St. Joseph School October 2010 Mrs. M. Medeiros Math We have completed out units on Patterning for both grades and students demonstrated their understanding in a final task, as well as a final unit test. We will be moving forward beginning units in “Numeracy” (grade 6), and “Factors and Exponents” (grade 7). In numeracy students will be reading, writing and comparing numbers beyond 100,000, renaming large numbers, comparing decimal thousanths, estimating sums and differences and adding and subtracting whole and decimal numbers. In factors and exponents students will belearning about multiples, factors, divisibility, powers of numbers and square roots and order of operations. In both units students will take part in 3 part problems using these skills, and a final culminating task/test. At home help: Students will continue to receive a “problem of the week” each Monday. These are due back on Friday morning so we can take them up together as a class. Please visit our classroom WIKI space and visit the tab “Helpful links and websites.” This tab provides several websites that correlate with the math strands taught in class. Literacy In reading this month students will be focusing on “reading with meaning.” They will be practicing the skill of “predicting” by using a variety of text features to help them make predictions about texts before and during reading. We will also be focusing in on making connections during our reading by trying to connect the experiences of characters in read aloud’s, shared readings and independent reading with ourselves and the world around them. Students will be using these skills to develop A.E.O (Answer, Evidence, Opinion) written reading responses to display their understanding of texts. In writing, our focus this month is on “Persuasive.” Students will be writing a persuasive writing piece based on information we have been learning about in “First Nations” (Grade 6) and New France (Grade 7). 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. History/Social Studies We will be continuing our units on First Nations and Early Explorers (Grade 6) and New France (Grade 7). In Social Studies students will learn about the characteristics of the North American First Nation cultures, and their interactions with the environment and the positive and negative interactions with European peoples. In Grade 7, the students will examine the roots and culture of the French communities in North America, and changes resulting from the interactions between the First Nation peoples and French and English settlers and the impact of these groups on Canada today. The final culminating activity will involve students choosing an art form (comic, museum exhibit, diarrama, painting, etc.) to create a moment from the past that they feel had the largest impact on the development on Canada today. They will complement these with a written persuasive piece that tries to convince the King to continue funding voyages to the New world! Religion/Fully Alive The virtue for the month is “Tolerance”. Tolerance is the ability to accept others beliefs and opinions, even when they differ from our own. In class, students will explore the understanding of tolerance through read aloud’s by making connections with characters in texts, and the world around them. We will also be making connections in our study on New France and First Nations by connecting how the different groups showed tolerance by accepting the different values and beliefs of the differing groups. Science We will be starting our units in Science with units on “Heat” (grade 7), and “Space Exploration” (grade 6). Students will take place in hands on experiments, and write about their observations and findings.