// //All the king's horses// //And all the kings men,// //Couldn't put Humpty// //Together again.//

[|More Fun With Spiders] (click the link above)

OUR NOVEMBER STARS Star of the Week  Nov. 4 - Wilson   Nov. 11- Tavleen   Nov. 18 - Curtis   Nov. 25 - Avery



2012 November Fun in the Classroom: What will we be up to this November? Keep checking back to find out!