E-Port #4: Probability

Title:  Probability

Questions:

What is probability and why do you think we learn about it?

Explain why the probability of something is between zero and one on a number line.

Name four words associated with probability and what they mean.

Is Rock, Paper, Scissors a fair game?

What is the difference between theoretical and experimental probability?

If I chose a random student from the class, what is the probability they would have a zuma chair for the day? (give fraction, decimal, and percentage)

If I chose a random student from the class, what is the probability they would be at table four? (give fraction, decimal, and percentage)

If I chose a random student from the class, what is the probability the person would be you?  (give fraction, decimal, and percentage)

Make up another “random student” choice from our class and give me the probability of that choice. (fraction, decimal, and percentage)

End of Systems Unit Fall 2023: ADST Game Project

Hello!

Final assignment for our first unit of the year! Report Cards are coming up fast for the end of term one!

Students will be put in groups to create a game to teach people how their personal choices are connected to the health of their body.

The game needs to:

  • Show your knowledge from the unit, so you need to use your binder and journal as a resource,
  • Teach someone in grade 3 or higher how they can make positive personal choices that help the interconnected system of the human body (we will play the games with our buddy class),
  • Be a board game or 3-dimensional game (try to avoid having a game with too many cards, as they take a long time to make — no games that are cards only, as this is an ADST project and needs to involve building),
  • Have a winner for the game after less than 30 minutes of play,
  • Be easy to explain and play right away, rather than having a ton of instructions,
  • Include a set of instructions and all playing pieces,
  • Be attractive and aesthetic so people will WANT to play the game (we will look at some examples in class), and
  • Be finished and ready to play by December 5th, Tuesday. 

Here are the steps to make the game:

Step One  Make up a theme for the game and think about how you will teach what we have learned in the unit about personal choices. We will brainstorm some themes together in class, so feel free to use one of those or make up your own.

Step Two  Create the rules of the game. Write them down as a draft in your journal, then someone in your group needs to type them up.

Step Three  Look at materials we have available, or what materials you could bring from home like cardboard and recyclables. Do not purchase anything to make the game. use existing materials. Think about how much time you have to build. Then, make a draft of what the game will look like in your drawing book and create a list of the materials you will need to gather. I can provide dice, timers, and some spinners, if needed, and we have a lot of items that can serve as play tokens, so again, no need to purchase anything new.

Step Four   Make the game. As you find issues with construction, don’t worry about changing your idea, but keep track of how much time you have to build so it is finished on time and meets criteria.

Step Five   Add playing pieces and think about how to store the game so pieces are not lost. Can you create an aesthetic way to store the game?

Step Six    Find someone to play the game with. Have them evaluate your game. Evaluate yourself on the rubric I provide for you. Turn the rubric in to Ms. D. Play the game with our Buddy Class.

Tips and Ideas:

  • Always remember simple is better. If a game is easy, it will be more fun to play.
  • Add a start and a finish space.
  • Borrow ideas from other games and make them better – don’t just copy, but do use ideas you have seen before and morph them into your own!
  • Add spaces where you have to draw a card, but do not make too many cards. This is one thing that generally takes too much time. What other ways can you communicate health information in the game, other than using cards and written facts?
  • Do a few test plays by yourself to see if it is too hard or needs adjustment.
  • Cut small figures out of paper to use as game pieces, or use Legos, etc.
  • Get ideas from other people. Creativity doesn’t just come from one person. The best ideas are ones that involve lots of ideas.
  • Make it colorful and eye-popping. Make it 3D! It doesn’t need to be too big, though. Think about the size of most board games we play.
  • Name it something appealing! Come up with something of your own – don’t use a name out of a movie or comic book.
  • You could have an objective or goal of the game, instead of a finish space to reach, such as find a golden nugget or land on the water fountain 10 times.
  • For the base of the game you can ask for a clean take out pizza box from a restaurant or find a box at home from Amazon. Any supplies from home are also okay, as long as Mom and Dad are okay with it! No need to purchase anything new.

A rubric will be provided to self-assess at the end of the project. The project is due by December 5th, Tuesday. No extensions due to report card timeline!!

Social Emotional Learning: Perfectionism and Doing Work Myself!

Creepy Crayon! image number 0Today we read the book Creepy Crayon by Aaron Reynolds, with illustrations by Peter Brown.

In the book, the main character, Jasper Rabbit, is struggling with school work, but then finds a perfect purple crayon that does all of the work for him! Jasper suddenly starts getting top marks on everything!

At first, it feels great, but then the crayon starts taking over Jasper’s life. The crayon even changes work Jasper was already proud of, coming behind him and re-doing everything so it is all in purple and perfect! Jasper feels badly about this, so he gets rid of the crayon and starts doing all of his own work. It isn’t perfect, but he feels much better about it being his own!

After reading the book, we discussed how there are many of us, as advanced learners, who really want all of our work to be perfect all the time. Sometimes as we strive for perfection, we look to outside resources to do the work for us. For example, we might use the internet or artificial intelligence, and ask it to do our work instead of doing our own writing. Or, we may ask others for help, and out of our worry to be perfect, we allow those people to change our work. This means the work becomes more “their work” and not representative of our own abilities.

It is okay to ask for help, but we also need to be willing to work on it by ourselves, because the struggle, the making of mistakes, is when we do our best learning!

I gave the class an example that was kind of silly. Ms. D does not feel “proficient” at soccer (mainly because it isn’t something I have put much thought into, really). But what if, rather than accepting my proficiency, I wanted to appear perfect. So, I hired a student who is amazing at soccer to wear my jersey and represent me on the field. They would do an amazing job, and then afterwards, I would take all the accolades and the trophy! This seemed ridiculous to everyone, and I agreed. If I want to get better at soccer, then I can certainly make some choices to develop my skills!

Also, being better doesn’t mean I need to be PERFECT at it. For example, if I want to be better at soccer, I don’t have to be a top soccer star on the field. I really just want some skills to be able to join friends in a game. So, I can be realistic about what I want in life. It isn’t possible to be top notch in everything. That is okay, because I am going to make the choice of where I want to put my time. I can play soccer with my friends without needing to always win or be the top player.

I shared with everyone this is why I also have them fill out rubrics for self-reflection before I give any feedback. The research shows, people are more likely to follow through on goals they make for themselves, or on their own self-reflection, more than they would follow up on what someone else tells them to do. For example, someone might tell you to clean your room a million times, and you may or may not choose to clean it (generally, I imagine, most of Division 5 doesn’t do this without supervision!) But, if you choose to have a cleaner room because you see the value of having a clean space to work and live and sleep in, well, you are more likely to work on the skills it takes to keep a clean room.

Finally, grade 4 and 5 are great practice years. We can make lots of mistakes because we are learning how to be independent self-managers. Developmentally, we are still working on personal awareness of one another, determining what our interests are, and learning how to make friends. Be willing to make mistakes! And, also know, none of the marks you receive at this point in your learning journey will stay with you when you move on to high school or college. And when you get to my age, no one cares about what you did in high school or college. With time, mistakes are just learning. We always move on from them.

I know, deep thinking for a Monday!  I hope everyone takes time to talk about these things at home. More to come on social-emotional thinking in future posts.

Kindly,

Ms. D

Assessment Reminders & Life Rubric Activity for Home

Hello Everyone,

Today, I would like to talk about assessment and the LIFE RUBRIC activity we did in class.

Some thoughts about assessment, as I shared in email to you all:

  • The goal is to get proficient; extending is reserved for going beyond criteria and grade-level expectations in specific ways.
  • To get a developing on anything does not mean a person is having trouble or needs any serious intervention at this time unless I contact you (because I would if it was needed). It means they are still developing and need special encouragement in that area.
  • Please review project rubrics you receive, then sign and return immediately to school. I track who has brought them in so I can be sure you have seen them. In this way we avoid surprises on the report card, and everyone gets communication about progress.
  • Projects involve more than one subject. As appropriate, depending on curricular competencies, I divide up the marks for a project between subjects, noted at the top of the rubric. For example, the Nutrition Poster involves language arts presentation and research documentation skills, socials research competencies, and science/health content from nutrition information.
  • All e-port marks contribute to language arts evaluation, as well as unit content in socials, science, and math.
  • You will note sometimes I indicate a mark with a slash. This means your child is between areas. I always note the stronger area of the proficiency scale first. For example, if I say PRF/EXT, it means the student was stronger on the proficient side, but they had some elements of extending.
  • For report cards I can only assign one proficiency scale mark per subject, so I gather information from all daily assignments, projects, and e-ports to make that decision. It is not an average of proficiency scale marks but based on the picture of child’s progress to date at the end of the term. I encourage you to read my feedback, report card comments, and student goals on the report, rather than just the marks, to get a better picture.
  • Please see your child’s e-ports and make comments if you have time. At the end of the term, I will be giving you a questionnaire to fill out about how you think your child is doing, so I can take your input into mind.
  • Binders have daily work that has been passed back with checks. Some students are also missing work. While I don’t have time to go through and chase every single learning assignment down, any student is welcome to ask me in class if they are missing something. Students will be asked to reflect at the end of term one how they have been doing on turning in assignments, as their input is also required for the report card.
  • A reminder that everyone responds better to hearing strengths first, and then 1-2 areas of feedback for next time. It is overwhelming to hear too much. This is especially true for advanced learners who frequently struggle with perfectionism and unrealistic expectations about performance. We can accidentally encourage their tendency to catastrophize about the importance of one mark by talking about an assignment or project for too long when it comes home. Everyone will have many more opportunities to practice and learn things they are still working on. One project is just one step in the journey.

Today, we reviewed the words associated with the proficiency rubric to ensure we all understand them.

I often say that the proficiency rubric is easier to understand, with its words of emerging/developing/applying (proficient)/extending if you create a LIFE RUBRIC.

Think of one thing that you do daily. We assigned the four parts to the four corners of our classroom. Then, Ms. D said an activity and students moved to the part of the rubric they thought they were in.

For example, where are you on “cleaning your room?”

EXTENDING — I can clean my room independently and use sophisticated skills, some of which I learned on my own time, such as feng shui arrangements, Marie Kondo folding, organizing boxes I created myself, to clean it. No one needs to tell me to clean my room. I could teach someone else how to clean a room, and I probably remind other people to “get to it!” I even developed my own personal schedule for cleaning and posted it on the fridge.

PROFICIENT — I can clean my room independently and use a complete set of skills I have been taught to organize it — for example, vacuuming, making my bed, and picking up materials to put into organizing buckets I have been given. No one needs to check in on me as I am cleaning my room. I feel confident doing it myself.

DEVELOPING — I can clean my room myself with some guidance. For example, someone might need to check in on me and say, stop reading and get to cleaning! Or, maybe I need help getting the vacuum out and turning it on. Maybe I need some advice on how to fold corners on the sheets. But, I have a partial understanding of what to do and can do some of it myself.

EMERGING — I either have never cleaned my room before, or I can clean my room with a lot of guidance, as I am beginning to learn how to do it. I might need assistance deciding when the room is dirty, staying on task and not making new messes while cleaning it up, or not shoving dirty laundry under the bed and instead putting it in the hamper. My parents are showing me how the vacuum works, as I haven’t done that before. My parents came in and modelled for me how to clean, talking about the steps as they helped me, so I can learn how to do it next time on my own.

**Try this at home as a discussion. Try something like — making your own lunch, making dinner for the family, riding a bicycle, coming up with a family activity, or playing with a sibling. It works best if BOTH parent and child identify some things they do on the LIFE RUBRIC, so everyone can see they aren’t alone in developing skills. We are all doing it, and it is a lifelong process.

Diseases PowerPoint Project!

Hello Everyone!

We have been talking together about germs and pathogens, and what we can do to keep the body healthy!

To further explore this area, with a partner, students will create a PowerPoint presentation together.

First, do some research on a disease of their choice. Research is due by Tuesday, November 7th. Here are the guidelines for choosing and researching a disease:

  • It needs to be a common communicable or non-communicable disease. We are not doing disorders or conditions.
  • Your choice needs to be approved by Ms. D before starting research.
  • The disease needs to be one that you would be more likely to get due to personal choices (nutrition, hygiene, exercise, etc.) so you can talk about how not to get the disease by making healthy choices we have discussed in class.
  • Please look on the Articles of Interest on the blog for website suggestions, or use legitimate websites per our discussion in class.
  • If you can’t understand an online article, and it has vocabulary words you can’t understand on your own, then use a different article at your reading level.
  • If you have questions about whether a website is safe, please ask Ms. D.
  • Keep notes in your journal using our note taking chart method.
  • No formal bibliography is needed for this presentation, but I would like you to record where you found your notes in your journal.

What do you need to find out about the disease? Each of these things can be one slide in your PowerPoint presentation, for 10 slides maximum and total PowerPoint due November 14th, Tuesday:

  • Slide 1 — Introduction: Name of the Disease, and your name as author
  • Slide 2 — What is it? Does it have more than one name?
  • Slide 3 — How long have we known about this disease? Who discovered it?
  • Slide 4 — What causes it? Is there a specific virus, bacteria, or pathogen that is involved? What does the pathogen look like under the microscope if one is involved?
  • Slide 5 — What are the symptoms of the disease? How would I know I have it? What tests would have to be done to find out?
  • Slide 6 — Who usually has the disease?
  • Slide 7 — What treatments or cure are there for this disease?
  • Slide 8 — How can I prevent getting this disease? What specific lifestyle or personal choices will help?
  • Slide 9 — Summary Slide, 5 key points or takeaways you want everyone to remember.
  • Slide 10 — Concluding Slide, “Are there any questions?”

We will use PowerPoint to do this project and to Present:

For many grade fours, this is a new presentation method, and your goal is to learn how to create a slide with a picture, title, and bullet points. We will practice in class.

For grade fives who were with me last year, the focus this year is to make your slideshows more aesthetic and effective. We will focus on how to use fonts, colours, pictures, and organization to make them more effective!

We will then present our PowerPoints to the class using a short script. Script and presentations due November 16th.

Here are the evaluation criteria for this assignment:

  • Please do 10 slides for your presentation as described above.
  • Share the responsibility with your partner.
  • Each of you can do either the intro or the last slide.
  • Split up the other 8 slides between you.
  • One person creates the PowerPoint and then shares between you on One Drive.
  • Don’t edit any slide that isn’t your own to do. If you have input on your partner’s slides, make sure you talk to them first.
  • Use one of the set themes in PowerPoint for all of your slides.
  • Make sure the font you use for titles and bullet points is an appropriate size for presentation AND stays the same type for all slides.
  • Use bullets and shortened phrases to present information, not paragraphs. Do not use too much text.
  • Put a picture on each slide. Pictures need to be related to what you are talking about, not silly pictures, smiley faces, or cartoons.
  • Do not use pictures that have copyright marks on them. If you don’t know how to tell, you can ask Ms. D.
  • Do not use emojis. At all.
  • Avoid using really bright colours such as red, yellow, or bright blue for text.
  • Keep text in dark, easy to read colours.
  • Don’t use a black, red, or orange background, as this can be hard to look at.
  • Don’t have a last slide that says, “Bye!” or “Thank you for watching!” It can say “Are there any questions?” and have a picture related to your presentation.
  • Make a script for your PowerPoint with what you would like to say for each slide. Don’t just repeat your bullet points. Add information here.
  • Limit your whole presentation to 5 minutes or less.
  • Practice in front of someone. It does not need to be memorized, but it does need to be well practiced.

I look forward to seeing your presentations! 

E-Port #3 Systems Unit Check In

**Reminder: Everything asked here comes from your own thinking, notes in your journal, or items in your binder. Use those as your tools. It is a great opportunity to review what we have done!

Due:  Nov 1st, Wednesday (extra days because of Halloween!)

Title:  Systems Unit Check In

Questions:

What is the Universal Systems Model?

Give an example of one system you know other than the human body and talk about how it fits with the Universal Systems Model.

You eat a bowl of cheerios. Tell me the cheerios’ journey through your body in your own words to show me you know how digestion works.

Why is it important to the body to drink enough water, based on what we have discussed in class (not an answer from the internet)?

What is Go, Slow, Whoa? Name a food in each category.

What are 5 things you might look for or avoid as you choose food for your body systems and why?

What are the measures of central tendency?

Why do we collect data?

What can too much stress do to the body?

What do you do to reduce your stress?

What does exercise like yoga do for the body systems?

Why do we need sleep?

Why do we need to use soap to wash our hands?

 

E-Port #2: Science World AI & Gut Bacteria Workshop

Reminder! Use those notes in your journal to answer these questions, not the internet! And use sentences to answer. Due one week from today, October 17th, Tuesday.

Title:  Science World AI & Gut Bacteria Workshop

Questions:

  1.  What was the name of the language the AI Chatbot uses to communicate?
  2.  What are the challenges of programming a Chatbot?
  3.  How much bacteria is in your gut?
  4.  What are the conditions in our gut that this bacteria likes?
  5. What does anaerobe and aerobe mean?
  6.  What are four ways you can take care of your microbiome (the good gut bacteria)?
  7.  Name a bacteria that lives in our gut and three characteristics of it.
  8.  What are four things probiotics do for our gut?
  9.  What are three fermented foods that help with our gut and feed the good bacteria?
  10.  When should you take antibiotics?
  11.  Should a chatbot be designed to mimic a real person? When would this be okay and when would it not be okay?

Size of My Problem! Being Independent Thinkers!

Hello Everyone,

Today we had a discussion, which is also worth having at home, around social thinking and problem solving.

As we work toward finding the confidence to solve our own problems that come up during a school day, it is important to know the size of the problem. If I know the size of the problem, then I can know the size of my reaction!

First, we defined what is a Small, Medium, and Big Problem:

Small Problems are:

  • Unexpected situations. — For example, someone does an “unexpected behaviour” which we talked about before, or the schedule of the day changes.
  • Quickly fixed. — Generally, these problems have a quick solution if we are calm and think about it.
  • A GLITCH, no BIG DEAL! — This came up randomly and isn’t an all the time problem. You made a mistake, you didn’t read instructions, you can’t find something!
  • YOU FIX — Typically these problems can be fixed by YOU. You don’t need an adult to do it.

Medium Problems are:

  • Didn’t expect this at all! — The unexpected event is bigger and goes beyond a small change in the schedule.
  • Can be fixed, but may take time. — There might have been a conflict and we need to talk about everyone’s perspective as we solve the problem.
  • Fights, being mean. — While no one was physically hurt, there were mean things said, words exchanged, and it needs to be resolved so we can all work together well.
  • Losing something important — While you won’t melt from losing something, losing this item makes you feel upset as it was important to you and you really want to find it.
  • Make you and someone around you upset. — These problems usually involve more than one person.
  • ADULT + YOU FIX — Typically, you need an adult to work with you to solve this kind of problem, but you are involved in coming up with solutions.

Big Problems are:

  • Someone is hurt or sick. — Someone hit their head outside, someone is sick and needs assistance, or someone was in an argument that resulted in the two people getting physical and hurting one another.
  • Affects lots of people. — Usually, these problems are serious and definitely involve more than one person.
  • Complex and hard to solve. — These problems can be long-term and involve complex situations or emotions that need to be considered carefully to help find solutions.
  • Emergency! — There is a situation where everyone is in trouble, someone is being hurt, or we are having a natural disaster!
  • ADULT TO FIX! — Generally, these situations do require an adult to be your guide in addressing the problem or following emergency procedures.

In class, we discussed different situations and sorted them. You might try this at home!

  • What is the problem?
  • Is it a Small, Medium, or Big sized problem?
  • What is your reaction to the problem?
  • Did the reaction MATCH the size of the problem?
  • Who helped you solve the problem?
  • Was it a problem you could have solved on your own, even though you asked the teacher or your parent for help?

All questions are good, but try to do some independent thinking, too!  In class, if you have lost something, forgot your journal, can’t remember the instructions, are feeling frustrated you don’t know something, need supplies, have technology that isn’t working, were not listening and didn’t hear instructions, or were absent and are trying to catch up, then know — these are all small problems. And YOU can do things to solve them yourself before asking for adult assistance:

  • Take three breaths in and out through your nose at your chair. Or, go do it out on the porch to get some fresh air. Get a quick drink of water. Recalibrate and reset if you are not feeling calm enough to solve the situation yourself.
  • Ask a peer for help.
  • Use your eyes, ears, and the body language you see in class (social cues) to pick up on information to make decisions or to find out things on your own.
  • Tell yourself, “This is a small problem, I will breathe and stay calm and find a solution on my own.”
  • Read the board,the GROUP PLAN schedule, the white posters showing the steps you need to take each morning, the signs on the building supply boxes, and other visual cues to figure out where things are or what you need to be doing.
  • Say to yourself, “Technology sometimes glitches, and I will ask a partner to help, then try another device if my iPad or laptop is not charged up.”
  • Read the instructions a second or third time — maybe you went too fast. We are great readers, but sometimes we go so fast we are poor absorbers of information.
  • Watch your peers. What are they doing right now? Do you need to be doing that, too? Social cues!
  • Ask yourself if what you are doing is SAFE and FRIENDLY?
  • Tell yourself, “It is okay to not know this. I just haven’t learned it yet.” Be okay with sometimes not knowing.
  • Tell yourself, “I will try this even if I make a mistake. It is okay if I make mistakes. Making mistakes is learning!”

Thank you,

Ms. D

Nutrition Poster Mini Assignment!

Hello Everyone!

We have been having excellent discussions about NUTRITION!

 

 

We have talked about:

  • The key food groups you need for balanced nutrition,
  • How what we eat can affect our brain health,
  • The role of fat, fiber, carbohydrates, vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients in our body’s systems,
  • How to read a nutrition label to make healthy food choices, and
  • How our gut acts like a second brain and has a microbiome that is important to our overall health.

Here are some videos you can watch that we watched in class:

Now, we are helping one another do some further research. Rather than investigate ALL of the nutrients out there, each of us is taking on the research for one. We will then produce a poster to share our information with one another. You can do research using the Internet, as well as some books found in class.

For the research, students need to take notes and to find out the following:

  • What is the nutrient?
  • Where would I find the nutrient? (In which foods?)
  • Why do we need this nutrient? Do we absolutely need this nutrient?
  • How much of this nutrient do we need?
  • What is the nutrient used for in the human body?

After finding out the answers to these questions, students will produce a mini poster. The poster will be done on blank 8.5 x 11 paper, which Ms. D will provide, and it needs to have the following:

  • A big title in the middle or at the top, which has the name of the nutrient.
  • Bubbles on the poster with key facts about the nutrient.
  • Some illustrations to help us better understand the nutrient.
  • An aesthetic presentation — coloured pictures, fine-lined words (which were done in pencil first), straight lines (use a ruler), and a nice layout (not too crowded on the page and using up the whole space.)
  • Readable information. If neatness is a concern, one option is to create the words with MS Word and then cut them out to put on the poster.

This mini poster is not meant to be a long project, just a mini research opportunity while we continue working on other interesting things about the human body! I look forward to you sharing your information so everyone can learn about all the different vitamins and minerals our bodies need.

Poster is due no later than Friday, October 27th.

E-Port #1: Making Goals

Hello Everyone,

Here is our first e-port assignment. Remember our discussion in class and the example I showed you:

  • Please use full sentences to answer questions,
  • Include a small picture,
  • Include a title,
  • Cut and paste the questions from here into your entry so your parents and I can see what you are answering,
  • Don’t write a novel but provide enough detail to answer the questions,
  • Never cut and paste from the Internet,
  • Do it yourself, not with parent help to type and write,
  • Use a dictionary to look up words if needed (online or paper dictionary),
  • Save as you go so you don’t lose your work, and
  • Have it done after one week from the time it is assigned. Use class time as much as possible for this, but you can work on it in the 30-40 minute time limit at home.

TITLE:  Making Goals for Myself 2023-24

Questions:

  1. What are your core competency goals this year? Pick two to talk about and give examples of what you want to work on and why. (communicating, collaborating, critical and reflective thinking, creative thinking, personal awareness and responsibility, positive personal and cultural identity, social awareness and responsibility)
  2. What are your curricular competency goals this year?  Pick two to talk about and give examples of what you want to work on and why. (Researching, Presenting Information, Questioning, Analyzing, Planning, Problem Solving)
  3.  What is a content area of the curriculum you would like to work on this year? Pick no more than two and explain what you want to work on and why.  (Math, Science, Socials, Language Arts, Physical and Health Education, Career Education, ADST, French, Fine Art, Music)

 

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