A Very Fond Farewell

Today is my last day in my grade one class.  I am so very honoured that you shared your children with me this year.  That you allowed the pleasure of speaking into their minds, into their hearts, and into their spirits blesses me beyond words.  I have watched them grow, change, learn, stumble, get back up again, and persevere.  I have heard them laugh, cry, pray, and question the world around them.  I am so proud of the year they have had.  I have met a future inventor, police man, a few teachers and vets, a scientist, an astronaut, some NHL players, police men, firemen, an artist, even a window washer and a princess! 21 little bodies who will grow up to be world changers!

When they came to me many of them could not even write sentences – yet we wrote stories this year.  Many were emerging readers with a basic understanding of letter sounds – yet we did guided reading and they learned to use strategies to become independent readers with a flair for comprehension.  Many of them were just starting to notice the world around them – yet we learned about communities, our bodies as temples, that insects and arachnids are spiders, some spiders don’t even have eyes, surface tension and coke and mentos geysers, that flower s have xylem and phloem and can change colours with help, we made roto copters and tested force and motion, went back in time to 1851 and learned about heritage and legacy (both our ancestors and the ones we are making right now), we did many taste tests and learned that although we are the same in some ways God made us different and that is what makes us special.

We learned that we can be bucket fillers or bucket tippers and that with the spirit of God inside of us we can MOVE mountains because he made us to be more than conquerors.  We learned that everything we put our hands to can prosper and although we can’t be Jesus we can be like him and change the world by changing ourselves to be more like Him! We know how much God loves us and wants good things for us.  We understand that the biggest hurdle in our lives is our ATTITUDE!  We never say “I can’t” or we can’t!  Our mouths have power!  We say “I can do all things through Christ who makes me strong!” We never fail unless we never try.

So, thank you – for your support, encouragement, assistance, prayers and most of all for trusting me with your most prized possessions!  They made this year AMAZING for me! I can't wait to see them again in Grade 7!

Charlottes web wrap ups!

Marshmallow sheep complete with John 10:11

Track and field day!

Remember your hat, sunscreen and water! Shoes and socks too!

Spider tests!

Making Aunty Nyms :)

Taste test mania!

I finally found something they didn't like.....figs! That's right - today we tried mission and Smyrna figs. We learned about the history, geography, and VERY interesting life cycle (fig wasps are incubated in figs!). Only 7 of my firsties liked them. I thought they were great personally :o)

Today we also continued to work on antonyms. They are very good with synonyms and antonyms now! I am impressed. Tomorrow we are going to continue to work on our craftivity to wrap up our learning "Aunty Nyms :o) " I thought it was a cute pay on words.

We are wrapping up our work on estimating and double digit addition. We are also still working on the properties of substances and objects. You should have gotten a note home that tells you we are making a bird house Friday morning (if all works out well for us). It is track and field day is only in the afternoon. They need to bring supplies from home and do some preplanning to make it work. I think it will be fun!

Lower fort Gary ( role playing history)

What a blessed day!

We have had a great day! We are working on our Father's Day goodies, working with similes and synonyms, and antonyms, had a special Athletes in Action visit in the a.m, and now are busy practicing for the final day of school!

Learning about antonyms :).

Non standard units of measurement :).

Beautiful morning!

Happy Monday!

How about that weather today? We were stuck in our car for 20 minutes while it hailed! Cars were pulled over all around us as we travelled home from the school! Hope you all made it home safe.
Today we did some end of year assessments and I am happy to say that I am proud of my firsties! They did great. We did a writing assessment – they wrote letters to their Grade Two teachers. Some of them took it home for homework. They enjoyed writing the letters, but I enjoyed reading them more. I like to see what they did and did not like about grade one. Most of them LOVED science and could have done without journals!
We are wrapping up our stories about helping Wilbur escape. This was a REAL story writing process – two edits and then a final draft. They have been such troopers. I just wanted to get them ready for grade two writing. We are going to have an author’s chair where they read them to the class. It is going to be awesome!
In bible we learned about the crowd of 5000 and how the generosity of the little boy made way for a miracle to take place!). We read in Hebrews that sharing with others pleases God. This can be a tough one to carry out when you are 6 or 7 years old – especially with siblings! But we talked about how God needs us to do it most when we feel like it the least!
Tomorrow we are learning about photosynthesis and chlorophyll in plants – I have asked your kids to gather some leaves of various size and shapes so we can do chlorophyll rubbings.
Reminders: field trip forms are due back SOON!!! Money for sport day also due. You are still welcome to send a cultural snack to share with the class. Tomorrow is the high schools athletic awards at 7 pm :o)

To study uncommon forms of measurement we enjoyed the bright sun while painting our feet purple. Last class we will measure the foot prints with big and small marshmallows to practice our estimating and sense of ratio.





This morning we learned about loving God and loving people in bible. We talked about new pennies and old pennies and how Jesus makes us all new pennies. When we choose him the crud - the dirt, old gum, germs, and dents we get in life are washed away and we become new!

We did our spelling test since there is no school tomorrow. the littles did AWESOME! We read a new Charlotte's Web chapter today - the kids love this book. Even my hyper ones sit {well, lay} through the chapters.

We had chapel that blew many of their little minds. We learned about Watoto. If you do not know what Watoto is you need to check then out here: http://www.watoto.com/. they are an organization that pairs widows with children orphaned by war, famine, sickness and circumstance. They give them a home, they give them a mother, they give them food, health care, education - love and hope - and JESUS!

Our school is doing a walk for Watoto Wed. June 19th. Your child will be bringing home a pledge form. Our class decided that they would raise 200 for this walk - so please support your little one in their dedication. I have five kids, a job, a house, and volunteer and my kids have things going on all the time so I know TIME is scarse. But I think it is important to take the time to show our children that the real purpose for us being here - to heal the broken hearted, to raise the poor out of poverty, to love eachother as Jesus loved us, to share the good news with all those who have ears to hear. We need to show them we know how to put others before ourselves before they will learn to do it themselves.

Check out these stories about how Watoto has changed lives: http://www.watoto.com/sponsorship/godfreys-story and http://www.watoto.com/sponsorship/josephs-story:-rescue . they had some of the kids in tears :o

A bug juicebox?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJA1BOZBi4A

The kids were entraced!

We worked on adding a new flap to our folders and are pretty much done. Spider test on Friday :o)

I tried to upload our Friday capers in science but unfortunately my teenage daughter erased all my pictures for me. :o)

We talked about physical and chemical changes and did a few experiments to test them out. We made clay animals and cut them up to see if we changed their molecules. We didn't.

them we did small group vinegar and baking soda explosions to see if we made a new substance and if we changed the molecules - we did :o)

Then to wrap it all up we baking cinnamon roll ups in the kitchen to review (rolling up changes the shape of the dough so it is physical. When we baked it it changed texture, teh butter melted and the sugar melted and became crispy. We decided baking was a chemical change.

It was a great day :o) thanks for sharing your kids with me.

Life cycles alive!