St. Joseph School November 2010 Mrs. M. Medeiros

Literacy In reading this month students will be focusing on “reading with meaning.” They will be practicing the skill of “inferencing” by reading between the lines and gathering a deeper meaning of texts. Sometimes when we read texts, things are not literally stated and we need to use our prior knowledge and what we know from the text to imply what the author means. Students will be using these skills to develop A.E.O (Answer, Evidence, Opinion) written reading responses. In writing, students will be writing biographies on significant people who have shown “justice” (our catholic virtue of the month) in their lives. We will apply our reading strategy of inferencing to our writing by generating opinions and implying characteristics about these significant people rather than just restating facts about them.

At Home Help: Encouraging your child to read on a daily basis and use the different reading strategies during reading will continue to help them in their understanding of texts, as well as develop their critical thinking skills. GeographyWe will be starting a new unit in geography called “Geographic Inquiry.” We will be focusing on the inquiry of the environment and our interactions with the environment. Students will learn about their physical surroundings and conditions, particularly as they affect people’s lives. Also, students will learn about how the environment provides opportunities and challenges; and how people change the environment as they use it. Students will demonstrate their understanding of this unit in a final culminating task. More details to follow in December!

Religion/Fully Alive

The virtue for the month is “Justice”. Justice is the ability to act and treat others fairly, and to stand up for others when they are being treated unfairly. In class, students will explore the understanding of justice through read alouds such as “Martin’s Big Words” and “A Day’s Work”. We will be looking at significant people in our history who showed justice, and how they made an impact on our world. Students will also be writing biographies on some of these people and make connections between their actions and the virtue of justice.

ScienceWe have started our units on “Heat” and Space Exploration.” Students have been studying what happens to particles when heat is added to them. They have also been looking at materials that are good heat conductors and insulators. Students will be applying their knowledge of this in a final culminating activity where they have to create a device that keeps a pop can cold for 2 hours, and explain how this works!

Reminders and Congratulations!-Novemeber 3rd: Grade 7 students go to St. Chris to take part in activities and become familiar with the different school programs.Grade 6’s are putting on the school “All Saints,All Soul’s mass” at 9:30am on this day. All are welcome.-Wednesday, November 17th- Progress Reports go home.Congratulation to Rachel Dunn who was the top earner in the school for the Terry Fox walk!! Also, congratulations to our gr. 6/7 class who won first place as being the top classroom in pledges for Terry Fox! Way to go Have a great month!

MathIn math this month the grade 7’s will be working on Ratio, Rate and Percent. They will be learning about relationships between fractions, ratio’s and percents and how to find equivalent ratios. In grade 6 students will be studying the addition and subtraction of decimal and whole numbers up to 1,000,000. They will be using mental math strategies, and estimation strategies to help them solve real life problems.

At Home Help: Students will continue to receive a problem of the week. Encourage them to show all of their steps and explain their thinking when solving these problems. Also continue visiting the “helpful links and websites” page on our classroom wiki which will provide alternative lessons for concepts being taught in class.