Gr. 3 PALS

The Grade 3's and I have been having fun reading one of Roald Dahl's classic novels, "The Twits." It's a funny story about a husband and wife who love to play practical jokes on each other.

One of my favourite quotes in the book is this:

"A person who has good thoughts cannot ever be ugly. You can have a wonky nose and a crooked mouth and a double chin and stick-out teeth, but if you have good thoughts they will shine out of your face like sunbeams and you will always look lovely."

We use these comprehension dice before, during, and after we read. 

JK/SKE Pictures

Yesterday I taught the kids some new songs to reinforce the sounds. We are working on reviewing some of the lessons and did partner reading. They all had a turn to come up to the front and be leaders. Way to go JK/SKs!

Reading Questionnaire

Things to do at home...

My daughter Kaitlyn is in JK and LOVES school. Here are some of the things we do at home to reinforce learning at school.

1. We practice with these little plates I made. Very easy to do: simply get a pack of dollar store plates and cut small slits around the entire plate. We use one with upper and one with lowercase letters but the possibilities are endless. You can do this to practice numbers, sight words, etc.

2. We practice reading leveled books. Kaitlyn is currently reading level "A" books. They are simple sight word books with one sentence on each page using repetitions of sight words. For example, "I see the Tiger."

3. She loves to play with an Easel. I keep coloured dry erase markers and magnetic letters and numbers on it. She also enjoys using different pointers.
                                                  
4. Make it fun! Play games. Kaitlyn loves when we take turns drawing a picture and guessing what it is. For example, I will say, I am making a picture that starts with the letter or sound "U." I will draw an umbrella.

Another idea we we is use Foam Letters in the bathtub. I show her the letter and if she says the right sound she sticks it on the side of the tub (or on herself).

5.  We also do simple flash cards. You can have your son/daughter go on a "letter/sound hunt" around the house. Pick a card from the deck and look for something with the same sound. For example, if he/she pulls the letter K, look for something in the house with that sound.

Review of Digraphs/Blends

Grade 1-3 students will continue to review Digraphs and Blends. Please review with your son/daughter at home if possible.

JK/SK Quick Review

• In JK/SK PALS the students have now been introduced to all of the sounds in the PALS program. Students have been working on sight words as well (the, to, with, etc.), as well as sounding out words through blending. 
• Students should continue to practice sounds at home.

Non-Fiction in PALS

For the last week we have been reading some pretty cool non-fiction books at the start of our PALS classes. 

I read a book called, "What if you had Animal Teeth?"

I brought in an actual shark skull that showed the students just how the teeth come through.