Contrary to the fact that there's been no new posts on our classroom blog over the last week or so (and believe me... I've been hearing it from some of the students!), Room 18 is still alive and kicking! It's been a super-busy time in the class (and away from the class, for their teacher!), and so I haven't had a chance to update the blog for a while (I've been feeling very guilty about it, if that's any consolation). Work and personal commitments have not left me with the time needed to contribute to the blog, but I've finally got a few spare minutes, so here we go...
Part of the reason that I have been so busy, and unable to contribute to our classroom blog lately, is that I was fortunate enough to attend a 2-day PD session in Gimli last week Thursday and Friday, called Riding The Wave Of Change (http://www.esd.mb.ca/wave/). It is a great conference that revolves around technology and education - I've been wanting to attend for a few years, and I was not disappointed! I learned something from every session that I attended, and was able to connect with many talented teachers doing really interesting things with technology in their classrooms - I cannot wait to start putting some of my new-found knowledge to work in the final part of this school year, and into the next as well!
We've been doing some fun stuff in class lately - we've been studying Mexico in Social Studies, and we've just begun to start talking about our wrap-up project for the unit: we're going to be working with Ms. Bell, our Teacher Librarian, and making dioramas! This is something that I haven't undertaken much in the past, but a few of my colleagues went to an excellent PD (professional development) session on how to make really cool dioramas, using items found almost exclusively at Dollarama (that store is a teacher's best friend!). We've looked at a lot of pictures of Mexico lately (primarily, focusing on Mexican villages), and Ms. Bell and I showed them the supplies that they'll be using to create their dioramas. The students were really excited, and were brainstorming about how they could use the different supplies to create different parts of these villages. Here is a shot of some of the supplies the students will be using:
We've been continuing our Plants and Soils unit in Science, and have been running a number of different experiments, to see the effects of light, water, and fertilizer on plant growth. Check out some of our work:
My little plant scientists at work - I'm so proud!
The white plants are pea plants that have been in the dark for two weeks. The green plants were placed under grow lamps for two weeks - what a difference!
Recording observations on what happens to the plants grown in the light and in the dark.
This is what happens when pea plants received no fertilizer (cup on the left), the recommended amount of fertilizer (cup in the middle - excellent growth), and way more than the recommended amount of fertilizer (poor germination and limited growth).
One of the experiments looked at how different amounts of water affected seed germination. Pea seeds either were placed into a cup, on top of a paper towel that was stuffed at the bottom. Seeds were submerged in water ("lots of water"), slightly dampened ("some water"), of left dry ("no water"). Here are the results:
Lots of water: yuck!
No water: no growth.
Some water: excellent initial growth!
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