What fun we had today creating our Gingerbread Houses.
Thank you Michelle for help setting up the tables.
A super big thank you to Karen for hanging out and playing with me!!
Pictures, pictures, pictures!!
Houses can be taken home from Wednesday on....come with a plastic bag if it is rainy out.

arent they amazing!!!

Good dark and rainy morning!!
Where is the snow???? Wouldnt it be soooo much fun if we woke up one morning and there was snow on the ground? Hey, Im from the interior...I love the snow!! Maybe when we are on holiday...which by the way is next week. Only five more days of school. Time flies when you are having fun!

We have had a very fun week and I will have a ton of pictures to post for you.
This is just a little summary of what we did all week:
Monday: Sarah came in and we continued playing bat games and creating bat scenes. The children are getting better and better at listening to her directions and stopping and freezing for more directions.

Tuesday: I worked on Tuesday as today was our Crazy Dance Party with Nat and Drew from 103.5 QM/FM. After recess we went to the gym and Nat and Drew and Scooter and Erin played two songs that got the children allll excited, then they left...so Mr. T said...lets just stay and dance...so we did. It was a great way to get some exercise and get rid of some of our building energy. In the afternoon...Mrs. Appleby had the children and did some smart board games while I did some clay with her children.

Thursday: We talked about the guy with the big belly and the white beard...must be santa!!
And we wrote about Santa and made some great pictures about Santa...he's a pretty cute guy eh??? Everything is posted in our hallway. The grade twos also went to the library to work with our librarian Ms. Whitelaw to continue their ba).t project. They were all creating an accurate representation of their bat.

Friday: We talked about Hannukah. Friday was the fifth day of Hannukah so we celebrated the fifth day by making some candle art that is outside the classroom. The grade twos also baked some gingerbread cookies that we all got a chance to decorate in the afternoon. We baked gingerbread cookies to sell at the xmas market (plus a little sampler for ourselves). Did anyone go to the Xmas market? How was it???

This week...it's a busy week...so make sure you write things down!!

Every morning this week the children will be down in the gym and they will be singing Xmas carols. It's that time of the year again.
If we are not in the classroom, hang your back pack up and go directly to the gym. We will be sitting in the same area that we sit in for our assemblies. If my door is open come inside first and I will take us all down.

Monday: This Monday afternoon we will be making our Gingerbread Houses. I could use a few more milk cartons...only two actually, I have many left over from the years...but if we get more...I will save them again. Send a little bit of candy for our directions...not too much as we will be sharing and there is always plenty. Fun items besides candy is baby marshmellows, chocolate chips, pretzels for fences, and then they all seem to love skittles and smarties that are the Xmas colours. It is sure to be a fun and exciting time. They do not take their house home on that day as the icing still will be setting.

Thursday: Today is the Santas Breakfast, Pajama party/fund raiser for Covenant House. Today you can wear your pajamas to school and come with an empty belly (that is if you like Pancakes!)

Nat and Drew and Erin and Scooter and ME!!!

Playing on the smart board in Ms. Appleby's room.

Using our gingerbread playdough to make snowmen.

Thats how big Caleb's bat is.

Look at the wing span of Leah's bat.

Eli and Ben show off their bats. One is pretty tiny!

Our finished family portraits.

It must be santa!!

Must be Santa, Santa Clause!

Come dressed in your pj's and come directly to our classroom, we will be called to the gym when it is our turn to eat brekky. For those children who are fussy, I would recommend a little breakfast before hand please. Also on this day the children are asked to bring a small donation for Covenant House. It is not mandatory and if you are feeling stretched and nickel and dimed, I understand. It is your choice. But I will be collecting the money in the classroom all week. The recommended donation is $3.

Friday: Today is our last day of school before the winter holdays. Today we will clean the classroom.
The grade one cooking group will make sugar cookies, and then in the afternoon we will decorate the cookies and watch a little xmas video on our in class home theatre system (my tv) while eating our cookies. We will try to keep it calm as it is already a very exciting time!!!

With all that going on...we will still be doing many activities in the class that are called reading, riting and rithmetic!!! Thats what keeps me calm!! hahha.

With that have a great Sunday...I am doing a sun dance as we speak!!
Enjoy the pictures!!!
t

Good Morning everyone!
We had a busy and very wonderful week last week.
We started our week with Sarah coming in and doing our Bat Drama. Wow, you should see the listening and the cooperation and the amazing actors and actresses this class has. They made "zenes"...where the kids were divided into groups and given a scene to draw and then they had to describe it first with their words as a group and then with their bodies.Was a difficult concept which the children mastered and had so much fun with. Sarah will also be doing another Bat Drama class with the children this Monday as well. We are lucky to have Sarah being our guest drama expert. On Wednesday we had two guest presentations...one was a Kins/cobbs presentation. The children heard a presentation on how important it was to eat all the parts of a grain and thus should be eating whole grain foods and then also how important it was to eat all the colours of the rainbow. They then got to try some very delicious whole grain bread and then a variety of fruits and vegetables. Many children loved the purple cabbage!!!
Also on Wednesday afternoon we went into Ms. Linton's class. Ms. Linton did a lesson on Kwanzaa.They then got to try on some dresses and shoes and play some drums as they celebrated the winter holiday that starts on December 26th. Meanwhile I taught clay to her children. Thats what we do at Bayview, we teach our strengths and passions. It was fun to do a switch off and see my former students.
On Thursday we  sorted and talked about the differences and similarities between bats and birds and then after sorting these into categories we had the opportunity to write if we would rather be a bat or a bird and why. Many want to stay up in the night late.....so we have a lot of bats in our class!!

On Thursday afternoon Ms. Whitelaws group went to the library and used the ipads. They found information on bats and wrote notes. Ms. Whitelaw was very impressed by the children's note taking skills and their attitude and their behaviour. Meanwhile my group continued to work on learning about vampire bats and making our vampire bat caves....some are finished!!

Coming up this week:
1) On Monday Sarah will be back to do some  more Bat Drama!! Yay!!!
2) On Tuesday, I will be working!! Why? This is pretty exciting...I won a contest with Nat and Drew from the morning show on the radio station 103.5 and the contest was an office takeover, where they would come in and give staff a little recess treat and some dance music. Well, they decided they wanted to give the entire school a little dance party. So after recess the team is coming into Bayview and setting up a disco ball and some loud music and we will dance for a little while. This is the first time ever that they have done a dance party at a school, so we are very lucky!! They are probably going to be taping the dancing and putting it onto their blog. If you have any problems with the possibility of your child being on their blog let me know and we will let them stay in the library with some supervision.  We are hoping everyone will be able to attend!
3) On Tuesday afternoon I will also be trading with Ms. Applebee.The children will have a wonderful smart board lesson with her and I will have her children in and we will be doing some clay activity as well. If there is any parent who would like to trade their Wednesday volunteer time for Tuesday instead I would love it...or if anyone would like to volunteer on Tuesday afternoon to help with the clay I would love that as well. Thank you.

Thank you thank you thank you
1) Thank you to all the families who will certainly bring tears to our family. The generosity and the love that you have sent for the hamper is amazing! The family will certainly feel very cherished this season. We will be backing up the items into smaller boxes and labelling them all on Monday and removing them from the classroom for delivery on Tuesday. 
2) A big thank you to Eli J's dad for stepping in on Friday to cook with the grade one group.Eli wasn't even in the group so thank you for taking on one of the messiest ( I heard) cooking activity. They made scented gingerbread playdough. What fun all the children had playing with the playdough in the afternoon.

With that, have a great Sunday. I will see everyone on Monday.
Enjoy the pictures.
teri

Sarah explaining the activity.

making the zene

Our beautiful door!

Kathy showing the anatomy of a grain!

Eating the rainbow.

Casper in traditional african clothing.

Leah looks so proud!

The outfits are so colourful.

Seriously playing the drums!!

Eli looking very noble.

Ayana looking very joyful.

So beautiful!

I love the combination of the wolf and the green outfit, trendy!

Looking like a cotton candy dolly!

B

Working on our family portraits.

look at the concentration

Brody, you rock this outfit!

The inside of our door....we are always drawing and talking...its a busy class!