Month: February 2016

Hello Everyone,

Please read the notice regarding our field trip on February 26th, Friday. You can find it here if you did not receive one.

Today we began by reading some articles out of the book Inquiry: A Guide to 21st Century Learning. This is a grade 4/5 level book that I use to help students break down the skills they need to do inquiry and research things they want to know more about. The first section was on listening skills. What does active listening look like?

• Be positive
• Make eye contact & use active listening body language
• Listen for signal words
• Think about what is being said
• Take brief notes (but focus on listening more)
• Write down questions and ask them at an appropriate time
• Review the speaker’s message after listening to ensure you understood
• Avoid poor listening habits such as daydreaming or giving up on a speaker’s ideas. Hear them out.

Thank you to Peter’s mom who came in today for 30 minutes to talk about her experience emigrating from Syria and to explain her work as a consultant helping people to immigrate into Canada. This provided us with a great opportunity to use listening and interviewing skills.

The second article from the book was about Taking Notes and Citing Sources. For science, each student will choose an animal that migrates and learn more about it. They will be using the iPad app Puppet Pals to make a mini presentation about that information. In preparation, students were asked to research the answers to these questions we brainstormed together (put your research with each question in your notes and include a source!):

• How does the animal migrate?
• Where does it live and travel when migrating (migration route)?
• Why does it migrate?
• What “cues” or tells it to migrate?
• What biomes does it live in?
• What does it look like?
• What is the animal’s scientific name?
• What is the animal’s diet?
• What type of animal is it? (mammal, reptile, etc.)
• Five AWESOME facts about the animal that we would not already know.

We will be performing our Reader’s Theatre on Friday, so please make sure you bring any costume or prop items before then. Tonight, scripts are going home so everyone can practice lines. They don’t have to be memorized, just well rehearsed.

Scholastic Orders due Friday, February 5th.

Tuning In Article Reflections due Friday, February 12th.

Hello Everyone!

Well, the groundhog did not see his shadow! That is good news — early spring!

Today, we began by preparing props and costumes for our Reader’s Theatre pieces being performed on Friday for Literacy Week. Please remember that any props or costumes you are bringing from home need to be here tomorrow so we can practice with them.

We will be starting a new round of Tuning In articles. Under the Articles of Interest section of the blog, look at the links under Unit 3 Migration and Science. Students are asked to reflect on six of those links. Four of them must be reading articles, but up to two of them can be videos. Please remember to 1. report briefly on what you read so I know you read the article, but more importantly, 2. tell me what you think! To reflect means to connect to the article in some way, writing down your thoughts. Questions are okay, but the reflection should not be a list of questions. Show some deeper thinking about what you are reading. If the article is not one you can reflect on deeply because it is not interesting to you, move on to another choice.

Unit Work today involved discussing the many, larger groups of immigrants that have come into Canada. These include, but are not limited to:

• French Immigrants (1627-1760)
• United Empire Loyalists (1775 – 1790)
• Irish Immigrants (1820 – 1850)
• Asian Immigrants (1870 – 1914)
• Eastern European Immigrants (1870 – 1914)
• Jewish Immigrants (1919 – 1945)
• Political Refugees (1960 – present)
• Economic Immigrants/Refugees (1980 – present)

We split into groups to do a think, pair, share, meaning students read about one group to find out the push and pull factors involved in their immigration story. They have a sheet to fill out that will help them report to the class about that particular group.

After our guest teacher read a book for literacy week, we began our science work talking about migration cues for animals. What lets an animal know they need to migrate? We discussed seasonal cues, magnetic fields, and more. Students were asked to watch the videos at this link for four different animals that migrate. Then, determine which cues we talked about apply to the animals, recording answers on the migration cues sheet provided in class. For homework, please think about what animal that migrates you would like to investigate further!

Tomorrow, don’t forget to wear pajamas and bring a favourite stuffie if you want! As part of Literacy Week, we will have random drop everything and read moments throughout the day, during which you need to have a book available, we will drop what we are doing, and we will read in our pajamas. Ms. D is bringing a book, too, so make sure you have something to read.

Oh, and Peter’s Mom is coming to talk about immigration tomorrow! I look forward to hearing from her about her work with Canadian immigrants.

Have a great night!

 

Hello Everyone!

Today began our activities for LITERACY WEEK and we had a great session reading with our grade 2/3 buddy class and Ms. Lee. We also practiced our reader’s theatre scripts, as Division 5 will be doing presentations of these for other classes in the school on Friday. We are doing the stories Stephanie’s Ponytail and Mortimer by Robert Munsch, the story No Bath Tonight by Jane Volen, and The Wizard, the Fairy, and the Magic Chicken by Helen Lester. Students have been asked to begin looking for prop and costume items at home, although we will spend time in class making most of what we need.

Special thank you to Adrian’s mom Jane who came in to talk about her immigration experience with the students today. We also had the opportunity to talk about active listening skills and how to do an interview, as each student was asked to come up with a question to ask. When students do their final project of the year, they will be required to do research that not only involves books and the web, but also relies on an expert! They will need to know how to do an interview and take notes, so we will practice this before then. Anyone have an immigration experience they want to share? Please let me know as it will help us develop these skills!

Students had an opportunity to put new questions on the wonderings board regarding our unit, so that Ms. D would know what everyone is interested in for future classes. There were great questions about how animal migration affects human migration, how genes help us understand the journey of humans in the world, and how the study of past human migration is helpful to us now. Thank you everyone for the deep thinking around these questions! Homework is to finish the immigrant thoughts sheet, putting yourself in the shoes of an immigrant to another country.

We also worked on our Quilt of Belonging squares. Please continue to look for symbols that could be helpful to your quilt square!

Library is tomorrow. Several students have overdue books, so please look at home and bring them in!

If you have any Words Competition entries, please bring them in. We have received an extension to bring them in, as long as they get in before Friday.

Have a great night!