Category: Science

Pringle Comes to Rosser!!

On Monday, January 14th we were thrilled to receive a very COLD package, delivered by Mrs. Ameixa, which had arrived from the South Pole!!  You can still see some of the wet spots on the brown paper from where the ice melted!

Inside this package was: a novel (Mr. Popper’s Penguins); a letter from Admiral Drake (a character in the novel); a lovely little penguin named Pringle; and a Journal in which the students can write and share their home experiences with Pringle.  This was a very exciting arrival for the students – and the adults in the room, as well!

Pringle, our class penguin, has already made home visits to the homes of: Maya A., Ateeq, Alex, and Justin.  She is currently spending this weekend with Lyka and her family.  When students bring Pringle back to school they share their home (and extra-curricular visits) with the rest of us through their written entries in the Journal.  Pringle has been very busy enjoying a lot of different kinds of foods and activities!

All students are anxiously awaiting their turn taking Pringle home.  When she arrives in your home I am sure your family will be very welcoming.  Enjoy the experience!

 

Stellaluna

Last week we began our bat study with the reading of this great book.  Students then did a sequencing activity which resulted in the creation of their own little booklets.  Through this story students learned a lot of valuable information about bats – and the differences between them and birds.  We will continue to explore these differences as we learn more about these flying mammals – bats.

Our Bat Cave

As part of our exploration of bats, today we did a survey of how we feel about these interesting – and sometimes scary looking – animals.  Students decorated their own bat (with whatever colours they wanted) and then we placed these in one of three columns in our bulletin board bat cave.  Students had the choice of “I like bats . . .”, “I don’t like bats . . . “, and “I am not sure how I feel (about bats) . . .”

I have been encouraging students to make up their own minds and not to choose the option that their friends – or the majority of the class – chooses.  This has been a bit of an issue with our morning sign-in graph as many students just put their ‘doodle bug’ name where they see everyone else answering – oftentimes without even reading the question.  We will continue to work on this.

We are going to ‘go batty’ . . .

Today we launched our new science based theme – bats!!  We began by recording what we KNOW (or think we know) about bats.  I asked the students for their input and wrote out their responses on chart paper.  There were no ideas left out (right or wrong).

We then made a similar chart paper with the things that we WONDER about (i.e. our questions about bats):

We are all looking forward to learning more about these fascinating animals!!!  We will keep you posted.

 

Me to We Play Day

As the winners of the Terry Fox fundraiser, our division won a play activity with the Me to We club.  This afternoon we were treated to fun-filled hour of gym activities set up the Ms. Sikic’s club.  There were five stations including: tail tag; bean bag hand ball; one where you knocked over skittles while on a balance ball; an obstacle course to maneuver while carrying wiffle balls in a scoop; and a scooter course.  The class was divided into five groups and they rotated through the different stations.

We gave our hosts a great big “thank you” for their thoughtful planning and their clever station set ups.

PNE Field Trip

We had an exciting morning on our field trip today.  Students learned a lot about how a farm provides us with our food – which we buy from our grocery stores.  Students had an opportunity to see a real cow being milked by a milking machine, and then saw the milk being fed to the baby calf, Charlie.

I’d like to thank all the parents who helped us out by driving and supervising on the trip.  We couldn’t have done this trip without you.

As a finale of the trip students were able to choose a pumpkin to take home to carve for their Hallowe’en celebrations.

I hope everyone had a fun-filled morning.

 

Cinemazoo Visit

Last Thursday a few little friends dropped by to see us.

We had a great visit from insects, arachnids, amphibians, reptiles, and mammals – and their human handlers, of course.  Students received a lot of information about the many different animals that Cinemazoo houses in their facility.   A lot of these animals have been ‘rescued’ pets that outgrew their owner’s habitats or expectations.

Different people reacted to these visitors in very different ways.  Mrs. Wall was happy to be a temporary backdrop for some furry arachnids (tarantulas) . . .

. . . while Mrs. K had a very different reaction!!

Near the end of our visit a few students got a goodbye ‘hug’ from a nine foot python.

All in all, a basically regular day at Rosser!

Vancouver Aquarium & Beach Field Trip

We had a great day today!!  We left the school shortly after 9:00 and arrived at the Vancouver Aquarium about 9:40.  When we had divided into our little groups we had about 2 1/2 hours to explore and enjoy the animal exhibits.  There were some changes from the last time we were there two years ago.  The entrance has been moved and there are some new fish tanks, but the most exciting change is the addition of their new Africa Penguin colony.

The grade 2 & 3 students from Ms. Astorino’s class who had been with me last year had studied penguins, as a species, in great detail.  They had also completed partner research on a particular penguin type.  Following the Ministry of Education’s IRP’s (curriculum) we study plants and animals in alternating years.  As this year was our ‘plant’ year this would make next year an ‘animal’ year for my next years’ class.  Hmmm? perhaps a study of penguins is predicted!?!

Unfortunately the camera reflected back on itself but you can get the idea.  Students had an opportunity to complete a ‘scientific observation’ paper on these flightless birds and all who did received a certificate stating that they were a Penguin Behaviour Expert.

As the three classes were split up into little groups, each group had different experiences.  Many watched the dolphin or beluga whale show.  Ms. Lam received a wet ‘present’ from the beluga as she and her group were sitting in the ‘splash’ zone.  Many other students enjoyed the 4-D show and got wet there!!  We were amazed to see how active the squid was – as in our many previous trips to the Aquarium we have almost never seen it even move!  Today it was doing rather athletic calisthetics and contortions!!  It must have been feeling energetic!

All groups met at the entrance at about 12:15 and we headed to the covered picnic area and playground for lunch.  Students always get extra hungry when on field trips out in all that fresh air!  They enjoyed some run-around time before we headed down to the beach at Lumberman’s Arch at 1:00.

With the bus picking us up at 2:15 we had about an hour to spend at beachcombing.  Most students got right into the explorations with no persuasion at all.  They loved it!!  Only the ‘too large’ rocks went unturned – even though some were tried!

While some students were a bit reluctant to get up close and personal with the natural habitat (and live crabs), with a bit of persuasion they were willing to experiment with holding the dead crab shells that we found.

Aside from crabs we found lots of shells, some seaweed, and a few starfish hidden under a large rock.  We also had a few ‘water walkers’ who spent the majority of their time wading through the shallows.

All in all it was a very fun, and very well-behaved, field trip.  Thank you to the parents who came along to join in the fun today!

Fun with Magnets

We have completed a mini-unit on magnets.  Students had fun experimenting with them and finding out what will attract (stick) and what will be repelled (not stick) to the magnets.  We learned about the poles, how some metals are naturally magnetic, and how some can be made to be magnetic.  Some of our experiments were a bit challenging due the age of our magnets and the need to get them re-magnetized!  This will hopefully be looked into before they are used again.  Oh, well.  It was fun to play with them.