International Dot Day!

   

Tuesday, September 15

The Busy Bees have joined over 21 million children and adults around the globe in 196 countries to celebrate International Dot Day – a grass roots “creativity and courage” movement, started in 2009 by a teacher in Iowa. Inspired by New York Times best-selling author/illustrator Peter H. Reynolds’ classic storybook for all ages The Dot. Exploring the themes of creativity, bravery and self-expression, The Dot is a story of a perceptive and caring teacher who reaches a reluctant student who thinks she can’t draw by encouraging her be brave enough to “just make a mark and see where it takes you.” What begins with a small dot on a piece of paper becomes a breakthrough in confidence and courage, igniting a journey of self-discovery and sharing, which has gone on to inspire countless children and adults around the globe to just give something a try.

Today, we celebrated The Dot by reading the story and discussing the author's message. Then we went on to make our mark and created our own dots to show how we are all unique and special. It is ok to try your best and your best is all we are asking for! This has been our message as we start Grade 1; a growth mindset with our Cupcake Work and continuing to try our best with positivity and risk taking in what we attempt to do as we learn.

The author also created a little song to go along with the book and we listened while we worked.

Here are some of our own dots from our activity!

Let's all give it a go and try our best in Grade 1!

You never know what may happen from just a little dot!

Cupcake Work!

Cupcake work you may ask? What is that?

Well Mrs. Herbert showed us all some cupcakes today to pick which one we would like to enjoy! They were decorated like bee hives with yellow icing and special sprinkles and little bees to go with our Busy Bee classroom theme. We were excited to pick the one all decorated with the extra things!

However there were many no one picked! These ones weren't as nice. One was burnt to a crisp, black and hard as a rock. No one wanted that one! And there was one with no icing, and one that was sort of sloppy and one with no sprinkles or bee decorations. Why didn't people want these ones?

Well when Mrs. Herbert asked the class, they said they wanted the ones with all the good things on it that make them extra special That makes complete sense!

This week, we will read this poem to solidify what picking that cupcake really meant...

I looked at all the cupcakes,

Sitting on the plate so fine,

And I wondered and I thought a bit,

“Now which one will be mine?”

Our teacher made them for us,

With gooey frosting spread with care,

Covered with coloured sprinkles,

Topped with sweet bee wear.

But one just didn’t look so good,

It was burnt and small and round,

With a tiny smudge of frosting,

But no sweet treats were found.

No one picked this cupcake,

‘Cause it really was a mess.

Of all the decorated treats,

This one was not the best.

Our teacher noticed no one ate it

And asked us all, “Why not?”

We told her that of all the treats,

This one didn’t look so hot!

“I see,” she said, “On this one,

I did not do my best.”

This one did not measure up,

It did not pass your test!

You didn’t want a cupcake,

That I didn’t make with care.

When handing finished work my way

Show me, that you really care.

I don’t want to see your work

Until you’ve done your best.

Work neatly and carefully,

Work hard to pass my test.

Then I will want to choose your work

To show to everyone,

And you will be so proud of

The fine ‘cupcake’ work you’ve done!

So now you see that this very special lesson went right along with explaining how Grade 1 works. We will be learning how levels work and that trying our best is what we always want. Sometimes we might try our very best and our best might be a level 1 or 2 and that's ok. Mrs. Herbert is here to help. As long as their best effort is given. No burnt cupcakes for us!!

Welcome to our classroom where our best work is not a burnt cupcake. We try our best, with our positive attitude! And of course, we ate our yummy cupcake but here are some photos from our special activity...

September's Reading Room

Here is our September virtual reading room! This contains some great books with themes we will be focusing on in September in our Busy Bee class:

• Back to School
• Growth Mindset
• Fall (Seasons)
• Respect

Click on the pdf with interactive links on the books to enjoy! 

As Good As Gold - Learning About Integrity

Throughout the year, we have been learning about many different character traits. This month, we have been focusing on a biggie! We have been learning about integrity as we feel it encompasses many of the other character traits into one. We have read books, listened to some songs and watched videos all about this concept to help us understand what this big idea means. We caught on pretty quick but certainly expanded our thinking too! We brainstormed all the ideas we have been learning about and have posted in our classroom:

We read these books:

And some great songs and videos we watched about integrity are:

  

We are working hard on focusing on making good choices and going to try our best to demonstrate integrity as our goal over the summer to start off next year to a great start!

Choose Not To Use Challenge Wrap Up Day

This past month, the whole school had been challenged to 'choose not to use' as part of way to understand how to positively support our mental health and wellbeing. The school's Mental Health and Wellbeing Team challenged each class to take the pledge and choose not to use devices (as much) as it impacts our body in many different ways. We learned some pretty interesting facts on how screen time impacts our heart, lungs, eyes and brain! We made a commitment and hope at home, we can be held to our promise to reduce the amount of time on devices. We discussed other ways to spend our time and engaged in some really great activities at electives and with some activities planned and ran by the school's Mental Health and Wellbeing group. 

Today, we wrapped up our month long challenge and enjoyed some outside time together as a whole school with some additional play time and a treat! What a beautiful day to enjoy our successes with our challenge! We challenge you to keep it up and make a conscious effort to continue to choose other activities that are better for your mind and body than screens! 

 

Fair is Fair - Learning About The Character Trait of Fairness!

Throughout May, we were learning all about fairness as our character trait of the month. We have read books, poems and watched videos all about this concept to help us understand what this big idea means. We caught on pretty quick but certainly expanded our thinking too! We brainstormed all the ideas we have been learning about and have posted in our classroom:

We have read these books:

And some great songs and videos we watched about fairness are:

We are working hard on focusing on making good choices and going to be learning more about integrity in June! 

 

Green Shirt Day - Awareness About Children's Mental Health & Wellbeing

Today, we participated in Green Shirt Day that brings about mental health and well-being awareness.

 

The Grade 1/2 Busy Bees have been learning all about emotional literacy, self regulation and mental health and wellbeing all year long, and our understanding grows each year. Today, during Children's Mental Health & Awareness week, we spent time solidifying how we should express our feelings and that it is ok to not to be ok all the time. We also spent time discussing what we can do about it as well as recognizing how to help others when they are not in the ‘green' zone. 

Exploring feelings, beyond the simple 'happy or sad' responses, helps children really understand what specific feelings can do to our bodies and how to deal with them. Being able to express our feelings with 'I statements' will be a starting point for our wee bees. For example, we will be working on 'I feel _______ because _____________________.' 

Here are some various emotions, we may be exploring...

We are understanding that our emotions impact our body. Sometimes we have difficulty controlling our bodies as a result of those feelings. The Zones of Regulation help us to really organize those feelings. When we say we are 'good to go', we are in the green zone and ready to learn. 

After our learning today, we decided to create a brainstorm on ways to help us get into the green 'good to go' zone...

One way to be healthy and take care of our mental health is to reduce the amount of screen time. The school's Mental Health and Wellbeing Team challenged each class today to take the pledge and choose not to use devices (as much) as it impacts our body in many different ways. We learned some pretty interesting facts on how screen time impacts our heart, lungs, eyes and brain! We made a commitment and hope at home, we can be held to our promise to reduce the amount of time on devices. We discussed other ways to spend our time. We look forward to our elective activities tomorrow to explore activities that might peek our interest more and get off screens to help with our mental health and wellbeing!  

Help us to stay true to our pledge and choose not to use (as much) to help keep our body and minds healthy! Thanks to the school's Mental Health and Well-Being Team for challenging us and for the cool new sunglasses!! 

Honesty Matters!

In April, we have been learning all about honesty as our character trait of the month. We have read books, poems and watched videos all about this concept to help us understand what this big idea means but students have a very good sense of this already. We brainstormed all the ideas we have been learning about and have posted in our classroom:

We have read these books:

And some great songs and videos we watched about honesty are:

We are working hard on focusing on making good choices and owning our mistakes. We all make mistakes but it is what we do about it that matters!

Optimism - Finding the Good!

This past week, we have been learning all about optimism as our character trait of the month. We have read books, poems and watched videos all about this concept to help us understand what this big idea means. We brainstormed all the ideas we have been learning about and have posted in our classroom:

We have read these books:

And some great songs and videos we watched about optimism are:

We are working hard on focusing on making the choice to find the good. It is easy to pick out the bad and dwell on it, but we are training our brains to find the silver lining more. Help us practice and we can show you our new skills!

I Think I Can...I Think I Can...I Think I Can

We spent this week learning about the meaning of PERSEVERANCE with Miss DeYoung. 

Books About Perseverance

We read these stories:

Videos and Songs About Perseverance

We watched these short video clips:

We have a pretty good understanding of perseverance is. We created a brainstorm, with Miss DeYoung, of our ideas throughout the week and now have it posted in our class:

We are working on how to change our mindset to really focus on knowing we are always learning and it is ok to make mistakes. The next while, we are going to focus more on the strategies to try when we are feeling challenged and want to give up!  

Pink Shirt Day

 

Today is Pink Shirt Day! We learned about the meaning behind pink shirt day and why it was needed. Thanks to Travis and David for standing up against bullies and how to show kindness! Students made posters to show what they know about what we were learning. We are excited to share a message about bullying and post our learning in the hallway at school. Check them out below but a close up is posted on each student's digital portfolios as well. 

Responsibility Counts

Our character trait focus for this past month has been all about responsibility. What does that look like and sound like for Grade 1/2's? We have read different books, watched some videos demonstrating the trait and even learned a little rap. Mrs. Stemmler had also been teaching all about responsibility in her Social Studies lessons.  

From all of this learning, we came up with our own brainstorm to post in our classroom to help us if we forget.

These are some of the books we have been reading to help us with our understanding:

Here are some videos we have been watching:

This is just the start of our learning! We know this is something we need to be doing consistently to build good character traits. Thanks to the families for helping instill this trait into their wee ones to help them take responsibility for themselves, their actions and choices. We are in charge of ourselves! 

Learning About Courage

This month's character focus has been courage. 

What a fitting time of year that we learn about courage and bravery surrounding our participation in Remembrance Day. 

We watched some different videos and we have read these books about courage to build our understanding:

We think we have a pretty good understanding about what courage looks like and feels like. We created a brainstorm of our ideas.

We are showing courage all the time when we are learning something new! We continue to be brave every day in Grade 1/2! 

Orange Shirt Day

  

This past Tuesday, we came together to participate in Orange Shirt Day. This day is an annual event held on each September 30th in remembrance of the Canadian Residential School system and the impact of this government policy on First Nations. 

To learn a little bit about Orange Shirt Day, the students in the Busy Bee class read this story as an introduction.

Based on a true story, it provides an introduction to the stories of the negative experiences of the First Nations, Metis and Inuit attending residential schools for younger students. 

We learned about the history behind Orange Shirt Day to honour just some of these stories of residential schools and watched this short clip about why we wear an orange shirt today. 

The following day, we read this story to refresh our memories before we created our own Orange Shirts with our own message:

Afterwards, we wrote a message on our orange shirt posters about how we show empathy for their experiences. 

We are listening, honouring and respecting.