THANK YOU!!!!

Thank you so much to all my students and their families for the thoughtful cards and gifts...I felt very loved today! :) Have a safe and happy summer and I will see you next year!

Canada Day!

Dear Parents/Guardians:

On Wednesday, June 28th,  our last student school day (reminder:  Early Dissmissal), we will celebrate our Ken Taylor version of Canada Day :)

Students are encouraged to wear red & white in recognistion of Canada's 150th birthday!  

Thank you,

David

Yearbooks!

Dear Parents/Guardians:

Just a friendly reminder that there are only a few more days left to order a yearbook!  This will capture all the highlights of our first year of learning and building a school culture.

Currently we have 44 orders and we require a total of 176 orders before we can go to print.

Please see the information on how to order here:  yearbook2017.pdf 

Any additional funds collected will be donated to our playground fund.

Cheers,

David

Guided Acrylic Painting

Here are a few pics of our guided acrylic paintings that we did today!

Hope everyone has a lovely weekend; we have only 2 and 1/2 days of classes left!

:)

End of Year Updates

Here are some important dates as we wind down for the end of the year!

Wednesday, June 28th is the LAST DAY of classes for students. We will be having the final, year end assembly at 8:30 that morning and the dance club will be performing! It is also early dismissal, so the students will be done at 11:35 am.

Thursday, June 29th is appeals day and teachers will be in school the regular hours.

Tomorrow, June 23 is a regular, full day of classes and the students will be dismissed at 2:30 as usual.

Swimming Update!

Swimming has been successful for our grade 1s overall and I would like to say THANK YOU to all my volunteers who came out to help!

Just a reminder that there is NO swimming tomorrow, June 16th! It will, however, commence on Monday, June 19th and Tuesday, June 20th.

Also, Friday, June 16th is early dismissal AND beach day! Wear your sunnies, flippy-flops and colourful leis to school!

IMPORTANT Report Card Information

Dear Parents/Guardians,

The end of the year is fast approaching and your childrens' report cards will be coming home soon! I wanted to post some information and examples of the expectations for the students for the end of grade 1. This is standard across all the grade 1 rooms.

For reading; based on our Fountas and Pinnell assessment system, your child should be reading at a level H/I at the end of grade 1. The assessment is based on decoding (sounding out the words), fluency (expression and pace) and comprehension (does the student understand what they have read and some of the underlying meanings of the text?). They need to be proficient in all 3 areas to be considered 'at' this level. Here is an example of the text you would find in an I level book:

Students may need help with one or two words and their meaning but overall they should be able to read this smoothly and be able to re-tell the important information.

For writing, the students are expected to express ideas and information in a way that is legible and have sentences that make sense. Here is an example of a basic grade-level writing sample (2):

The child uses capitals at the beginning of sentences, periods at the end and spells most common sight words correctly. There are some spelling mistakes but it is easily understood by the reader. The picture matches the writing.

The next sample is a child who would receive a 3 at the end of grade 1.  In addition to the expectations above, this child added some more interesting details, started sentences in different ways and used alternate words for descriptive or action words. Notice the use of 'snap' and 'tuck':

Finally here is an example of a 4. The student came up with a story that follows a logical sequence, used interesting vocabulary and started the sentences in different and interesting ways. There is appropriate punctuation and spelling.

To achieve a basic, grade-level mark for math in Number Sense, the student must be able to independently do the following things:

Say the number sequence 0 to 100 by:

• • 1s forward between any two given numbers
  • 1s backward from 20 to 0
  • 2s forward from 0 to 20
  • 5s and 10s forward from 0 to 10
• Represent and describe numbers to 20
• Identify the number, up to 20, that is:
  • one more
  • two more
  • one less
  • two less
• Describe and use mental mathematics strategies for basic addition facts and related subtraction facts to 18

If your child does not receive a 2 on their report card in an area, we use the language that they are not yet achieving the skill at grade level, because they are working towards it! It does not mean they are 'failing'. 

Please, as always, email, call or stop by the classroom if you have any questions regarding the information above or any other concerns or questions and I would be happy to help in any way I can! 

Looking forward to a wonderful week!

-Ms. Carstairs

Swimming Starts Monday the 12th!

Friday June 9 2017. 

Dear Parents,  

Next week, our grade 1 students will be taking swimming lessons at the Thornhill Aquatic & Center.

Lessons will be held at the Thornhill Acquatic & Fitness  Center on June 12 – 15, 19 and 20, 2017.

A few items to be mindful of:

• The buses are scheduled to leave the school at 8:40 a.m., however, classes and attendance will begin at regular time, 8:00 a.m. 
• Please have your child wear their swimsuits under their clothes 
• Students will need to bring a plastic bag for their towel and change of clothes (including underwear) 
• Please do not send any toys or money to the pool next week, as we cannot be responsible for lost or stolen items 

The students have all been placed into swimming lessons based on their previous swimming experience.  Swimming teachers and life guards will be closely monitoring all of the children during the Water Safety Program.

Should you have any questions or concerns, please feel free to contact me.

Have a great weekend,

Ms. Carstairs :)

School Photo!

Hello Parents,

 

Please watch your child’s backpack for an order form for our Ken Taylor School Group Photo.  If you are interested in ordering an 8” x 10” color photo please return this form with payment  to the school prior to June 16^th, 2017.

 

Thank you,

 

Barb Rocca

The Great Book Exchange

Thank you to everyone who donated books and organized the Great Book Exchange! It was a huge success. I had many students from my class buy books and they were so excited to read them that they asked at recess if they could bring their books outside and read instead of play! So we played for a little bit and then we all got our books and enjoyed them outside on the field in the fresh air!

Tomorrow is Crazy Sock day inspired by Fox in Socks by Dr. Seuss. Don't forget to wear your crazy socks!

Drop Everything And Read!!

Yesterday was a huge success with our DEAR initiative! The students did an excellent job of stopping, getting a book, and enjoying it quietly throughout the day. Looking forward to Whacky Wednesday!

This week is Literacy Week at Ken Taylor!

This week we are celebrating the love of reading and writing with some fun activities. Today is Read my Shirt day! We had a lot of students with some funny and motivational sayings on their T-shirts!

Tomorrow, Tuesday, June 6th is ride your bike to school day. If you live close and would like to participate, please ride your bike to school. We will be opening up half of the gym to store the bikes in so they will be safe, as we do not have enough bike locks to accommodate all the bikes outside! Tuesday is also D.E.A.R. day; which means 'Drop Everything And Read!' Throughout the day the teachers might tell the students to DEAR! This will be a fun way to promote literacy throughout the school.

Wednesday is Wacky Wednesday where the students are encourage to dress mixed-up. Thursday the students are asked to wear many different colours and Friday is crazy sock day! This days were all inspired by the much loved author Dr. Seuss and his whacky books:)

Thursday is also our Great Book Exchange! Thank you for all the donations of gently used books that will go on sale for $0.25 on Thursday and give students a chance to donate old books and buy new ones for their shelves at home:) If you would like to donate some books, please send them with your child this week up until Thursday!

Swimming starts on Monday, June the 12th so please don't forget to send your child with their swimmies!

Plant Inquiry!

Today we posed the problem to our students: Why did the plants in Mrs. W.'s class grow so much taller than the bean plants in Ms. C.'s class? The students have been learning about the needs of plants and animals, the differences in growing preferences of different plants and about adaptations. After a review of plant adaptations; the students were asked to write down their hypothesis in their visual journals.

Bean Plant from Ms. C.'s room.

Bean Plant from Mrs. W.'s room.

We reminded the students that when we planted the seeds we only had two differences; Ms. Carstairs' plants were in ziplock bags and placed directly on the window and Mrs. Witzcacks' plants were placed in a cup on a table about a meter away from the window.

We still haven't had anyone come up with the correct answer; we will check back tomorrow!

Volunteer Appreciation

Volunteer Appreciation

Dear Parents/Guardians, The students and staff of Kenneth D Taylor School want to thank all of our volunteers who have worked so hard at making this first year so successful. We are inviting all of our school volunteers to join us in our Learning Commons on Friday, June 2nd at 1:30 PM.  This celebration will include light refreshments and student entertainment. Please sign up through eventbrite by June 1st in order to assist us with our planning.  We look forward to seeing you! ​​​​​​​Please follow the link to RSVP by June 1st   https://ktsvolunteerappreciation.eventbrite.ca Sincerely, ​​​​​​​David

A few pics from Crazy Hair Day and Drumfit!

Thank you for showing your school spirit by participating in our crazy hair day! The students had some wild dos:)

The past week and a half the students have also been combining music and fitness with Mrs. Frasier and Mrs. Buonomo for Drumfit! With the nice weather, we have also been taking our learning and our activities outside:)

Crazy Hair Day Tomorrow!

Tomorrow is another great Kenneth D. Taylor school spirit day! Show your community spirit by coming to school with your wildest, whackiest hair-do!

Reminder: Movie Night Tonight!

Puppet Plays

Today we finally got to start making our puppets for our Reader's Theatre that we have been practicing! The students were split into groups and each given a character in a play. They have been practicing reading their lines and today got to use a variety of materials to plan and build each character and props for the play; using details from the story. We will continue to practice our lines using our puppets and our special puppet theatre that was built by Mr. Carstairs and painted by me! We will let you know closer to 'performance' times!