Category: Articles and Unit Connections

Hello Everyone!

Many things to report today! Here we go….

Unit and Socials!:

In connection with the social studies curriculum and our unit, we are looking at BEARS! Why? We are learning about why bears are important to First Nations in British Columbia, what humans can learn from bears, and how bear anatomy is similar to human anatomy. Looking at First Nations traditional knowledge — knowledge about the land gained from thousands of years living in this region — we discover how important bears were and why they were considered sacred animals. Bear’s have similar organ systems to those of a human, and thus, bears and humans eat similar foods. What is safe for a bear is also safe for us! We can watch bear behaviour to learn where to find food and what foods are safe to eat.

Today, we looked at characteristics of black and grizzly bears and practiced telling the difference between the two types. We learned the white Spirit Bear is actually a black bear with a recessive white gene! We watched a video on the Great Bear Rainforest to see the beautiful lands up north where you can find these bears. We also heard a First People’s perspective about how important the land and the bears are to their culture and way of life.

Tonight, try watching 15 minutes of this video by National Geographic on the Great Bear Rainforest to have a sense of how beautiful these lands are. You don’t have to watch the whole thing.

If you want to know more, you can also find out more information on the B.C. Government Website on the Great Bear Rainforest or Destination BC or this CBC Article on how the Great Bear Rainforest received protection in 2016. 

PE/Health:

Today, Ms. D gave everyone their own copy of a book called Heartsmart Kids which is produced by the Heart and Stroke Foundation. These books are provided by Heart and Stroke to students in grades 4-6 to learn about heart health. Inside you will find activities directly connected to our curriculum. As we investigate personal choices and how they impact the human body, I will be asking everyone to do some activities in the booklet. The book will then be yours to keep!

Tonight, try reading pages 12-13 as a review of the circulatory system and do the activities on pages 15-16. Only spend 15 minutes on this, and if not finished, you can do some in the morning when you arrive. If you would like to work further in the booklet, go for it! But, you don’t have to. I will be pointing out certain pages I want you to look at for sure, and then the rest are optional to do at your leisure!

Math:

Today we did went over some tricks for multiplying simple decimals in our heads! Then, we did some group math, and Ms. D gave everyone math challenges to solve about pizza and fractions. These challenges come from the book United We Solve, which has some excellent cooperative learning activities! We divided into six groups, and students were given a large whiteboard to use to draw pictures and to show their work as they solved the problem. Then, students presented their results to one another.

Art, Language Arts, and Core Competencies:

We recently finished an art project which is currently displayed on the bulletin board in the school across from the music room. Students used fine-motor skills to carefully divide a piece of paper into sections and to collage the sections in different colours using a variety of paper and other media. They then looked at a list of adjectives in either English or French for new words to describe themselves. This involved some language arts thinking, using a dictionary to look up new words, and some reflection. Who am I as a person? What are the personality characteristics I bring to the classroom? We all learned new words, and I was impressed as everyone practiced the Core Competencies of Communication and Personal Awareness. Check out our art when you get a moment! 

Caribou Contest:

We will be doing the Caribou Contest either Wednesday or Thursday. If you want to practice, go to the Caribou Tests website to do it before tomorrow.

Diwali Assembly Tomorrow:

Students will be participating in an assembly designed to learn about Diwali, which is a holiday celebrated by members of our class as well as other students at our school. This is one of many assemblies we will have to learn about cultural celebrations, as we also do one for Chinese New Year, and we have holiday celebrations in December. Thank you Anisha for sharing with us what you will be doing tomorrow during assembly!

HAVE A GREAT EVENING! BRING LIBRARY BOOKS TOMORROW!!!!!

Ms. D

Hello Everyone!

Here is a quick update of what we have been doing in class. Hope you had a lovely weekend with the sunny, October weather (not today, though!)

Unit Studies:

Students have finished researching a disease of their choice, and they are now making a 10 slide Power Point to explain the disease. Ms. D spent some time on Friday teaching students who are new to Power Point how to use this tool. For many grade fours, this is a new presentation method. 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! Here are the criteria for this assignment:

• Please do 10 slides for your presentation.
• One slide will be a title page with your name, title, date
• Title the other slides using the questions from the notes page Ms. D gave to you
• Spread out the information so you use up 10 slides. Don’t put too much text on any one slide.
• Use bullets and shortened phrases to present information, not paragraphs.
• Don’t have a last slide that says, “Bye!” or “Thank you for watching!”
• Avoid using really bright colours such as red, yellow, or bright blue on top of black — it is very hard to read.
• Avoid using red, orange, and yellow unless you really want to bring attention to your words.
• Do use pictures, interesting fonts, etc. BUT please don’t use silly pictures. Pictures should help the presentation, not just be entertaining.
• Make sure pictures don’t have copyright symbols like “Shutterstock” over them.
• No bibliography is needed for this presentation.
• Make a script for your PowerPoint. You can do this in the “notes” section on the PowerPoint itself, or write a separate script for yourself.

We have two more people who need to present their Human Body Corporation letters tomorrow, and then we will be moving on to our DISEASE GUESSING activity in groups, during which you will use some of the human body expertise you have gained.

On Friday, we began a formal lab on GERMS. Everyone dressed in safety glasses and had sanitized swabs to take samples of surfaces we think may have germs in the school. We brought the swabs back to the classroom and swiped them across agar plates (homemade ones). Tomorrow (Tuesday), we will look in on them to take our first data observation and see if anything is growing. The goal is to collect information and answer the questions: Where are there germs in the school? If you touch a specific spot in the school, what is your probability of getting a germ, out of all the places tested? We will be using science, close inquiry and observation skills, and math to analyze our results.

Next up? Looking at healthy choices! Today we talked about how stress and positive thinking can play a role in your health. We practiced mindfulness breathing that anyone can do if they find themselves in emotional situations, to calm the brain and begin to think rationally again. This week we will discuss diet, exercise, and other personal choices we make that help the body. Thank you to our Community Health Nurse Students from Douglas College who came in on Friday to talk with us about some of these personal choices and their impact on immunity!

Some Other Quick Things:

• October 18/19 we will be doing the Caribou Math Test Competition. It is free for everyone on this first test of the year. You practice ahead of time by going to Caribou Tests online 
• We are finishing an ART IDENTITY Project which requires everyone to find interesting words to describe themselves and then to present them in an artistic, colourful way. They are looking amazing! If you hadn’t finished the paper gluing portion, it was sent home today. We hope to have these done tomorrow.
• In Math we did some more review of decimals, converting decimals into Mixed Numbers, and also practicing addition, subtraction, and multi-digit multiplication of decimal numbers. Most people finished the first page in class. Please try page 3 or 4 of that handout for 15 minutes tonight.
• In Beginning French, students are working on French-Games.net on the vocabulary in the sections on Human Body, Food, and Number Words. Students must finish all the lessons in each section. For example, Human Body actually has three sections to it, and each one has four lessons. If you don’t have earbuds, please get some and have them for class, as listening and repeating the words is an important part of practicing. Once complete, you must take the quiz. Don’t take the quiz until you are ready. YOU MUST TAKE THE QUIZ in class for each section and show the completed screen and score to Ms. D; it can’t be done at home. This instruction was given in class during our last French lesson. If you did a quiz at home you will need to re-do it for class purposes.
• French Immersion French students were given a booklet from the A la une series to take home for one night only. They are to read it and make a list of 20 new words for themselves in their journal. An alternative choice is to choose one article or story and write a quick French summary of what they read. After they complete some of these booklets, they are to work on French-Games.net using the Advanced settings, which will mean doing more reading and writing of French than our beginner level students.

Let’s have a great week! Remember, we are working on COMMUNICATION SKILLS as our area of the Core Competencies to unpack during this unit. Please continue to work on being active listeners and caring, thinking collaborators with one another.

Ms. D

Hello Everyone!

We have had a great week! People are starting to really get into their routines and we are starting to dive into our first unit.

Here are some quick reminders of dates and important notices going home:

• ​Parent Meetings Sept. 20/21: Please return blue forms by Monday. 
• Early Dismissal on September 20th, Wednesday 2:00 PM
• Late Start on September 21st, Thursday, 9:55 AM: Mark calendar!
• Field Trip Notice Sept. 28th Science World Trip: Due Sept. 20
• Yellow Student Verification Forms:​ Check info, due Sept. 22nd
• Professional Development Day / No School on September 25th, Monday
• Work Not Finished: Math Fractions Pg 1, Letter for Cap Hill Student due Mon.
• TERRY FOX: The Terry Fox run is coming up soon! Students will start collecting money for Terry on Monday.

MATH:

This week we have finished our math assessments, and Ms. D will communicate the results to parents next week. We began our unit Crunching the Data! Students worked with a partner to do a survey of their fellow classmates and then report the results in an interesting way on a visual graph. This was a great way for Ms. D to see: our data gathering abilities, our sense of how to organize data, our ability to work with a partner collaboratively, and our understanding of graphs and how they are presented.

We also talked about probability and played some games to get started. Today we continued with some “unfair” dice games and had to explain why they are not fair. Students often say that things are unfair, but this gave them a chance to explain why in words. We also began working on fractions, as we will be doing the conversions of fractions to decimals to percentages. The exercises presented are called “high ceiling / low floor” meaning some students will be working on beginning understandings of fractions, while others will stretch their understandings to percents, operations involving fractions, and other math for statistics.

UNIT:

Our unit focus statement is: Our personal choices play a role in the interconnected system of the human body. The key concepts we will discuss are SYSTEMS and CAUSE & EFFECT. Ms. D introduced the Universal Systems Model involving input, process, output, and feedback. We explored how the human body is a SYSTEM and then talked about how the universal systems model can apply to other things. What are the parts of the SPACE system? How is a GROCERY STORE a system? How is a ZOO a system? In partner groups, students made their own models in their journals of different systems.

We watched a video on nutrition and the digestive system, Ms. D talked about how she doesn’t have a gall bladder and explained what it does! Students did some creative pre-assessment drawings of human anatomy, and now we are using the posters, iPads, and book resources available in the classroom to figure out the parts we may have missed! Today Ms. D led everyone in the HOT AIR EXPERIMENT where students determined their lung capacity using a milk jug, plastic tubing, water, and a straw! You can do this at home and the instructions are in the unit packet. Also included are two optional activities.

CONGRATS BRIAN on trying out the egg experiment which explores how acids work in your stomach!

JOURNALS and DAILY WORK:

We each have a composition book, and it will be used this year for taking unit notes, writing down reflections on our work, sharing thoughts with Ms. D, and recording learning activities. Sometimes Ms. D will ask to see specific tasks and provide students with a check plus, check, or check minus to show if they are on track. Please try to keep up with daily work and complete journal tasks. If you receive a check or check plus and want an upgrade, just re-do it or add detail, then show it to Ms. D the next day. If you take the journal home, remember to return it to school. 

CONGRATS to SHERMAN today for receiving the first check plus plus for amazing thinking on universal systems!

PEN PALS AT CAP HILL!

Everyone has been assigned a pen pal from Ms. Geddes’ class at Capitol Hill — this is the other MACC 4/5 class in the District. Ms. D and Ms. G will be collaborating on several projects this year. We hope this is a great opportunity to meet a friend from across the District and to practice personal letter writing.

Letters and envelopes need to be finished on Monday.

PARTICIPATION RUBRIC:

In grade 4/5 we have letter marks given to us on the report card. Sometimes, these letter marks come from specific big projects and quizzes (usually at the end of units). There are a lot of activities in MACC, however, that don’t have a specific mark given to them. We are sometimes so busy learning, it is hard to give every activity a mark. So, we develop a participation rubric for MACC together. Today we discussed what the letter marks really mean in MACC and how you know if you are being the best participant in your learning.

Here is the Participation and Work Habits Rubric 2017, which you can discuss at home. Ms. D has put it in language teachers, parents, and students can understand, with input from the students. Each year, students seem to truly know what makes a successful student. We use this rubric to guide our daily interactions and learning.

HAVE A GREAT WEEKEND! See you next week!

Ms. D

Hello Everyone!

NEW UNIT:

As mentioned in my beginning of year information, we will approach the curriculum with larger, trans-disciplinary, conceptual-based units that allow us to not only touch upon all requirements for grade 4/5, but also allow us to pursue depth and complexity in the subject areas.

Each unit has a unit focus statement to organize the BIG IDEAS we are learning. Our first unit is called BODY WORKS, and the statement is: 

Our personal choices play a role in the interconnected system of the human body.

During the unit, we will talk about these areas which will touch upon areas of the curriculum in Science, Socials, PE/Health, Math, Career Education, Language Arts, and French:

• The systems of the body and how they work together
• Diseases and how they impact our community
• How the body defends itself against disease
• The factors and strategies that contribute to healthy immunity and well-being
• Crunching Data: How we gather and analyze data to tell us information we need to stay healthy
• How art and mindfulness practices are related to mental and physical well being
• Beginning French & French words for the human body

STARTING THE UNIT:

Today we introduced the unit and how it will work. Students did a pre-assessment activity to see what they already know about the human body by drawing life-size posters of classmates and seeing what parts of the body systems they could identify without looking at books or the web. We have some entertaining posters in the classroom! 🙂

We also began working with our composition notebooks, which will serve throughout the year as a place to reflect, to put down notes about the unit, to do brainstorms, and to record our thinking. These notebooks will go home every night, but should be brought back with you every day. Everyone had to create a cover page, and for tonight, finish a HUMAN BODY brainstorm. Please fill page 2 with all words you can think of related to the human body!

Tomorrow, we will continue our talk about the body systems!

READING AROUND THE WORLD:

As part of their Language Arts Reading marks, students are required to do 20 minutes of reading a night. If they choose, they can participate in the Reading Around the World program. They were given a green duotang today with the information about the program, including a letter explaining how it works. Here are some highlights:

• There is a book listed in your packet for each country of the world, organized into six continent groups.
• Sometimes there is a specific book to read, but many times it will say “any book” — it really is any book! Not necessarily anything to do with the country name next to the prompt.
• As you finish books, you can write them on the list or record them on a piece of notebook paper. Parents can initial to say it was completed.
• If you are not allowed to read a certain book or have absolutely NO interest in reading the book suggested, tell me another book you would like to use to replace it. I am flexible.
• Finish a continent, receive a prize, recognition on the blog, and a post-it on the wall calendar in my room.
• Finish all the continents, then get a free lunch with Ms. D in late June.

REMINDERS:

• Do the brainstorm in your composition book for tonight. If you don’t have a composition book, please get one soon.
• Thank you to everyone for turning in the parent questionnaires! They are all in!
• Thank you to everyone who brought supplies! We really appreciate it!
• First gym class tomorrow, so be sure to bring runners you can move in AND a water bottle so we don’t have to stop and keep going out for water in the hallway.
• Parent Conferences Sept. 20/21: Save the date! Notice to come soon!
• Field Trip on September 28th: Save the date! We are going all day with Ms. Geddes class (the other MACC 4/5 class in North Burnaby) to Science World to study the human body. Notice to come soon!

Have a great night!

Ms. D