Thursday, September 19, 2013


Hi everyone! Thanks for checking in with the blog!  We’ve had a busy and productive week in Grade 1A! 
**** A bit of house keeping- Someone has left a purple, black and pink Hurley zip up sweater in the classroom! We all had a good look at it today and no one could remember if it belonged to them!  If this sounds like something from your child's wardrobe, tell them to come and get it on Monday!! It's super cute, but it just wouldn't fit me!

I’ve had some parents ask how they can be helping their children at home.  Until home reading begins, our biggest job right now is getting the students to memorize their sight words!  This is a place where students can easily fall behind in!  Our job is to get those students so familiar with those words so they can easily recognize them when reading books.   

It is not enough to have them just reading from the agenda! Here are some really simple ways of making sight words fun! 

Each week as we write 5 new words in the agenda, start your own sight word flash card set at home. 

Have the students make the flash cards! You can build sentence starters with them, and take turns finishing the sentences (example:  I like to play_____). 

You can build 2 sets of flash cards and play a game of Memory Match- they LOVE this!!

Have them sort the words in different ways! Words with 3 letters, 2 letters, 4 letters, etc. and then read out the piles.

I promise with this extra practise now, it will make the daily home reading much easier to transition into!  Thanks for your help with this!

Next week we will be talking about Terry Fox and what a tremendous spirit he had.  This is one of my favourite events of the year!  I love teaching the kids about what a hero he was, and how lucky we are that we can participate in such an amazing event!  In addition to students collecting pledges for their walk, our school is putting on a spirit challenge where we are hoping that every student at MMH can bring a ‘Toonie for Terry’.  It was Terry’s dream to have every Canadian donate 1$ to his cause, and we know we can do even better than that!

On Thursday September 26th, I will be sending home Terry Fox tattoos, and “I am running for…” stickers that they can wear on the walk! I’ll tuck them safely into the plastic sleeve of the agenda so that they don’t get lost over the week, and then students can proudly wear them, along with MMH colours for our walk on Friday September 27th! 

As a staff, we understand that this time of year can be difficult with the start of school, registration costs for activities, fundraising, etc.  In the spirit of Terry, we will be talking with the students about not just asking for a toonie to donate, but perhaps earning a toonie to donate.  They can offer to do a chore around the house, help a neighbour or grandparent, etc.  Thanks for your support with this!

*Please ensure that on Friday September 27th, your student has good walking shoes and is properly dressed for the weather. 

On Monday September 30th, your student will be bringing home their mini progress report! The intent of this progress report is to give you an idea of your child's progress so far in Grade 1, in relation to grade level expectations at this time.  We hope that you can use this progress report to set goals with your student between now and the first formal reporting period, which is in November.  Keep an eye out for this report coming home on Sept. 30th! 

That’s it for now! Have a wonderful weekend!
-Anna Tsentouros

Friday, September 13, 2013


Hi Everyone!

Welcome to the blog! We’ve had an awesome first couple of weeks of school! Grade 1 is such a huge change from Kindergarten but our class seems to be adjusting well! 

It was great to see so many families out at our Meet the Teacher night!  It’s always neat to see just how excited the students get to have you in our room.  They're already so proud of being in Grade 1 and that’s just awesome!  In our class this year, we have 20 students – 13 girls and 7 boys:

Abigail                 Layla
Berkley                Lizzie
Chloe                   Madison E.
Danica                 Madison P.
Gavin                   Nisarg
Hailey                  Peyton
Hayden                Reilly
Kaiden                 Serenity
Keetly                  Seth
Larsen                  Taryn

Yesterday I sent out our Class Phone list! It’s very possible that I made a typo while inputting all your phone numbers so please let me know if there are any mistakes!

Here’s a brief summary of what we’ve been up to in Grade 1:

In Language Arts we’ve been reviewing our letter sounds and printing.  We’ve also been practising our 5 sight words which are written every week in the agenda.  Each week we will practise these sight words and we ask that you please practise them at home!  It is important that the students are able to READ (not spell- but if they can spell them woohoo!) these words without trying to sound them out.  I mentioned to many of you last night that our home reading program will begin in October.  Thank you to the parents who signed up to exchange home reading!  I will be emailing you closer to the start date. 

In Math, we began with printing numbers 1-10 as a review, as well as testing out different ways to represent them.  Our first two units in math are about numbers 1-10 and patterning.  In Science we’ve begun our Colours unit, and this week we spent some time talking about colours in nature as well as manufactured colours.

This year, we do NOT have any peanut allergies in our own class. There are peanut allergies in other Grade 1 classes so we exercise caution when students have peanut butter sandwiches.  Please remind your student to wash their hands after handling anything with peanuts! 

Thanks to parents who signed up to bring snacks outside our door! When it comes time, you’ll receive a reminder for what you’ve signed up for via email. 

On Friday, September 27th we are going on our Terry Fox Walk!  We are going to be walking with our Grade 4 book buddies.  We are leaving MMH just after announcements, and will walk over to Nicholas Sheran Lake.  We go around the lake once where we meet up with the other Westside Schools, and then we head back to MMH.  If you’d like to join us on our walk please just let me know via email. We ask that younger siblings don’t come for this, as usually the walk is pretty exhausting for our Grade 1s.  If you don’t want to walk, you are more than welcome to grab a spot at the lake and cheer us on when we pass! 

I think that’s it for now! Here are some important dates in September and October to mark your calendars with.  Have a great weekend!

-Anna Tsentouros


September

Wednesday September 18th- Magazine fundraiser assembly @ 8:45
Thursday September 26th- Terry Fox Assembly @ 11:15
Friday September 27th- Terry Fox Walk @ 8:45

October
Wednesday October 2nd- Family Assembly TBA
Wedneday October 9th- School Council @ 6:30pm
Monday October 14th- Thanksgiving! No School
Tuesday October 15th- PD Day – No School
Tuesday October 22nd- Picture Retake day
Thursday October 24th- PD Day in Pm only
Friday October 25th- PD Day no school
Thursday October 31st- Halloween Parade in the pm