Day: January 20, 2016

Blog Access and Google Drive

Hello Everyone,

Today we spent some time organizing how we access electronic tools for use in the MACC program.

First, we practiced logging into the blog interface and making comments as subscribers to the website. As a reminder, if you want to leave a comment on a post, please use your user ID and password. If you were absent today, I am happy to show you when you return.

Second, we discovered our new google drive account, which has been set up by the Burnaby School District. We practiced logging in, using the “google docs” tool, and collaborating on a document with a partner. This tool will allow us to share documents with Ms. D more easily, use tools such as google docs to create work for class, and to collaborate with other students.

All students promised that when using either Google Drive or the Blog, they must:

  • Practice social media safety
  • Only write things that would be okay if viewed publicly
  • Not mention their last name, name of the school, last names of friends, and other identifiable information
  • Use respectful tones with one another at all times
  • Only post appropriate material
  • Only use these tools for school work, not personal conversation or chatting between friends
  • Protect the password provided to them for these sites

I can tell we are very excited about having these tools, and I look forward to using them with students more frequently. My hope is that students will begin to do some blog posting as I have been doing. Look for their contributions to come!

Ms. D

 

Tuesday Update

Hello All,

Sorry for the delay in getting this up here, but I had meetings today after school! Exciting things coming up in the months to come, so they were good meetings!

Today, we began our new unit. The focus statement is: Human migration is a response to challenges, risks, survival, and a natural need to explore. During the course of the unit, we will be talking about:

  • The reasons people move throughout the world
  • Human migration and its impact on Canada and the world
  • The nature of exploration
  • The similarities between humanity and other animals as related to migration

We began our discussion today by defining migration and seeing what we already know about the topic. Following this, we talked about how everyone has a story of movement in their lives, either within their core family (you, mom, dad, siblings) or through the extended family. Everyone was asked how many times they have had to move in their short lifetimes — the record was 11 times! Ms. D, at a different stage in her life, has moved 13 times. To further investigate this movement, everyone is filling out a basic family tree going back to great-grandparents. On the back of the paper, I have asked everyone to write down what they know about their family’s movement story — where have they lived, what countries did they come from, how many times did they have to move, whether between houses, cities, or continents. Tomorrow we will share this information and begin charting it on a map.

If anyone would like to try charting their family tree online (this is not required at all), then you could check out Family Echo.  You need to set up an account so the tree will be saved. It is not required to do this and paper is fine for tomorrow. If there is any information you can’t find out from your family, that is okay, too.

We also talked today about animal migration and began a discussion of the reasons animals move by watching Pole to Pole from the BBC Planet Earth Series. For Science related to our unit, we will be looking at animal migration and biomes. My hope is that we will be going on a special trip February 26th to talk about bird migration, but stay tuned and save the date! Will try to get it confirmed as soon as possible.

In math we continued working on our Skyscrapers math, marking a few pages and then assigning p. 26-27. We also talked about measurement with more depth, discussing the differences between the metric and imperial systems. Tomorrow’s “at the door first” challenge is to find out the history of why Canada changed to the metric system. Students went around the room using both systems to measure a variety of items.

On February 22nd, Friday we have the Young People’s Concert – please be on time. We have to leave right away. As soon as the bell rings at 8:50 AM, we will be going to load the bus. If you arrive late, please see if we are out front already at the buses loading if the classroom is locked, otherwise, check in at the office.

Have a great night!