Category: We are scientists.

Our little scientists have been learning about the water cycle. Yesterday was super exciting because we had an opportunity to go outside to study snowflakes. Can you spot the “perfect” snowflake with clearly 6 dendrites? Click on the image to see a larger one.

We have some new vocabulary words: condensation, evaporation, precipitation, transpiration, water vapour, cloud, runoff.

Students know the words to the Water Cycle song. Watch the video to practice with the music (no words):

Today, we watched Bill Nye explain the Water Cycle. Please feel free to watch again at home to reinforce learning.

As scientists, it is important to be curious. What do you wonder about water and the water cycle? Please feel free to ask your questions here by making a comment on this blog post. Thank you for your questions!

A ball of modelling clay was provided to manipulate into an object that can float. After discovering a way of how to make it float, students were tasked with seeing how many teddy bears can sit on the boat before it sank. For such young children, what we were most impressed with was their ability to stay focussed with great determination to succeed and for such a long time. They showed such patience, perseverance, and critical thinking when provided with the challenge to make a dense object float.

The critical thinking skills that were demonstrated throughout were also truly brilliant. Wished every parent could have been there to witness their learning! Some used the inside of a bowl to form their boat. When that didn’t work, they tried it on the outside of the bowl. Other students believed that making sure their boat was dry was important so they used our sponges to dry it off each time. Then in order to try to hold more teddy bears, they exercised further critical thinking skills to experiment with the shape of their boats. The learning was so rich and students were so engaged and motivated. We felt so proud of how they self-regulated their emotions even though some of them weren’t successful until the very end. They kept trying and trying and demonstrated a never give up attitude.

Here were some reflections shared:

• I learned that when I take the clay and fold it up, it float.
• That the same object can sink and float. – Isla
• If you have too much water in the boat, then it will sink. – Sasha
• I learned to “never give up”. – Charlotte T.
• I learned that even if there’s little tiny holes, you will have to block the holes. It can be holes on the side but not on the bottom. – Mehr

Spontaneously, most unexpected student etched “I can think critically” on her floatie. Made us smile!

Core Competencies connection:

• I can show perseverance.
• I can try and try again.
• I can think critically.

Students, what did you think about this critical thinking activity? Please feel free to leave a comment. We would love to hear your thoughts!

Our little scientists started learning about Water and States of Matter last Friday by witnessing the life cycle of a snowman. Since we have had no snow in our forecast, the learning must go on so we gathered some “snow” from the skating rink last Tuesday to create our snowman in the classroom. They watched it go from a solid snowman to liquid water and end up as a gas (steam). Students learned that solids keep its form while liquids take the shape of its container and gases expand to the size of their container. They have also learned about the molecules in solids, liquids, and gases.

We watched Ms. Frizzle teach her students about molecules. Click here to watch the video “Magic School Bus Meets Molly Cule” together at home as review. Ask your child what they already know! Check out our Science page to learn more about what students are expected to learn. Feel free to make a comment to add any questions your scientist at home may have about the states of matter or molecules.

If you haven’t had an opportunity to come by the classroom, we have some cute, unique snowmen hanging by our windows. Come check them out during our Family Reading time this Friday. They sure brighten up the room!

Our other experience with frozen water ended yesterday with our last ice skating session at Bill Copeland. We are so proud of the great improvements our athletes made over only three sessions! Many went from little confidence and experience to skating around on their very own. We are so very grateful to our parent volunteer drivers; without you, this triple field trip would not have been possible. Many thanks to the parents of Fisher, JeanBenoit, Katherine, Leo, Lucas, Myel, Priscilla, Charlotte, Gabby, Hanna, Jeffery, Olivya, and Sasha.

If any families have an overabundance of plastic forks or spoons, please feel free to send to school as our stash has been depleted. Just a note that no utensils are provided for hot lunches and a gentle reminder to pack a fork or spoon with your child’s lunch if they need one. Thank you.

Family Literacy Week begins next week. Be on the lookout for more information about our planned activities including a dress up day! Please save the date and join us for our Celebration of Learning on Thursday, January 31st at 9:00 am.

Arriving Early –  Thank you so much to the families who make the effort to arrive on time every single morning. Unfortunately, we also have a number of different students arriving late on a regular basis on many mornings. Some days, we may have up to eight students who are not on time. We love starting our lessons right at the bell. If your child is six minutes late every day, that equates to 30 minutes of lost instruction over a week and over the course of a month, that is over two hours missed. So, we are requesting that families readjust their mornings and plan to arrive early, rather than just on time, please. We really appreciate your support in reaching our class goal. 

What a wonderful experience students had during our visit to SFU’s Biological Sciences Department! The team started with a presentation about the differences between spiders and insects. Then we divided into groups to learn more about the critters at each station: cockroaches, grasshoppers, mosquitoes, ants, spiders, bed bugs, moths, and beetles. They even had an arts and crafts station set up which many enjoyed!

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As scientists, students are expected to be able to demonstrate curiosity and a sense of wonder, make observations, ask questions, and communicate observations and ideas. While everyone was fascinated by the different insects and spiders that the SFU team prepared for us, Ms. Cowan and I were most impressed by the kinds of deep and inquisitive questions asked and keen observations made. It was also inspiring to see these grad students, as experts, so enthusiastic and passionate about sharing their knowledge about particular insects or spiders they were researching. We were expecting to stay for an hour but because they were all so engaged in the hands-on learning, we ended up staying for an extra half hour! We are so very grateful to the Biological Sciences team who provided this great learning opportunity for our students. Thank you for your generosity of time and for setting up so many stations for us to learn from!

In the afternoon, Kira’s mom, Bryony, so graciously offered to teach us yoga. Not only did we have the pleasure to exercise our bodies, Bryony planned an amazing experience that started with exploring and singing the Eensy Beensy Spider in different ways as we warmed up our bodies. Then, she took us on a storytelling journey about the adventures of a spider as we became the spider, the mountain, and the tree, to name a few poses among many we practiced. We even tried collaborative yoga with a partner to become a spider with 8 legs! Finally, we ended with a fun game to test our spider senses. So very thankful to Bryony for her time to prepare and teach such an engaging lesson of yoga! Our bodies and minds were blessed!

All students have worked hard on finishing their own Spider Facts Booklet. We are currently working on a class book about what we found as the most interesting thing we learned about spiders. [We are using an iPad app called Book Creator.]

Students were also offered the opportunity to extend their learning by researching a specific spider of choice. We are looking forward to sharing more of our learning about spiders with you soon!