Asalaamu'alykum Dear Parents,
Welcome back! Some updates from last week.
After returning from the winter break on Monday I had students participate in a fun and interactive ice-breaker activity to reconnect and get to know how they spent their break. This did take away their gym period but I've promised to give it back next week, inshaAllah.
This month's character is honesty. Our initial discussion was about what it means to be honest. Some of our answers were: honesty means to be truthful, morally correct, free from lying and hardworking. The effects of being honest are shown in one's demeanor, honest people are more calm and relaxed as opposed to being anxious and fearful while telling lies. We then spoke about how the prophet (saw), his family and his companions demonstrated this attribute in their everyday lives. For msulims acting honestly is an honorable thing to do and we should never be hesitant to tell the truth. Our take away lesson was: honesty starts with ourselves because if we can be honest with ourselves we can be honest with Allah and others.
Math: We reviewed everything we know about time. We talked about different elements of time, explained their functions, discussed the role of the hour hand and minute hand. Students practiced telling time by the hour, half hour, quarter to/past and in 5 minute intervals on a digital and analogue clock. They watched related videos to consolidate their understanding and answered the following questions: What time is it? Where does the minute hand point? Where does the hour hand point? They also practiced writing time using words for eg: 2:30 would be half-past 2, 4:45 would be quarter-to 5 and 8:15 would be quarter-past 8.
Language/Science: Alhumdulilah last week we dedicated our time to finish all sections of our apple books: what apples "can" "have" "are", K-W-L (what we know, what we want to know and what we have learned), life-cycle, seasons, and my favourite kind of apple. We also managed to successfully complete our in-class project about green sea turtles. Students put their best work in to compiling all the necessary information related to this fascinating reptile with a smooth carapace.
Science: Students are now learning all about amphibians. We watched a national geographic video for kids about how amphibians begin their life in water with gills and tails then develop lungs and legs for their life on land. We identified several of their characteristics but will continue exploring more unique facts in the upcoming week and compare/contrast them to reptiles inshaAllah.
Writing: I prepared a writing prompt by the title "All About My Winter Break". Students wrote 6-7 sentences (some wrote upto 10!) in their writing journals to describe what they did and how much they enjoyed their time with family and friends. As always, while writing they were encouraged to pay close attention to punctuation, capitalization and expressing complete thoughts.
Spelling Test: On Friday, January 20th we will resume with our weekly spelling test. The words they will practice have consonant blends with the letters "l" and "r": grass, trunk, truck, flew, flat, class, plate, from, glove and friend.
BONUS: time, minute, hour, analogue and digital
Islamic Studies: We've come to a close with our wudu books as well. All incomplete items have been completed. Students will have a salah party by the end of next week on Friday with 2B inshaAllah where we will play games including a fun salah quiz, names associated to the position of prayer etc. I will send more details on that this coming Tuesday. Next week we will be starting a new chapter on salah.
Reminders:
Please encourage your children to read on RazKids for 20 minutes every day.
All library items should be returned as per the due dates.
Marked social studies projects, homework and spelling tests will be sent home next week inshaAllah.
JazakAllah khayr.
