Monday, April 4

 Hi parents,

We had a bit of a crazy day today. I spoke with the students about continuing to progress, and always doing their best work, rather than just 'passable' work. I've noticed a trend in which many students, particularly the faster writers, will spend 80% of the work period talking, and then quickly write a few sentences and draw a black and white picture and call it a day. 

I challenged the students to look back through their writing books, and find their 'best work' from the year. If the date on that work is from more than a month ago, then we've got a problem! We have spoken numerous times throughout the year about how to ensure work is the best it can be: editing for spelling / punctuation, adding more sentences, including a colourful picture are the three big ones. But the question I hear more than anything else is still "Am I done?"

Ms. Brown also let me know that our class has been consistently missing out on Gym time due to excessive talking - so I think this is definitely something we will need to address this week.

Moving forward we will be replacing Explore and Play time with an additional work period. I hope that will help.

We started learning about Fractions today! Mrs. Fernandez taught the class the meaning of the word 'fraction', and why fractions need to be equal. The students folded paper into fractions and non-fractions and had some great conversations. We talked a bit about how to write fractions, but more work still needs to be done.

Have a nice night,

Zac