Sunday 23 April 2017

Updates and Reminders

Asalaamu'alykum Dear Parents,

Hope you all are well inshaAllah. Below are some updates from the last couple weeks of class.

Math: We started and ended our unit on probability- a measure of the likelihood that an event will occur using mathematical language such as likely, unlikely, possible, impossible and certain. It took only a week and half to grasp the concept of the different types of probability. They wrote the definition of each type in their math journals, watched videos, completed corresponding exercises in their math activity books and even came up with their own sentences using the appropriate type to comfortably express their predictions.

Language: We've been on an exciting new journey for the past 2 weeks in Language Arts class since we started our novel study unit. The book we're reading is called Fantastic Mr.Fox by Roald Dahl. Before delving into the book we went over the importance of reading and created a mind map as a class. After establishing why it's important to read, we went over the key story elements in every fiction novel: characters (protagonists/antagonists), setting, problem and solution. I read aloud chapters 1-3 and the students pointed out the story elements, made predictions/inferences, summarized the main idea of each chapter and also presented their group work to describe character traits of some of the characters we've been introduced to so far. Before reading ahead, students completed an online quiz in the computer lab (10 multiple questions based on chapters 1-3). Last week we covered 2 more chapters and inshaAllah will work on comprehension worksheets in the upcoming week (all related to main idea, characters and setting).

Spelling: Spelling test for Lesson 28 was taken up on Friday. For next week's spelling test (Thursday, April 27th) I've given them the following words from Lesson 29 "Words with Vowel Pairs": beat, roads, mean, lay, main, lower, pie, tie, toes, read.

Art: We worked on a spring theme last week "April Showers Bring May Flowers" where we learned how to draw flowers using different coloured construction paper rather than plain old markers and color pencils. To really get it right we watched a video 2-3 times to see how its done. They did a fantastic job and it turned out to be a vibrant collection once I put them on display. Job well done mashaAllah.

Science: I will be starting a new unit on simple machines. We'll look at their impact and identify movement as an outcome of energy.

Social Studies: For the last two weeks we've been busy exploring interesting facts related to the planet's 7 continents and 5 oceans. We've learned to identify them on a map, watched a video describing their various differences and played an interactive game called "Roll a Map".

Islamic Studies: The story of Prophet Nuh (as) has been our main focus for the last couple of weeks now. Students completed workbook activities as well as other activities. These activities were broken down into one or two sections focusing on particular points in the story for better understanding of what they have read so far in class.  


Reminders:

- Homework packs are due next Thursday, April 27th
- Please inform your children to return any soon to be due (or due) library books
- Please encourage your children to read on RazKids for 20 minutes everyday


JazakAllah khayr.