IMPORTANT INFORMATION Aluminum Foil WE HAVE ENOUGH FOIL! IMPORTANT DATES December 6: Fun Lunch (Booster Juice) December 8: PD Day - No school for the students December 14: Family Winter Event in the evening December 19: Teacher’s Pet In-Class Presentation & Stations (morning) December 20: Fun Lunch (Boston Pizza) December 20: Report Cards sent home December 21: Winter Party (1:30 - 2:30) December 21: Last School day before Winter Break December 22: PD Day - No school for students OUR DAY 58 days under our belt, 126 days to go! Wednesday started out listening to Elder Shirley Hill, as she shared her life and culture. We started with the smudge protocol (without lighting the sweetgrass). Elder Shirey had been presented with tobacco (kinnikinnick) for her knowledge, which she accepted. During the presentation, students were able to look and touch many artifacts she had personally created, such the regalia for different types of dances, beaded collars, moss bags for babies, and a pouch. Some students were lucky enough to try on some regalia, which they wore for our circle dance. After recess, we practiced our chat pastel skills for our Family Winter Evening Event, coming up December 14th. Students were reminded that chalk is fussy, that sometimes we need to redo our work, and when our work gets “wrecked”, it just means we reflect to learn what NOT to do next time. In the afternoon, we looked at a video for rounding to the nearest 10. We stopped the video frequently and discussed what we were thinking about. We then did a quick shouting game of rounding. Next step will be to introduce rounding to the nearest 100, and then rounding to the nearest 10 in 3-digit numbers. After gym, we had library, and then a student shared a haiku book he had, as we are moving into our Poetry Unit. Cheerios! Ms Lauf “Energy cannot be created or destroyed, it can only be changed from one form to another.”
- Albert Einstein IMPORTANT INFORMATION Aluminum Foil We need aluminum foil for an art project, which will be used as inspiration for a Poetry writing piece we will be doing. IMPORTANT DATES November 29: Elder Shirley Hill December 6: Fun Lunch (Booster Juice) December 8: PD Day - No school for the students December 14: Family Winter Event in the evening December 19: Teacher’s Pet In-Class Presentation & Stations (morning) December 20: Fun Lunch (Boston Pizza) December 20: Report Cards sent home December 21: Winter Party (1:30 - 2:30) December 21: Last School day before Winter Break December 22: PD Day - No school for students OUR DAY 56 days under our belt, 124 days to go! Students had a busy day building functional rocket ships, repainting the Sistine Chapel, and traveling to Peru, with time to spare! Actually, They spent the day exploring number values, word work, drawing and writing how the creature they would change themselves into if they could, and math games. Ms Sunohara was in for me, as I was with the Grade 3 Team (Go Team!) planning our next 6 weeks. I am also away tomorrow, at my Professional Development for the Indigenous Educational Professional Learning Series. Ms Temple will be in. Cheerios! Ms Lauf IMPORTANT INFORMATION Aluminum Foil I am putting out a request for aluminum foil, which will be used as inspiration for a Poetry writing piece we will be doing. IMPORTANT DATES November 29: Elder Shirley Hill OUR DAY 55 days under our belt, 125 days to go! We started our day with all three classes meeting to brainstorm ideas for the Family Winter Evening Event that is coming up December 14th. Grade 3s will be hosting a self-directed photo booth with winter themed props. After music, we finished up the Hi, Koo book, while students ate their yummy looking snacks. The rest of the day was Ketchup and Relish. The whole class has been working really hard on their writing. I am very excited to get these up so they can share them with you. Other Ketchup tasks were finishing up the Ways to Represent Numbers chart and the Crystal Map task, both in their Visual Journals. Oh yeah! We also had a practice run Spelling Assessment, which is part of their Word Pattern learning. My! They were excited to write the quiz. It went very well, and I will begin the word sorts next week Wednesday. Cheerios! Ms Lauf “People love chopping wood. In this activity one immediately sees results.”
- Albert Einstein IMPORTANT INFORMATION Housekeeping Please remind your children to not splash in puddles during school hours, as we do not have changes of clothes, and sitting in wet jeans is truly uncomfortable. I also encourage students to have water bottles to drink out of in the classroom, which reduces the amount of requests for water break interruptions and missing out on instruction/work. Aluminum Foil I am putting out a request for aluminum foil, which will be used as inspiration for a Poetry writing piece we will be doing. IMPORTANT DATES November 29: Elder Shirley Hill OUR DAY 54 days under our belt, 126 days to go! The Best Part of Me Writing is just coming along. They are sweet and mindful pieces of writing. Students are taking the feedback to heart, and are learning grace, perseverance and stamina when the Editor at Large asks for re-writes. Our next step will be to do the photographs. I will teach kids about photographic composition and editing, through proper composition when taking the photograph, and also using the editing tools available in iPhoto. This has been a wonderful springboard into the I am a writer concept, as well as our Poetry Unit, which began today with the reading of Hi, Koo, written and illustrated by John J. Muth. The Poetry Unit will be to support students with figurative language which will come in handy when we begin narrative writing in the new year. We finished our Ways to Represent Numbers lesson, and students that need to add to their chart in their journal will have an opportunity tomorrow during Ketchup & Relish. Students completed their Autumn PoWer Hour sessions. A digital showcase will be up, I believe tomorrow, through the administrative blog. After a rousing gym of Revenge Tag, Silent Statues After Running, and finding out which foot is dominant, we had a Sharing Circle, where students shared with each other what they did in their PoWer Hour. Cheerios! Ms Lauf “I prefer to make up my own quotes and attribute them to very smart people, so that I can use them to win arguments”
- Albert Einstein (Wait... what?) IMPORTANT INFORMATION If all the LEGO bricks ever manufactured were clipped on top of one another, they would make a tower ten times as high as the distance to the Moon. IMPORTANT DATES November 29: Elder Shirley Hill OUR DAY 53 days under our belt, 127 days to go! Math! Rocks! Literacy! Running! Fun Lunch! The One and Only Ivan! Singing! Library! That was our day in a nutshell. Some students put on their critiquing hats, looking at a variety of rocks and minerals websites, and then judging whether it was a good site or not and WHY. Always the WHY. Other students wrote 10 Interesting Facts About Rocks and Minerals. They will continue working on this tomorrow, and then switch to the other station. After music, more students completed their The Best Part of Me writing, and then did a Word Work station. After recess, we dove into the world of Venn diagrams, where table groups were given two different rocks, and they had to use the Physical Properties of Rocks to compare and contrast the two. After lunch, we looked at out three-dimensional crystal shapes they made from nets, and looked at the three different parts: faces, edges, and vertices. As we were looking at the shapes, and then reflecting that the students love building with their creations, I proposed to the class that maybe we could make BIG CRYSTAL STRUCTURES using a variety of nets, different paper, paint, and then they need to figure out what type of fastener to use to hold it together (testing tapes, glues, clips, …). BOOM! Math outcomes! Describe the characteristics of 3-D objects and 2-D shapes, and analyze the relationships among them. BOOM! Science outcomes! Topic A Rocks and Minerals: 3-5 Demonstrate knowledge of materials that comprise Earth’s crust, and demonstrate skill in classifying these materials Topic B - Building with a Variety of Materials: 3-7 Construct structures, using a variety of materials and designs, and compare the effectiveness of the various materials and designs for their intended purposes. Topic C - Testing Materials: 3-8 Evaluate the suitability of different materials and designs for their use in a building task. We also added two more ways to represent a number to our Visual Journal Anchor Chart. We will finish off with the number line tomorrow and dive into playing with our deconstructed numbers. End of day ended with Library and then The One and Only Ivan. Cheerios! Ms Lauf “Do not grow old, no matter how long you live. Never cease to stand like curious children before the Great Mystery into which we were born.”
- Albert Einstein IMPORTANT INFORMATION For school, nothing important to report, but it is important to floss your teeth everyday to avoid the gingivitis. IMPORTANT DATES November 22: Fun Lunch (Opa!) November 29: Elder Shirley Hill OUR DAY 51 days under our belt, 129 days to go! Today was a sparkly day as we explored the world of gemstones. While I wish we were able to create diamonds and rubies, we made the next best thing: detergent crystals. Students selected either an egg carton cup or a pipe cleaner (which they crumpled), tied a string around it, and set it aside. In small groups, we discussed why this process works, how the hot water dissolves the detergent, and that we needed heaps of it to over-saturate the water. While the solution was being mixed, we talked about the importance of following instructions, especially when mixing in chemistry, as we do not want to end up in high school blowing up the lab because we don’t follow the instructions, measure properly, and display unsafe behaviour. After the talk, we added in the colour, then placed our egg carton cup/crumpled pipe cleaner into the solution, hanging it off of a popsicle stick. And now we wait. We wait for 24 hours, take it out of the solution, and then let it dry to harden for two days. The kidlets are truly excited about this. Our next step will be for them to document the process in their visual journals. We also worked on our portraits, with today’s lesson focusing on line weight due to pressure. I believe students have a better understanding about how much pressure they are exerting when using a pencil, and hopefully this will help them decrease muscle fatigue and increase their stamina. In the afternoon, we looked at some pattern rules, doing a Scoot Pattern Activity, where they walk to different tables to solve the problems. We tied it into the number line, and skip counting, as well as how the hundred chart can help us see and solve the pattern. After gym, we added a couple more elements onto our Ways to Represent Numbers chart. We have tow more to go, and then off we go! There will be a substitute teacher in for me in the morning. I chatted with the students about behaviour expectations, and work expectations. They will be doing things they have done before, so nothing will be a surprise. Cheerios! Ms Lauf “I thought of that while riding my bicycle.”
- Albert Einstein IMPORTANT INFORMATION PD DAY There is a PD Day tomorrow, so no school for the students. IMPORTANT DATES November 17: PD Day - No School November 22: Fun Lunch (Opa!) November 29: Elder Shirley Hill OUR DAY 50 days under our belt, 130 days to go! Foggy, blizzard, sunshine. Calgary weather certainly keeps us on our toes. Students are putting their finishing details on their The Best Part of Me Writing, or they have finished them. I am excited to see their writing paired with their photographs. Students explored gemstones today, learning that they are created with a mineral and impurities, such as iron, aluminum, or copper. They were given an information card for their birthstone. Students found out the mineral composition of their birthstone, as well as the hardness, and crystal habit or shape. We also learned about some of the symbolism that we have attributed to them. Next steps will be to further explore the crystal habits (e.g., What is a tetragonal habit?) through nets. We will discuss face shapes, edges, and vertices that make the habits. On Monday, we will be creating crystals, and talking about how they form, why they form, and how can we test what the mineral composition is. Students attended PoWer Hour today, followed by gym. A reminder that there is no school tomorrow. Cheerios! Ms Lauf “Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.” - Albert Einstein IMPORTANT INFORMATION Scholastic Book Orders November Scholastic Book Orders are due tomorrow!! IMPORTANT DATES November 16: November Scholastic Book Order Due November 17: PD Day - No School November 22: Fun Lunch (Opa!) November 29: Elder Shirley Hill OUR DAY 49 days under our belt, 131 days to go! First you form the Earth, form, form the Earth First you form the Earth, form, form the Earth Then you SLICE THE EARTH! SLICE, SLICE THE EARTH! Today, we made the Grade 3 version of the Earth’s layers (inner core, outer core, mantle, crust), which, we learned is the chemical version of the layers. We watched a short video about the different layers. I will admit, it was above our pay grade, BUT we stopped it many times and talked about what was being said. And did we talk! I actually had to persuade the kidlets to end the discussion so we could create our plasticine Earths. We have decided that this topic will be added to our Day of Discussions. We also worked on different activities for our Word Work, such as putting the words into alphabetical order, building words with letter tiles, or writing our words in code for a friend to figure out. We started our anchor chart for Ways to Represent Numbers in our visual journal, which will help them with a Literacy station called Number of the Week. We will finish this up tomorrow. This is what their charts will look like. About half the class is writing out their good copy of The Best Part of Me. We will get our pictures done, printed, and then have them on display in the classroom.
While this does not look like a full day, it really was. Cheerios! Ms Lauf “In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity”
- Albert Einstein IMPORTANT INFORMATION Food Band Collection We are still looking for donations for the Food Drive. Dec. 4 – 15 Mayor’s Xmas Food Drive This year will be the 29th annual food drive to support the Calgary Food Bank. Scholastic Book Orders Scholastic Book Orders are due on November 16th. IMPORTANT DATES November 16: November Scholastic Book Order Due November 17: PD Day - No School November 22: Fun Lunch (Opa!) November 29: Elder Shirley Hill OUR DAY 48 days under our belt, 132 days to go! What a day! Experiments! Wee drawings! Predictions! Rain! Flooding! Erosion! We have been growing beautiful spring-green grass for our erosion science experiment. Students wrote predictions of what they think will happen when it rains on our hill of dirt and our hill of dirt with grass. They sketched the two pans, and then The big sponge in the sky opened up. We made many discoveries, such as the dirt under the grass was soaking wet before the rain; the dirt pile was bone-dry under less then 0.5 cm of rain coming down; dirt, pebbles, and rocks travel down with the rain. We discussed how these findings impact our lives, resources, and jobs. We related the erosion of the dirt pile to the erosion of rocks. We talked about how choices made today impact our lives 40 years later. Folks, I have to tell you, it is something special when every single child is thinking about what they see and are hearing. As a result, we have all decided we would like a Day of Discussions. Students are also recreating the rock cycle in their visual journals. They have looked at many different rock cycle infographics, compared rocks, reenacted the cycle, and learned the vocabulary. Now they will cement the small sediments of information, amalgamate their knowledge, so the heat and pressure of not knowing extrudes out, only to be replace with a metamorphic change in thinking. A rock solid day of learning. Cheerios! Ms Lauf “You never fail until you stop trying.”
- Albert Einstein IMPORTANT INFORMATION Food Band Collection We are still looking for donations for the Food Drive. 1. Nov. 1 –14 Veteran’s Food Drive Since 2007, the Canadian Legacy Project has presented the Annual Veterans Food Drive in support of the Veterans Food Bank and the Calgary Poppy Fund. The support we have received from the Calgary community has been amazing and we have successfully filled two warehouses with food at the Calgary Veterans Food Bank annually, which equates to roughly $300,000 in food donations. As a part of this fundraising initiative we also receive cash donations which are used to purchase Calgary Co-Op food cards which veterans can use to purchase fresh produce, meats, and pharmaceutical products. A key component to the Annual Veterans Food Drive is educating our youth about the sacrifices made by our veterans. In partnership with The Calgary Board of Education (CBE), event information is sent to all schools. The CBE encourages the faculty and students to raise funds and food for the Annual Veterans Food Drive. 2. Dec. 4 – 15 Mayor’s Xmas Food Drive This year will be the 29th annual food drive to support the Calgary Food Bank. IMPORTANT DATES November 17: PD Day - No School November 22: Fun Lunch (Opa!) November 29: Elder Shirley Hill OUR DAY 47 days under our belt, 133 days to go! Perseverance is the word of the day. Many students expressed frustration when learning about the rock cycle. This lead to a discussion about working through the frustration, and not letting it get hold of us. We talked about strategies (e.g., looking at the information we are learning, thinking about it, talking it through, re-doing, asking questions, …) that could help us make it to the other side. With the rock cycle, we accessed our past few weeks of hand-on experiences (George’s presentation, Indianna Jane, rocks in the classroom, life experience) to fit it into the rock cycle. I pulled out a small part of my personal collection, having the students compare the rocks, and thinking about how they fit in with the different stages and the 3 different types of rocks. Students will be creating their own rock cycle in their visual journals, showing how diagrams/flowcharts/infographics is one type of scientific literacy. We also created human number lines, and then talked abut any patterns that they see. We also touched base on how number lines can help you with addition and subtraction. Again, there was some frustration as a new concept is being introduced. I reassured the class that this is normal, and that we will have lots of practice to help us become old hands at it. I also introduced the students to how our Word Work Groups will work. I will continue working with them as a whole class, so we can begin our groups next week. Cheerios! Ms Lauf |
AuthorMs Lauf Archives
June 2018
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