Welcome to Division 3!! Welcome parents and students to Division 3 and our Grade 4/5 class. It is with tremendous excitement that Mrs. Thorne and Ms. Lopez are sharing our classroom this year: Mrs. Thorne will teach Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, and Ms. Lopez will be teaching Thursday and Friday. We apologize in advance for the abundance of information you are about to receive, but there is so much to share with you at the beginning of the year.
Inside shoes and water bottle Please send inside shoes for your child. We will require students to change from outdoor shoes to inside shoes once they enter the classroom. As the rain returns (even though we haven’t seen a lot of it recently… we do live in B.C.!) it is always nice to have a dry pair of shoes to change into, and clean, dry shoes will also help to keep our classroom and school tidy. Please stay away from black-soled shoes, as they might mark the floors, and labelling shoes would be a good idea too. A labelled water bottle is always nice to have at each student’s desk so they can stay hydrated and work at the same time!
Communication We will also have a class blog. Here you will find information for parents, class photos, teacher emails, homework assignments, and useful links. Each student will also receive a blue communication folder. One side will be for newsletters or information that can stay at home, and the other side of the folder will be for forms and work that needs to be completed and returned to school. Our class reading log will also be included in the communication folder, as the majority of our homework will be reading, reading and more reading. This folder should be up and running by next week.
We will also be using the Remind App for parent/teacher communication. Please include your email address on the ‘Student Interest’ form so that we can get all the emails uploaded. This is a quick and simple way to send reminders or share a quick note about the day. We have found that this is the best way for parent communication as it is very efficient, and the easiest way to get a hold of us. You will receive an email to sign up shortly.
Both Mrs. Thorne and Ms. Lopez check email regularly. Please email us if you have a question, concern or comment. We would love to meet in person after school, but please make an appointment if you would like to have a longer meeting.
Language Arts ProgramYou may hear your child talk about Reading and Writing Power. Reading/Writing Power is a reading and writing program that will allow your child to learn the strategies needed in order to challenge their skills, or continue to build on strategies needed. Whether your child struggles with reading or writing, or needs to be challenged, this program will help to individualize learning. Our goal, as your children’s teachers, is to provide as much individualized instruction and group opportunities so that each child feels successful. The focus at the beginning of the year will be on strategies and children will then be able to showcase their learning throughout the year through Literature Circles and novel studies. Our major focus will be on Connections, Predictions, Inferences, Questioning, and Visualization. Our spelling program is based on chunk spelling. The basis for "chunk spelling," as you might imagine, is the "chunk." This is the word family for our lesson. Students will create their own lists based on classroom choices and individual levels. Students will have a spelling test every 2 weeks. Students will need to study their words at home. We will be starting the first week with some team building activities and we will let you know when our first spelling unit will commence.
Classroom Philosophy TEAM (Together Everyone Achieves More) is an important component to our class. We work on team building, and we will focus on a new virtue each month. Each student will also be given a class responsibility at the end of each day, which promotes that we are all a part of our team and we work together to make our classroom a collaborative environment. We will also be implementing a classroom economy, where students earn “money” by completing their jobs effectively, and can earn bonus “money” or pay a fine. They will be responsible for a balanced spreadsheet, and they will need to pay a monthly rent for their desks. This will help them gain an understanding of and practice financial literacy.
Homework We understand the time restrictions outside of class time. Homework will consist of nightly reading (30 minutes) with a reading response log, math practice of concepts if needed, and spelling practice (every 2 weeks). Students who do not make good use of class time may also need to take unfinished work home.
Allergies We do have students with severe allergies to nuts at Lynn Fripps Elementary. Please ensure that you are not sending any food or drink items with any of these ingredients.
Supplies If you purchased supplies through the school, they have been organized and labelled for the students. If you have not yet sent supplies to the school, please send them as soon as possible, labelled with your child’s name.
We look forward to working with the Lynn Fripps community of parents, students and staff. It is going to be a wonderful year!!!