This week has been all about “Cleaning things up”.
It all began with Earth Day on Monday where we spent some time thinking about how important our earth is and how we need to keep it clean 
and healthy so it can keep providing us with so much. It was great to celebrate Earth and show it some well deserved gratitude!
We presented our Earth Day reader’s theatre plays On Thursday to a Mrs. Wilson’s and Ms. Allen’s classes. They provided us with feedback on our performance in each scene and focused on our oral language skills. Presenting to an audience of your peers is not easy and we are so proud of you for being courageous and stepping out of your comfort zone to do that! Well done Div. 6. 
We used the data those classes gave us to learn about “averages” and how to calculate them. In partners we calculated the averages from 5 sets of feedback. Then we took those averages to determine what the final average was from ALL of the feedback provided. It took some calculating, but we had fun figuring it out!
We moved on to cleaning up and reviewing our fraction and decimal work with the Grade 5’s. We had our unit test on Wednesday which seemed to go well for most of you and so now,
we will be moving on to Measurement and Geometry starting next week!
Next, we worked on typing up and editing our Extreme Environment Essays to get them ready for publishing. You took your drafts home on Wednesday and it is my hope that you will all have them handed in by Friday night or Saturday at the latest! While you are working on them at home, it is a great idea to have an older sibling or parent have a read through your work. 
Our best editors are usually those who have no idea about your topic or your assignment. A sign of a well written essay will be that they can read through it easily (because there are no errors) and that they understand what you wrote. If they stumble or have questions, that is a sign that you should make some changes in order to “clean it up”.
Along the lines of some other writing, we learned a new poem this week as well! The Diamante poem is a 7 line poem around antonyms ( opposites). To kick us off , we did another word sort using pairs of antonyms… but ones that were more abstract. Pairs such as “hero/villian”; “wealth/poverty”; “determination/apathy”. As a class, we wrote a Diamante using the antonyms “reality and fantasy” as our anchor words. This sparked our creative juices as we continued to write our own poems.
Our new Social Studies unit is focusing on our government. This week we watched a video about the 3 levels of government in Canada: Federal, Provincial/Territorial, and Municipal. Next week we’ll dive into those a bit deeper. The technology we’ll be using to share what we learn is Power Point. 
In our randomly created triads, we have been creating a mini- ( 5 slide) power point to show what we know how to do using this platform. Most of the us have created power point presentations before so this was just a “refresher” before we embark on the actual project.
Finally, we had some long discussions about how important it is to stay clean during puberty. We discussed the changes that happen to our body when we experience puberty like; increased sweat, overactive oil glands, acne, and of course,
menstruation. It is important to remember that personal hygiene routines are super important when you are experiencing so many changes in your body. Next week, we will move on to discuss the science behind our reproductive organs and what jobs each part plays in the cycle of life. We were very pleased how well you handled our discussions this week because we know it can be quite embarrassing to talk about our bodies so openly. You all asked some really great questions and a lot of you already know what to expect, which is great!
Sadly, we had to say good-bye to Radin as he is moving to North Vancouver. We will certainly miss him in Division 6… but we also know that his new classroom will enjoy his presence and energy just as much as we have here. We hope your transition into your new class is smooth and you enjoy your time in your new school as much as you have enjoyed your time at Brentwood Park! Good luck Radin!
This weekend’s blog response question is this:
A book has 8 chapters. Ch.1: 14 pages. Ch 2: 22 pages, Ch.3: 12 pages, Ch.4: 17 pages; Ch.5: 25 pages, Ch.6 19 pages, Ch. 7: 20 pages and Ch. 8: 15 pages.
What is the AVERAGE number of pages in each chapter?
Have a wonderful long weekend Division 6! Monday is a Pro D Day!
Mrs. Gil and Mrs. Davis