Welcome Back from Spring Break We have many exciting events and activities planned for our last term of the school year. Please visit our Class Schedule and Calendars page for more details. I am also hoping to organize a few field trips using public transit or walking to our nearby parks, Ravine Park, Quilchena Park, and UBC endowment lands. I am hoping to keep the costs of the field trips low, as we have other in-school activities happening as well. (More information to come.) As you know, students have started their Historica projects. A reminder that they will receive a great deal of in-class time to work on the projects because they are group projects and because they cover learning skills in social studies, reading, writing, oral speaking, and career education. Students are working in groups, but will have individual assignments that will be marked individually and in parts over the next two months. As has been the case all year, students will be encouraged to read my feedback and to make additions and changes to their work up until the final due date and presentation. Please feel free to ask your child to bring home his/her Historica handouts or read the information I have posted under Assignments and Projects. I am looking forward to a busy and productive next three months.
Parent Support at Home
In general, I do not assign homework, but encourage all students to read for 20 minutes (grade 4) and 30 minutes (grade 5) every night, as well as to practice basic multiplication and division facts. At times, your child may also bring home assignments that were not completed at school. However, if you child is working for more than 30 minutes at his or her homework and is still unable to complete it, please allow them to stop and write me a note in his or her agenda and I will check in with them the next day. In order to prepare your child for later years where there is more homework, it is a good idea to begin a homework routine. Please take the time to find a quiet, well-lit place in your home that your child can use to do his or her homework. It also helps to find a consistent time each day, when homework will be completed. For example, your child could finish their homework while you are making dinner. This way, students get time to play outside after school, while it is light out, but are working on homework before they are too tired. Home reading can be saved for just before going to bed as a way of winding down from the day.
Other ways for you to support your child's learning:
talk about current events or newspaper articles around the dinner table
ask specific questions about what your child is learning at school, books your child is reading, or what your child is doing with his or her friends
enroll your child in one or two (at the most) programs of interest other than school, for example, sports, choir, musical instruments, art, or other community centre programs.
visit the library regularly and support your child in finding interesting books they can read on their own
read with your child and talk about the characters, the problems the characters are having and interesting vocabulary
Reporting and Student Competency Scale The Vancouver School Board will require all teachers to use the new reporting guidelines this year. This is an initiative created to help district reporting practices better align with the redesigned BC curriculum. Please see the website, http://go.vsb.bc.ca/schools/ltm/Pages/default.aspx#pptparents, for more information. I have also included a snapshot of the Student Competency Scale, which is used in place of percentages and grades.