Building a strong academic vocabulary is essential for your child's future success in school and beyond. To support their learning, we are focusing on three key strategies as part of our School Development Plan this year. First, we teach academic vocabulary by introducing important words in all subjects, explaining their meanings, providing examples, and helping students break down unfamiliar words through decoding and word origins. Next, we model and scaffold vocabulary by consistently using subject-specific terms and providing helpful tools like word walls, concept maps, and visual organizers to reinforce understanding. Finally, we reinforce vocabulary by regularly integrating and repeating key terms, helping students retain what they’ve learned and gain confidence in using academic language.  By strengthening their vocabulary skills, we are giving students the tools they need to express ideas clearly, think critically, and succeed in all areas of learning. 

Our Grade 1 students have been learning about landmarks as part of their Social Studies exploration on communities and places. Landmarks are special features that help us recognize and understand a place. Students are learning that landmarks can be natural, such as mountains, rivers, forests, and lakes, or human-made, such as buildings, parks, bridges, and pathways.

As part of this learning, students are also building their Social Studies vocabulary. They are practicing and using words such as landmark, natural, human-made, prairie and map. Developing this vocabulary helps students talk about and describe the places around them with greater confidence and understanding.

Through discussions, stories, and learning tasks, students are exploring some of the important landmarks in our local community and thinking about why these places matter to the people who live here. They are also learning that many landmarks have special meaning in Indigenous cultures, and that First Nations, Métis, and Inuit peoples often share stories and traditional names connected to the land.

Students are identifying familiar landmarks, sharing why certain places are important to them, and creating drawings or simple maps that include landmarks they recognize.

Sincerely,

Angela McPhee

Principal