Math - equality

Mr. H. came around during Daily 5 and was asking students questions about reading. - Gal and Jacell
Daily 5 was fun, and we had it twice! Once after Phys. Ed. and once after afternoon recess. - Cam H.
Today we had gym. - Taylor
We have 4 marbles for our next Mystery Motivator. - Hailey M. and Braylin
We did Math on the SmartBoard doing questions about if number sentences were balanced or not. - Jenna and Joey

The last couple of days, we've been working on equality in Math; that is, that the amount on one side of the equal sign needs to be the same as the amount on the other side. We used a balance scale to show how when you have more weight on one side than on the other, the two sides will not evenly balance out; an equation is exactly like that. It was interesting that the students all knew that an equation like 4+2=6 is true, but were thrown for a loop when asked if 5+3=4+4 was true. However, after seeing it demonstrated with a scale, and some really cool activities that the students got to participate in on the SmartBoard, the students really 'got it' (I love seeing students when the 'light goes on' - one of the best parts of teaching!). Here's a screenshot of one of the activities the students took part in:

Tuesday

We made a list for who's allowed to go on the camping chairs in our class for the week. - Taylor
We had a bus evacuation today. They tell you the safety rules, where the exits are, and then you get to jump out of the back end of the bus. - Robyn
At recess, we had a guy named Jason from Grade 5 help to make teams, and he was the ref. - Cam H.
Every Tuesday we have intramurals for soccer at lunch recess. - Joey
We had Health for the third time today. - Gal

Happy Thanksgiving

While my students were happily enjoying a day off today, the teachers were hard at work, spending the day involved in professional development. It was a really good day, and we learned a lot! However, it's nice to have a long weekend now. I'm looking forward to turkey dinner, pumpkin pie... and the Winnipeg Jets home opener on Sunday — Go, Jets, Go! I hope you all enjoy your weekend - Happy Thanksgiving.

Math in the computer lab!

Today we had our Mystery Motivator. Mr. H. gave us chips and a movie. - Jenna
The movie we watched was 'Gnomeo and Juliet'. - Braylin
We had extra recess today because we got close to our Terry Fox goal. - Tyler
We had Phys. Ed. after O Canada. - Alexandra
After morning recess, we had our Math in the Tech Lab. We did Number of the Day in the Tech Lab and it was really fun. - Cam H.
Today was Phys. Ed. and then Choir right in a row. - Taylor

Last year, I attended a PD on using technology to enhance student learning. We were challenged at the PD session to create a tool that would would foster the independence of students. At the same time, I was finding that sometimes, when the students were working on their Number of the Day books and they were unsure of what an answer should be, they would be put in an answer without checking it; that it was better to have any answer (right or wrong) than no answer at all. So, after bouncing ideas off of a few of my colleagues, I got the idea of creating a tool in Excel that would let the students know whether their answer was right or wrong, but force them to reason out for themselves how to correct their answer if there was a mistake. If the the students get the right answer in activities such as patterning and making the number with money, they are given a 'thumbs-up'. If not, they are given a 'thumbs-down', and have to go back and figure out for themselves where they need to make changes. With their number sentences, Excel gives them a 'true' if the number sentences are correct, and a 'false' if they are not. As this was the students' first time this year trying out the tool, there were a lot of questions, and we didn't quite finish. However, the students really enjoyed doing their Number of the Day in a different way, and were asking me when we could do this again!

Hard at work on the Number of the Day:




Working on skip counting - lots of thumbs up!



Making the Number of the Day using money:

Long day

Students love early dismissal, as they get to 'cut out of work early'. This is definitely not the case for the teachers. While the kids are going home early, the staff attends a staff meeting. The meetings are usually fairly long, as there is always professional development (or PD, as we call it) that we take part in, in addition to many things that need to be discussed, debated, and decided, with regards to making the school a better place to work, learn, and play. After finishing the meeting, running a couple of errands, eating dinner, catching up on some reading, and watching a little news (RIP Steve Jobs), I realized "AAAAAHHHHH! We didn't post on our blog today!". Unfortunately, as a result, I was unable to get the students' input for our blog today. However, the highlight of the day was that the students started creating their own beautiful oil pastel masterpieces, based on the painting we've been talking/writing about in out last few Art classes - B.J.O. Nordfeldt's Green Woods (which was mentioned in a previous post a few weeks ago). The plan is to get the finished works up on Artsonia, but more about that at a later date... :)

Grade 1 Reading Buddies

Today we did Reading Buddies for the second time with the Grade 1's. - Jenna

We had a good time reading with the Grade 1's! - Kaynen
In Social Studies, we were working with different characters. - Gal
We were saying who the characters are - if they're nice, if they share, care. Things like that. - Hailey M.
After lunch, we had Social Studies, and we worked in groups. My group worked on Phineas and Ferb. - Cam H.

Today we had Music and Library right in a row! - Taylor
Today we picked new books from the Library. - Dasia

Election 2011!

Before morning recess, we had Family Bins. - Braylin
Logan is the only Grade 3 student in the Frisky Foxes family group. - Robyn
We had 2 free times in the Gym. -Tyler
We earned 5 marbles today. - Joey
We wrote for 11 minutes in our journals for the Daily 5. - Marie
Today in Social Studies, we voted for the election. - Jenna

During our election, when Mr. Hoeppner was counting the ballots, the NDP beat the PC's by 11-5. - Dylan
The Green Party had 3 votes and the Liberals had 3 votes. - Lexi
This afternoon, we had our own mini-election. The NDP had 11 votes, and whenever the NDP got another vote, people went "WOO!" - Sydney
Today in our mini-election, it was really fun. The NDP won the whole thing. - Cam H.

With the Manitoba provincial election taking place tomorrow, I thought it was the perfect time for our class to learn about what all the hubbub was about. We've been talking about rights and responsibilities in Social Studies, and voting in elections just happens to be a major responsibility of being a citizen of Canada. We talked about how the province was divided up into different ridings (and found out the Joey's aunt is running for the Liberal party in Transcona - cool!), and how voting actually works. Then we talked about the different political parties, and what each of them stood for. Next, we watched some of the TV ads that the different parties have been running over the last few weeks, and noted how some of them were really negative towards other parties, while other ads were really positive about their own party. Finally, we had our own election, where the students voted for the party of their choice. As you saw from some of the students comments at the beginning of the post, the NDP won in the riding of Radisson Room 18 - we'll have to wait until tomorrow night to see who wins the 2011 provincial election!

This is what our ballots looked like:

There was a long line-up at the poll in Room 18 today:

A student carefully considers who he will cast his ballot for (don't worry.... he waited until the photographer left the polling booth before casting his vote!):