Good afternoon!

We started off the day today with language where the students worked on poetry writing.  As a class we brainstormed everything that we could think of on the topic of Thanksgiving Day.  Then as a class we chose our favourite items and added them into a poem.  It was a lot of fun to work through this activity together.  After we had our class examples the students were asked to individually create their own poems of a topic of their choice in their Ontario Writing books.  We then moved on to working with sentence construction, punctuation and rules of capitalization in our Language books.  The students finished off their language period by working on cursive.
During our Unit of Inquiry today we began to explore the topic of urbanization.  As a class we came up with a definition.  We drew diagrams and labeled the diagram to help explore the issue.  The students began coming up with points to support and to argue against urbanization.  We were then joined by Mrs. Haag's Grade 4 class where the students took place in a formal debate.  They became MPP's in the Queens Park and were asked to debate the introduction of a new Bill that dealt with urbanization.  The students had a lot of fun debating this topic.  Ask your child tonight what side of the debate they were on and why!  I have a picture included below of the students at the debate.
During math today the children went back and reviewed the multiple ways we can represent a number in the hundreds place.  Students were asked to represent the number using pictures, using base-ten numbers, and by shifting the value of each place back and forth.  Students are asked to practice this concept in their Homework and Practice books tonight.

The students also went to PE, Art and French classes today.

Homework: Read for 2o minutes and record in the reading log, practice weekly spelling words,  and math pages 22 - 23.

Important information:  Tomorrow is the first Casual Day at SJA!  Students are able to come to school wearing their casual clothes as long as they have paid their fee for the year.

A boy in our class came home with the wrong SJA uniform pants last week after changing in PE class. His name is marked in his pants. Please check your son's pants at home to make sure they are wearing the correct pants and did not take home the wrong pair. This boy has a pair of pants he needs to trade back once his pants are located.

A girl in Mrs. Haag's Grade 4 class is missing her SJA cardigan.  It is labeled with her name.  Please check for this missing cardigan at home.

Please make sure that all articles of the uniform are clearly marked with your child's name. It is almost impossible to tell these pieces apart once there is a mix-up. The only way for your child's uniform to stay sorted is to ensure it is clearly marked.

The Terry Fox run is happening at SJA on Thursday, September 26th. Students are asked to collect pledges for this event which will be donated to the Canadian Cancer Society. Pledge forms went home with all students last week. If you have pledge money collected please send it into the school. Pledges can be collected up until the morning of the 26th when the run takes place. For more information please contact Mr. Browning at rbrowning@stjudesacademy.com.


We are looking to have small boxes collected for an upcoming project in our Unit of Inquiry. The students are going to be asked to build small scale rural and urban communities. Please help us with this project by collecting and sending in small boxes that we can use. Please see the form sent home yesterday for more information.

Best regards,

Mrs. Nelson