Global Read Aloud

October 1st starts the first day of the Global Read Aloud. Our class will be reading Charlotte's Web along with Mrs. Kewley and Mrs. McKinnon's classes at our school. Not only will our classes be reading this book, but classes all around the world will be reading Charlotte's Web.

Throughout the next 4 weeks, we will be sharing our reading with different classes participating in the Global Read Aloud.

If you are a class looking to connect with, please leave us a comment! We'd love to share our thinking and reading with you!

All classes participating will be following the same reading schedule:

Week 1: Chapters 1 - 6
Week 2: Chapters 7 - 11
Week 3: Chapters 12 - 17
Week 4: Chapters 18 - 22

Check out this Animoto of the Global Read Aloud history created by Mrs. Ripp (the creator of the Global Read Aloud)

Our Primary Blogging Community

During the summer, Mrs. van Rees connected with other Grade One teachers through twitter.  While they were chatting about their new upcoming classes, they agreed how great it would be to connect with other classes around the world together. So, one of the teachers decided to organize a Primary Blogging Community.

For the month of October, we will be visiting 3 Grade One class blogs to see what they're doing in their classrooms in Grade One. As well, their classes will be visiting our blog! Each week, one class will be in the "spotlight".  We'll be able to leave comments and learn more about each class. When it's our turn, the other 3 classes will leave us comments and learn about our class!

Later on in the year, these same classes will explore our individual blogs and we will be able to read theirs. This will be something like digital pen pals! It should be a great opportunity.

The classes that will be in our blogging community are:

Mrs. Ruckes' Class (from Michigan, USA)

Ms. Ziemke's Class (from Chicago, USA)

Ms. Leech's Class (from Surrey, BC)

Mrs. Wideen's Class (from Windsor, Ontario)

Identity Day

Today was Identity Day. Students from Grades 1 - 6 brought in items that represented themselves. We got to share our items with other grades as they came to our class and asked us questions. After talking and answering LOTS of questions, it was our turn to check out their projects in their classes. There were so many great projects and so many creative ways to present them!

Mrs. van Rees brought in some of her very favourite picture books. She said she would share these books with us throughout the year. We read Olivia while we were waiting for other classes to visit us in the morning.

Most of our class brought in items that were our favourite sport, favourite animal, favourite toy or about our families. Here are some pictures of items we created or brought in to share. Some of the items we brought in couldn't be put on our blog because they were photos of our families.

It was such a fun and exciting day! We sure were tired by the end of the day, but we're already looking forward to Identity Day next year.
If you had Identity at your school, what would you bring in?

Creating Patterns

For the past few weeks we have been working on patterning in Math. We created a variety of repeating patterns, including ABA, ABB, ABC, etc. Last week, Mrs. van Rees had us create necklaces or ropes, using yarn and different coloured straws. Check out some of our work:

First Time Blogging!

Today we started blogging! Check out our "student blogs" (the tab at the top) to see what we are writing about. It was our VERY first time blogging and we were excited but nervous to start. Remember that we are learning how to type and write, so some of our posts are short.  Mrs. van Rees helped us by writing what we wanted to say in brackets underneath our writing. She typed the words as we read our writing to her.

Thanks so much for stopping by and reading our blogs. Don't forget to comment on our work. We love to read your comments!

Raising Butterflies in Room 12

Mrs. van Rees went to the Butterfly Conservatory (go here to check out their website) last week and bought a Monarch rearing kit for us. We were given 4 Monarch caterpillars, 3 chrysalides and a potted tropical milkweed plant. Today, 2 of the butterflies came out of the chrysalides! It was so exciting to watch the butterfly stretch out its wings. Did you know that the wings are scrunched up and wet when it first comes out. We needed to let it stretch out its wings and dry before we could let it go outside.

We have a butterfly bush outside our principal's office, so we carefully carried our 2 new butterflies to the bush where we safely placed them. After school, some of us looked to see if the butterflies were still there, but they had already flown away.

Here are some pictures of our caterpillar/butterfly habitat in the classroom:

Our Monarch habitat

If you look close, you can see the Monarch pattern of its wings within the chrysalis.

Our biggest caterpillar sitting on a leaf.

This butterfly JUST emerged from its chrysalis moments before Mrs. van Rees got out her camera!