JANUARY2 0 1 7
Welcome back to school! The Christmas season ends and the New Year begins!
In the New Year, we look once again at the life of Jesus and his renewed
presence in our lives for resolution and guidance. What resolutions is your family
planning to make for the New Year? Chinese families are lucky. They have a
few more weeks to think about making resolutions before Chinese New Year
begins. New Year in the Church actually started on the First Sunday of Advent in
December.
Some ideas for New Year’s resolutions, in which the whole family can participate,
are:
1) Go to bed earlier (parents and children).
2) Breathe consciously. Learn different kinds of breathing. Practice
together. For example, inhale for a count of 4, hold for 2, exhale.
3) Connect together each morning before giving directions. Be consciously
thankful for life, breath, safety, a place to live and heat in the house.
Count your blessings every day.
4) Exercise your bodies. Walk together. Put on music and dance. Take a
class at the community centre, such as badminton or martial arts. Parents
may resolve to participate and have fun too, instead of reducing their role
to driving and waiting.
5) Exercise your souls. Pray together. Sit and read scripture. Take
meditation walks. Meditate silently together on the Holy Family and how
they relate to one another and to others outside the family. Start with one
minute a day. Increase one minute per week up to 15 minutes.
6) Become storytellers. Each family member looks for and learns to tell one
short story a month, or an anecdote, joke, poem, or fairy tale.
7) Resolve to be on time for school, for appointments, or for social visits.
Being on time demonstrates respect for each other.
8) Watch less T.V. and play less video games, both of which do little for
intellectual stimulation, and which can contribute to a person’s lack of
concentration. Replace these activities with fun family games or individual
quiet time, such as reading, drawing, painting or listening to music.
December Highlights
Grade 2 studentshadafun-filledandproductiveDecember. Studentsperformed“I’m
Gonna Be Santa’s Tree” at our annual Christmas performance. Students
enjoyed preparing for and participating in this show.
In December, we learned about winter holidays in celebrated in other parts of the
world (such as Hanukkah and Kwanzaa). We also had the opportunity to create
Christmas presents for our parents.
In January and beyond
In Science, Grade 2 students will begin a unit on water and the water cycle. Later
in the termwe will have High Touch High Tech scientists visit our classroomand
participate in the program “Water Works”.
In Math, we will be working on patterning (identifying the core and continuing the
pattern), geometry (identifying 2-D shapes), probability and data management
(sorting rules) and measurement.
In Language Arts this term, we will be beginning to study Adrienne Gear’s
Reading Power Program.This program “provides students with the tools to
become more thoughtful and meaningful readers as well as how to become …
aware of their thinking while they read.” Our focus this term will be the
“visualizing” concept (making a picture in your head of what you are reading).
Students will soon begin practicing their poems for the school Speech Arts
competition. Students should keep their poem sheets in their planners at all
times, except for when they are practicing at home and practicing daily at school.
After practicing, students should put their poem right back into their planner
pockets so that we don’t have an issue about students losing their sheets.
Students should practice being loud, clear, and expressive. For more
information, please refer to the separate sheet about speech arts and options
available to students.