It's a Leap Year!

Dear children,

It just occurred to me after school that today is 29 February, and this date comes only once in 4 years! Today's also Dex's birthday, so it must be a really special day for him! I've included a video I found on Youtube that talks about Leap Years. It's a little fast so hope you can still understand it!

For today, we had our lessons as per usual, we went through our comprehension practice and I asked this question:

Can we use "Because" at the start of our sentence?

Sample Question: Why did Ailing help the old man?
Incomplete Answer: Because she was a kind girl. X
                                 It is because she was a kind girl. X
Explanation: These are not complete answers.

Complete answers look like this:

• Ailing helped the old man because she was a kind girl.
• Because Ailing was a kind girl, she helped the old man.
• Ailing was a kind girl.

You can start your sentences with 'Because' only if you continue with the main clause.

I recommend that you go straight to the point and say that Ailing was a kind girl. You will still be able to get the full mark for that question.

Hope this clears things up!

Love,

Mrs Soh

Revision for English

Dear children,

Do get familiar with the TR paper format and see if you can complete the paper in 1 hour. Things to take note for each section:

Vocabulary MCQ and Cloze Passage: 
Learn the meanings of the words in our Spelling list

Grammar MCQ and Cloze Passage:
Highlight keywords that tells us -

1. Subject Verb agreement (Singular Nouns need Singular Verbs 'Super S')
2. Tense (was, yesterday, last week gives us clues that we use the past tense)

Comprehension MCQ & Open-ended

Highlight keywords in the questions that tell us:

1. Who (Person), What (Thing), Where (Place), When (Time), How (Manner)
2. Tense (was, did - past tense)

Bring back questions on Monday if you have!

Sincerely,

Mrs Soh

EL TR 1 Format

Dear children,

Reminder that next Friday, 4 March 2016, will be our TR 1 for English.

These are the components that will be test:

1. Vocabulary - 3 MCQ
2. Grammar - 3 MCQ
3. Vocabulary Cloze - 4 Q
4. Grammar Cloze - 4 Q
5. Comprehension - 2 MCQ and 1 open-ended

You will be tested on the first 2 units: Bubble Trouble and A Butterfly is Born for vocabulary and grammar MCQ. The other sections will be general English questions.

We will be having more practices tomorrow and next week. Remember to revise your work!

Sincerely,
Mrs Soh

Pronouns

Dear children,

Let's revise our pronouns! Watch the video to recall what pronouns are and try the Grammar WB exercise on your own. Remember to highlight the keywords!

Also, I'll be checking your English files again tomorrow. These should be filed in your blue English file with all corrections done and signed:

1) Unit 1: Bubble Trouble
2) Unit 2: A Butterfly is Born
3) Unit 3: Beware of the Cat!
4) Reading Practice
5) Reading Assessment Rubrics

Some of you did not bring your thermometers during the last temperature-taking exercise. Please make sure that you have a working thermometer in your bag at all times. See you tomorrow!

Sincerely,
Mrs Soh

Simple Present Tense and Simple Past Tense

Can you remember when we use present tense and past tense? Remember to highlight the keywords that tells you that!

PAL Sports and Games Lesson 6

We learnt to create our own games! Can you remember how each team's game is played?

SPD Charity Hongbao

Dear parents,

Thank you for your generosity! I would have messaged you personally to acknowledge your donation. Please let me know if you have donated and I have not messaged you, it means that I did not receive it. This is how it looks like:

Sincerely,
Mrs Soh

Countable and Uncountable Nouns

Dear children, 

Let's recap what we learnt today for English!

Man Min also brought up the word 'homophones' when we were talking about how to pronounce the word 'flour'. 'Flour' and 'Flower' have the same pronunciation but they have different spelling and meanings. They are homophones.

Revise what we have learnt by going through your Grammar Handbook, which has many exercises that you can work on. Remember to ask me when you have questions!

:) Mrs Soh

It's Friday!

Today's updates:

1. We went through the story of 'The Ant and The Grasshopper' again and talked about the moral of the story. Do you remember what did the grasshopper learn? 

We linked it to being able to plan our time wisely as well. We helped Alif plan his time and for our weekend homework we are going to plan our own!

2. We used Microsoft Word during our Computer Lab lessons to change the colour of the font, underline words and add bullets.

3. During recess, as part of the Water Awareness Week, a photobooth was set up for us to take photos with the mascots! It reminds us to drink lots of water! I managed to capture some of you in action!

4. For English, we revised our subject verb agreement. Remember, when the noun is singular, the verb that comes after must be singular as well! Super S!

See you next week, have a great weekend!

Love,

Mrs Soh

Big Book: Bad Dreams

We read a new big book today, 'Bad Dreams'. Small books have been given to member no. 4 of each group.

Check out this website where you are able to play mini-games to learn more about the vocabulary used in the book!

Have fun!

Sincerely,
Mrs Soh

Past Tense

Dear children,

Can you remember when to use the past tense when we write?

1. Always look out for keywords that tell you when the action or event happened.

e.g. We use past tense when we see:
yesterday, last night, last week, last month, last year, this morning, this afternoon


2. Check for verb groups. 

e.g. [ did not run ]

did already tells us that the action is in the past. We do not need to repeat the past tense, so we write 'run' instead of ran.

e.g. Priya completed her Maths homework but did not complete her English homework last night.



See you tomorrow!
:) Mrs Soh

Collective Nouns

Dear children,

We went back to collective nouns again, but this time we looked into the use of singular or plural verbs.

The group of pupils is dancing to the music.

A bunch of bananas is hanging on the tree. 

When there is only 1 group, we use the singular verb 'is'.

The two groups of pupils are dancing to the music.

Three bunches of bananas are hanging on the tree.

Where there are 2 groups or more, we use the plural verb 'are'.

We will come back to this again tomorrow. See you!

Sincerely,

Mrs Soh

PAL Sports and Games Lesson 5

Total Defence Day 2016

Dear children,

I think we did great for our first performance for the year! For some of us, it was our first time performing while for the others it was one of the many times on stage. Regardless of our experience, I hope we had all learnt something valuable from the experience, and that this shared experience will be a great and positive one for us.

Today, you will be able to hear the "Important Message" signal at 6.20 pm instead of the usual 12.05 pm. This is to mark the time when Singapore fell into the hands of the Japanese 74 years ago. Click on the picture below to go to the SCDF website to listen to the siren and to find out more.

You may also want to check out the Total Defence Website for the latest music video of the song, "There's a Part for Everyone".

http://www.mindef.gov.sg/imindef/mindef_websites/topics/totaldefence/campaigns/TD2016.html

:) Mrs Soh