Family Literacy Day

Monthly

Report

January, Am Faoilleach, Penamujuiku's, janvier, 2020

Inside this Issue

Message from Regional Executive Director............2

Tweets from Schools.....................................................3

Well Being....................................................................4/5

Mathematics...............................................................6/7

Literacy..........................................................................8/9

Marion Bridge Elementary...................................10/11

Seton Elementary..........................................................12

Jubilee Elementary.......................................................13

Boularderie Elementary..............................................14

Middle River Elementary............................................15

Word of the Month......................................................15

Oceanview Education Centre...................................16

Glace Bay Elementary.................................................17

Every year on January 27, ABC Life Literacy Canada hosts Family Literacy Day, the largest national family literacy event in Canada. Literacy organizations, schools, libraries and media groups will coordinate numerous literacy-themed events and activities across the country in honour of this special initiative.

Family Literacy Day® is a national awareness initiative created by ABC Life Literacy Canada in 1999 to raise awareness of the importance of reading and engaging in other literacy-related activities as a family. 

News Media Canada is a proud supporter of Family Literacy Day, distributing public service announcements and editorial resources from ABC Life Literacy Canada to our members.

Lots of shared reading at Riverside on Family Literacy Day.

Message from the Regional Executive Director

Happy 2020 everyone!  January is a month when I like to curl up with a cup of peppermint tea and, as one of our schools so nicely put it, ‘get lost in the pages of a good book’.  As you read through our January update, you will see many students and staff taking part in learning activities that focus on Well-Being, Mathematics and Literacy.  You will see them focused on learning about their community and being actively involved in making it a better place, all important pieces of the curriculum. 

You will also see students getting outside to enjoy many different activities such as skating, sledding, skiing, snowshoeing, playing hockey and even doing some outdoor cooking, while they enjoy the outdoors.  The happy faces of our students playing in the snow makes me smile!   (See the following links).

Shipyard students enjoying the great outdoors!

Some of us have had enough of winter!

Rankin students enjoying their first day on the rink! 

Research clearly states that students who get regular exercise are better able to focus on learning. Whether they are taking part in tobogganing, archery, climbing or other things, both indoors and out, it is important to make time in schedules for these healthy activities.   

This month we have highlighted two of the many groups of staff who work directly with students to help create equitable access to learning.  You can read about the work of Child and Youth Care Practitioners (CYCP’s) one of the many new positions added to regions by the NS Department of Education and Early Childhood Development, as a result of the recommendations of Students First, the report on Inclusive Education in Nova Scotia.  Reading Recovery teachers are another group whose focus is on establishing equity for grade one students in literacy by providing individualized and accelerated programming.  Ensuring students can read is important to success further on in school.  Parents/guardians are encouraged to observe a lesson so they can support at home. 

Lastly, I would like to close with a quote that I recently read and was reminded of by the work being done by the staff and students of Seton Elementary School on kindness. 

           “Kindness is loaning someone your strength instead of reminding them of their weakness.” 

Until next time,

(Below) We have exceptional GBH students who travelled to Eskasoni for a drum making workshop. They spent the day with Carter Chiasson (music teacher), Ernest and Myrnie Johnson (hand drum facilitators), as well as 20 Allison Bernard Memorial students. What an amazing day!

Inquiry Based Learning in action! These grade 8 students (above) are examining the concept of viscosity and flow rate in their Science class! Great teamwork

North Highlands Elementary winter wonderland

Tweets from Schools

Sydney Academy Blue & White Tournament in Membertou

Enhancing Well-being Through Non-Traditional Activities

Archery at Oceanview Education Centre

Many of our secondary schools follow the NASP (National Archery in the Schools Program) for teaching archery. The health benefits of archery include many items that are associated with mental wellbeing – control, patience, staying calm, relaxing and socialising. 

Traversing Wall - Sydney Academy

Having access to a traversing wall, and using it, leads to a marked improvement of physical literacy in terms of balance, agility and coordination. Regularly climbing is a great form of exercise with many  health benefits.

Outdoor Skating at Rankin

Hopping on the ice is a great stress reliever. There are two ways to look at this. If you’re a complete beginner, then you’ll be entirely focused on staying on your feet.  That means no time for worrying. For those who can skate , you can calm the mind by enjoying your immediate surroundings and use it as a form of relaxation.

North of Smokey School Skiing 

Skiing not only boosts overall happiness and well-being, but it is beneficial to a student’s physical health, as they get good cardiovascular exercise by working the heart and lungs in the crisp and clean mountain air.

Riverside sledding and Memorial High School snowshoeing and cooking outside.

The winter months provide us with different ways of moving our bodies, such as sledding, snowshoeing, or building a snowman. Our larger muscles are put to great use in the winter months due to the challenges that snow provides. This large-muscle use and increase in physical activity support children’s gross motor development and overall health.

For more information on some of the exciting things are schools are doing, please check our region’s Facebook page and our Healthy Promoting Schools Committee Initiative Blossom: https://www.facebook.com/BlossomHealthPromotingSchools/ 

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January’s theme, elicit and use evidence of student thinking, continues the focus on the National Council of Teacher of Mathematics (NCTM) eight Effective Mathematics Practices.

Elicit and use evidence of student thinking. Effective teaching of mathematics uses evidence of student thinking to assess progress toward mathematical understanding and to adjust instruction continually in ways that support and extend learning.(Principles to Action, 2014)

Grade 3 students (below) at Harbourside Elementary were asked: How many tens are in 412?  Students show their understanding using pictures, numbers and/or words.  Each student presents and defends their thinking orally.  Following this, students are asked "Do you think that there is more than one answer?" They share and discuss all types of strategies and ways to solve problems.

Students in the Grade 3 classroom at Coxheath Elementary use number of the day to elicit student thinking through pictures, numbers and words. 

Integrating Technology into Mathematics not only enhances a deeper learning for students but also provides active participation and promotes problem solving. 

In a combined 4-5 class at Brookland Elementary, the grade 4 class worked on a word problem  (assessing prior knowledge) with the use of manipulatives. Students used their own personal strategies and then shared with the class.  This lesson was used as evidence of student thinking to help adjust instruction for the next lesson. The grade 4’s continued to work on word problems using Greg Tang Math ( an excellent math resource for in class, small group, or at home) https://www.gregtangmath.com/ 

Next, the grade 4’s created their own word problem booklets  while explicit instruction was given to the grade 5’s on 2 digit by 2 digit multiplication using  Area Model. Differentiated instruction at it’s best!

Middle School teachers participate in Professional Development learning to incorporate educational technologies in the classroom. Many thanks to Leanna Campbell-MacDonald and Michelle MacAulay for providing this valuable session. They provided training and practical application of Mimio, an interactive whiteboard for students, and Codey Rocky, a robot that promotes coding. Here are two short videos of Codey Rocky skip counting. 

The Nova Scotia Mathematics Homework Hub is a valuable resource for students in Grades 9, 10, 11, and 12 to access Mathematics support in both English and French with an online tutor.  Students can access the Mathematics Tutors via the Homework Hub icon on their gnspes launchpage, Sunday – Thursday from 5:30 pm – 9:30 pm.   

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READING RECOVERY

Reading RecoveryⓇ is effective short-term literacy intervention consisting of daily, one-on-one,  individualized, 30 minute lessons that are supplemental to good classroom teaching, for the lowest-achieving grade one students. The goal is to dramatically reduce the number of grade one children with extreme difficulty learning to read and write. The emphasis is on prevention of literacy failure. 

There are currently 25 Reading Recovery teachers providing Reading Recovery intervention to 104 grade one students within the Cape Breton-Victoria Regional Centre for Education. 

Daily attendance is tremendously important to support accelerated learning. Within each part of a Reading Recovery lesson, teachers use a wide range of procedures and make responsive decisions to build on students’ strengths and support the literacy needs of the individual child. 

THE READING RECOVERY LESSON

Reading Recovery lessons are individually designed and individually delivered by specially trained teachers to promote accelerated learning.  Each daily, 30 minute lesson includes: 

• Reading familiar books
• Reading yesterday’s new book while the teacher takes a running record 
• Working the letters and/or words using magnetic letters
• Composing a written message 
• Assembling a cut-up story
•  Reading a new book 

Principals, classroom teachers and parents are strongly encouraged to observe a Reading Recovery lesson to deepen their understanding of Reading Recovery and to support student learning.

MIDDLE SCHOOL LITERACY

Drawing and use of colour are not just for elementary students. Grade 6-8 students at Dr. TL Sullivan School and Sydney Mines Middle School put their artistic skills to use when writing their own Six-Word Memoirs (1), researching young global changemakers (2), and showing how their inner selves differ from what others see on the outside (3). Visual representations - both creating and interpreting - are as important in the literacy classroom as they are in art, science, or mathematics.

WRITING AND OTHER WAYS OF REPRESENTING

Writing and representing is about expression and the communication of ideas and information.  What forms they take or how the information is communicated can be very diverse. Here, English Language Arts 9 students at Breton Education Centre work on a writing and representing task to conclude their study of The Outsiders by S.E. Hinton.  The students are using graphic organizers and Chromebooks to organize their thinking and express their ideas in writing.  This is one example of how our students are writing every day.

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Marion Bridge Elementary

Small School        Big Heart

Motivating students to take charge of their learning:  At Marion Bridge School, we work hard to respond to the individual learning needs of our students.  We also encourage students to take the lead.  We tap into their interests and talents and use these for meaningful instruction and experiential learning.

          LUNCH TIME LIBRARIANS

Several of our students in grades four and five are avid bookworms.  They love to make use of our school library but they were getting frustrated because without a school librarian, the library was getting disorganized and messy. The students wanted to do something about it!  We invited System Library Technician, Carmelita Shea, to help out. During a “Lunch and Learn” session, Carmelita taught the students how to sign out books, how the library is organized and how to re-shelve books.  Our Student Librarians help out when classes visit the library and spend one lunchtime a week taking care of our collection and the library space

                                           NATURE LOVERS

With the heavy snowfall, some of our younger students were concerned about how the birds would be able to find food.  After some discussion in the classrooms, we decided to make bird feeders to hang around our rural school property. All of the students from Pre-Primary to grade five rolled up their sleeves and made feeders then we took them outside for the birds.  This activity has led to more discussions about the wild birds found in Marion Bridge in the winter. The grade primaries, grade ones and grade twos used the activity to practice procedural writing.

PEER HELPERS - PRE-PRIMARY AND GRADE FIVE 

Moving from a small elementary school to a large middle school can be intimidating.  Working with Schools Plus for the Riverview Family of Schools, our grade five students have been receiving lessons in making good choices and how to be peer helpers as they prepare to transition to Malcolm Munroe Middle School.  They are now putting their new skills into practice by working with our youngest students, the Pre-Primary class.

FINDING INSPIRATION IN THE PAGES OF A BOOK

Sometimes, we get lost in the pages of a book.  Other times, we get inspired! Grade three student, Aiden Bell, read a book about time capsules.  Now Aiden and his classmates are researching time capsules and the students are going to create a time capsule for Marion Bridge School.

Students in the Grade One/Two class were inspired by the book, “Snowmen at Night”.  This book is a class favorite. The students used the book to demonstrate their success with their class goal of adding descriptive words to a written retell with a clear beginning, middle and end.

                           MAKE IT TECH

We are surrounded by technology and Marion Bridge students use technology every day in their classes. Our students have been talking about how technology is used as a tool in their learning. In Grades Primary and One, students use “Bee-Bots” to learn basic coding and to help make literacy and numeracy fun.  Marion Bridge students are taking advantage of having a “Maker Cart” in the school. Students have fun experimenting with circuits. Students experiencing hands-on activities that allow them to use their imaginations to learn about coding and technology in our everyday lives. Document projectors help students demonstrate their learning in all kinds of ways, including math.  Students at every grade level work in the Google Classroom to share their learning with their classmates and teachers and gain valuable hands-on experience working with technology.

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Seton Elementary Highlights

Learning is Lots of Fun from Primary to Grade Five

Seton's Grade Primary students are learning about the sense of taste.  Everyone tried something new and look at those faces! 

Our grade fives are reviewing their multiplication facts by playing multiplication tic tac toe in small groups

Kindness, Friendship and Empathy

The Grade 3 class is learning that a little kindness goes a long way as their kindness chain grows every day. Every time a student does an act of kindness, another link is added. They also created a “Friendship Quilt”.  Each student made a quilt square that included qualities of a good friend, how to develop positive, healthy relationships, or activities friends can do together. Seton’s grade 2 class has been part of the Roots of Empathy program this year. They are leaning about empathy, nonverbal communication through body language and facial expressions, exploration and understanding of the development of humans.

Jubilee Elementary Highlights

Jubilee Elementary celebrated Family Literacy Day on January 24th.  The day started with an open house for families to come in and read with their child.  Throughout the day, we cuddled up with books and our pajamas and had guest readers from the community share their favorite books.  To finish off the day, the Parent Support Group provided milk and cookies to all students! These pictures show our students reading with their families in various cozy places around the school.

Genaya Fraser from Green Schools was at Jubilee Elementary to help us learn about how we can all be more energy efficient.  Pictured below are the Grade 1’s learning how to save energy and be kind to our environment.

The Grade 4 and 5 students enjoyed a day hillside on a Physical Education outing to Ski Ben Eoin

Jubilee Elementary Guidance Teacher, Paula MacRae, started a Diversity Club for our students in grades 4 and 5, who meet every Day 1 at noon. The diversity club promotes understanding, acceptance and valuing the differences and similarities in each of us. The club will be participating in diversity games, volunteer activities, a diversity project for the school, etc.

Boularderie Elementary Highlights

FAMILY DAY

Parents, grandparents and family members joined us for a morning filled with literacy activities.  A famous Canadian illustrator , Barb Reid, was honored as parents read a selection of her books (The Party, The Subway Mouse and The Perfect Snow) to our mixed age groups.  Following each story, students and parents worked together to create birthday invitations, winter scenes using plasticine, and the morning concluded with snow fort building.  Students were proud to have family members experience literacy learning with them. It was a fantastic event for all.

VIRTUE GROUPS: (left)

Multi age groups working together demonstrating the virtues they have been learning about each Day 1. While students are engaged in various virtue lessons, teachers meet in their PLC groups.

Morning check-ins are a regular routine now at Boularderie Elementary.  This is an opportunity for students and teachers to share with their peers how they are doing and things they may want to share.  Students can opt to pass if they wish.