Friday, September 30, 2016

Happy Friday Students, Parents, and Carers!

We began our sunny Friday by playing "Snow Ball Fight", where friends had to run around a specific area. Once they heard, "snow ball fight!" they had to throw snowballs and duck and run away from snowballs. The snowballs were scrunched up paper balls that had questions written on them. This game was great to help regulate the students and demonstrate great body and muscle awareness, proprioceptive, vestibular and bilateral movements, fine and gross motor skills, motor planning, auditory processing, social problem solving, oral and two way communication skills, and questioning skills on the history of the Olympics, Terry Fox, and two-digit math problems.

Carter and I posing for a selfie!

Zachary reading out his question.

Sander and Avery asking each other questions about Terry Fox.

As always we went over our Question Wheel and looked at different questioning techniques for Show & Tell. Everyone did a great job and used lots of inferencing, questioning and answering skills, oral communication, problem solving, scientific vocabulary, adjectives, and implemented the question wheel and the Five W's. I just want to remind parents that Show & Tell is every Friday! : )

Here we are singing Mr. Sander Happy Birthday! We had cake, cupcakes, and party music with our friends.

Blowing out his birthday "candle" (Mr. Jacob made one from a straw and coloured paper lol).

In Art class today students received a piece of construction paper and asked to make a tree. We had some great discussion on what is a tree, what a tree is made out of, and what a tree entails (roots, trunk, bark, branches, and leaves). Students used great problem solving, scientific vocabulary, fine motor skills, inferencing, and creativity to design their own tree using different kinds of real leaves and paper.

Afterwards we put them to work and cleaned up our cafeteria room. We had to throw garbage away, put away our materials, sweep, wipe, and mop!

Have a fantastic weekend everyone and see you on Monday!

Mr. Jacob

HOMEWORK:

1) Have your child keep a diary of weekend events, family trips, how the weather is changing, etc. and use pictures (use a camera), drawings, photos from magazines and/ or newspapers, and writing to describe their weekend adventures.

2) Continue working on two-digit addition and subtraction problems. 

3) Go out in nature and create a picture and/ or a landscape and then write about what they have created. Use scientific vocabulary and do not provide your child with the answer (for anything!) always have them discover for themselves by actively 'doing' and 'investigating' rather than listening to your answers. The answers they solve and find out themselves will lead to greater confidence, success, and retention.

Mr. Jacob : )

Thursday, September 29, 2016

Happy Thursday Students, Parents, and Carers!

The day began with a little semi-structured play session while we waited for all of our friends to arrive. There were some pretty innovative creations and great social conversation.

Mr. Eric was our teacher today and went over the month, date, day, year, weather, time, and feelings. For feelings today we discussed what symbolism is and how we can show our emotions in various ways, i.e. colours, actions, and objects. Mr. Jacob chose a clock to represent "worried" and "anxious" because there were so many different things to accomplish today that entailed everyone being on time. Next, Mr. Jacob asked the students to look for things around the room to represent how they felt and think in symbolic and abstract ways.

Eric said it made him happy when we got to fill up our bucket because then it will almost be full.

Sander said a gym ball makes him happy because he likes to move on it and it calms down his body.

Avery said he felt a little anxious because there were so many words and instructions on the board. To be honest, I felt the same way!

Ojani chose a dinosaur because he said they make him happy because they are cool and not boring. We then discussed how it is very disappointing and boring when you go to the Zoo and all the animals are sleeping. We all agreed dinosaurs would be way more fun to see!

Carter showed us a food cashier teller because he said he likes money and food, and they make him happy. I could not agree more! Haha

Today we had our Terry Fox run that also turned into a fun dance party with our friends from Oakwood and St. Jude's Academy. Mr. Jacob was the DJ and played some great jams!

After snack and recess we participated in the TGTS creative abstract fine motor skills game called "Complete the Picture". Students were given various shapes, lines, edges, curves, etc. and then asked to create a picture, image, character, etc. with the design provided. We all worked hard to use our imaginations, creative artistic skills, fine motor skills, visual spatial skills, and math skills. 

We continued to play Colours Octopus in gym class today. Everyone demonstrated great auditory processing skills, hand-eye coordination, teamwork, social skills, sportsmanship, motor planning, fine and gross motor skills, proprioception skills, vestibular and bilateral movements, and balance and coordination. 

In the afternoon we completed our "Complete a Picture" exercise and then got to share what we created while using mathematical language, descriptive language, and oral communication skills. We also went into the sensory gym to work on our hand-eye coordination, teamwork, sportsmanship, motor planning, fine and gross motor skills, proprioception skills, vestibular and bilateral movements, math, time, phonics and rhyming skills, and balance and coordination.

Mr. Ojani wanted to play some Fine Motor Math Toss to show off his math skills and beat Mr. Jacob!

Buddies!

Our last activity of the day was discussing Terry Fox and why he is considered a hero. We then looked at super heroes vs. real life heroes. This led us to have a great lesson on fiction and non-fiction, and what those both mean. Afterwards, we started drawing and writing about our own real life heroes. Great work by all! : ) 

Have a great evening everyone and remember, tomorrow is Show & Tell.

Mr. Jacob : )

Wednesday, September 28, 2016

Happy Wednesday Students, Parents, and Carers!


The day began with a morning question correlating to our work on the Ancient Olympics from yesterday. Everyone had to read the question, answer the question, and then correct the question as Mr. Jacob had some errors. Mr. Sander was our teacher today and went over the month, date, day, year, weather, time, and feelings.

Today in SJA gym class we discussed what a good sport is and looks like. Next, we played a fun game where everyone had to dodge balls that could only be rolled at you from various directions. If you got hit, you had to do some jumping jacks. Everyone demonstrated great auditory processing skills, hand-eye coordination, teamwork, social skills, sportsmanship, motor planning, fine and gross motor skills, proprioception skills, vestibular and bilateral movements, and balance and coordination. 

One of our friends needed a little sensory break to help him regulate his body! Great work!

Stretching after our work out.

Before snack and recess we worked very hard on our shoe tying skills. Everyone demonstrated great concentration, determination, fine motor skills, and bilateral movements. 

Ms. Elizabeth completed her DRA (reading assessment) program before going off to SJA.

After snack and recess we discussed a social problem that occurred during Freeze Tag. As a class, we communicated why there are problems, what the rules are, should be, and we compromised by creating our own rules to ensure everyone knows how to play properly and together. It was a great oral communication, social problem solving, social skills, and language arts session! 

During our "Mindfulness" today we used a fun exercise involving spaghetti exercises to work on calming down our bodies, deep breathing, stretching, drama, and regulation. Afterwards, we went on a magical journey through a forest, river, climbed snowy mountains, listened to birds and the sound of leaves, while listening to a relaxing narrative and being exposed to sensory stimuli.

Two of our friends decided to participate in a math, fine motor game to help regulate their bodies.

Deep Pressure Relaxation

After lunch we learned how to use the Regrouping Method in order to solve two-digit math problems. This was a hands-on, active lesson where students had to use manipulatives (unifix cubes) to create, break up, and regroup numbers in order to solve the question. Everyone needed some prompting and support but did an awesome job!

In the sensory gym we worked on our hand-eye coordination, teamwork, sportsmanship, motor planning, fine and gross motor skills, proprioception skills, vestibular and bilateral movements, math, time, phonics and rhyming skills, and balance and coordination. Today we split up the groups into two. While one went to the sensory gym, the other group completed their Developmental Reading Assessments (DRA). 

After Lizzie finished her DRA she used a visual story to create her own sentences relating to what was occurring in the photograph. 

Our last activity was a Phonics Fine Motor Art session. Students had to look through various magazines for pictures (objects, food, people, words, etc.) that had the /or/ sound in them. Once they found a photo, they had to use scissors and carefully cut it out, paste it in their phonics work books, and then write out the word.  

Have a great evening and see you all tomorrow for our Terry Fox Day!

HOMEWORK TIPS:

1) Have your child look through old magazines and create a sentence using words and pictures. For example, find the word THE and then a picture of a DOG, next find the word IS and use a photo of someone EATING. They can cut these all out and paste them in proper sequence to make the sentence: The dog is eating. You can use bigger words and/ or make a scene with characters and a setting, and then write about what is happening in the scene. For example, paste pictures of some people, walking on grass, with a sun above their heads, and a kite floating. The sentence may be: Here is my family flying kites in the park.

2) Use the regrouping method (tens and ones) at home with two-digit math problems. If you do not have the same size blocks, you can use anything that sticks together or stacks on top of each other (e.g. Lego's, plastic cups, food, etc.) Here is a link to understand the regrouping method: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L1nYPbQc6Yg.

Mr. Jacob : )