Totally Random: Star Wars by Mrs. J

In honour of the new STAR WARS film which will be opening TOMORROW (December 18th), Mrs. J will be posting a daily random STAR WARS until the end of this week...

Here's the LAST one. The winner of the Select Fan Film award from 2015 as selected by starwars.com

Looking Ahead to January!

In the next month, lots of exciting things will be happening!

Here are a few of the highlights!

Animal Farm: this is our next read aloud, as per our student survey. Animal Farm is 'classic literature', a text that allows for a multitude of connections and 'deep thoughts'. Students may encounter this text again in high-school and this a great opportunity for some excellent 'high-school literacy prep'.


SKYPE interview with author Kevin McGill: Kevin is a writing friend of mine who self publishes YA novels. He participated (and co-created) my Boys Literacy Skype Event from 2011 (see the news paper/media articles about the event here...scroll down to the bottom!) and used to run a website called Guys Can Read. He has been a frequent SKYPE guest in my intermediate classes. Here is his book website. And this is when he sent his book into space!

Barrie Film Festival: As part of their Education Program, we will be viewing Raiders of the Lost Ark: The Adaptation, which is a 1989 American fan film made as a shot for shot remake of the 1981 original film. It was filmed over a 7 year period by 3 boys from Mississippi. 

As preparation for this film, we have been asked to watch the original film. We have used short films to prepare for our next CASI reading assessment and we can apply those skills again to these films. It also ties in quite nicely to the conversations we have been having around Growth Mindset. 

More Engineering Projects & Tech Buddies Projects: Our building projects and tech buddy session were both very successful. There is more to come in the new year! We will likely meet our tech buddies again for a science project, and also have another engineering project within the month of January.

Maker Cycle: Our next media project for the learning hubs is 'environment issues'. 
These are just a few of the highlights! Of course there are other things. Check out the Current Learning Focus page in January to see specific goals by subject.

Looking forward to exciting January!

Totally Random: STAR WARS! by Mrs. J

In honour of the new STAR WARS film which will be opening soon (December 18th), Mrs. J will be posting a daily random STAR WARS until the end of this week...

Here's the SECOND one.

Blogging about Our Experiences! And Learning How To Embed Videos

Students, today you will:

1. create a new post on your blog
2. you will be doing two reflections
1. one will be on your building project
2. the other will be on your graphing video project
3. post your videos for both projects
4. and answer some reflection questions for each
5. then publish each post to your blog

That means you will need to go to our youtube page, find the video you need, and copy the embed code. It can be found when you click on SHARE and then EMBED. Like so!

Then go to your blog, and create a new post. When you click on the HTML button on the top left, you can see the code version of your post. You can paste in the code here.  Then, when you click back to 'compose' you should see your video.

Here is a HOW TO VIDEO (procedure) we will watch to get your started.

The reflection questions for each project are as follows:

BUILDING PROJECT

1. What skills did you need to do this project?
2. What were you trying to do that wouldn't work? What happened? How did that feel?
3. Did you ever want to give up? If so, why didn't you?

GRAPHING VIDEOS PROJECT

1. What skills did you need to do this project?
2. How did the practice on the graphing stories website prepare you for these videos?
3. What did you learn in the process of using graphing stories and creating your own graphing stories?

Once you have embedded your video(s), please answer the reflection questions for each and then publish your post.

Graphing Stories: Creating Graphing Stories Videos!

As mentioned in a previous post, Mrs. Boate, Innovation Resource Teacher with SCDSB, planned to return today to video our own graphing stories!

When Mrs. Boate visited us in early December, she introduced us to this site: graphing stories. 

On it, are different real life scenarios which can then be graphed.

Students watch the scenario and then creatively interpret it into a mathematical (graphical) representation of their own devising...which involves lots of interesting math processing skills, like estimating distances/time, and reasoning, reflecting upon and justifying their decisions, etc. 

Then you get to watch 'the answer'.

We have since watched, and graphed several graphing stories on the graphing story website. It reached a point where we could look at the scenario and already have the 'graph' version in our minds before even putting pen to paper!

Clearly, we were ready to create our own versions!

We brainstormed ideas for videos, scenarios that could easily take place around the school yard, such as basketball, football, playground activities, paper airplanes, games like leap frog...

Having practiced so many graphing scenarios on the site, students could tell us straight away what the end results/graph would look like...

So they were able to apply their knowledge to a new context! One of their own choosing, and one which they were able to physically and visually experience. 

Then, with the help of Mrs. Boate and Mrs. Owen (also an Innovation Resource Teacher with SCDSB), small groups filmed the activities on the iPad and/or go-pro camera.

Afterwards, they edited the raw footage to create 'graphing stories' like videos.

 Some included slow motion and some decided to also include 'the answer' as a graphic representation (which is how it is on the website).

Here is an example!

Please check out the other fabulous creations on our class youtube page!

Totally Random: STAR WARS #3

In honour of the new STAR WARS film which will be opening soon (December 18th), Mrs. J will be posting a daily random STAR WARS for the next 3 days...

Here's the THIRD one.

Engineering STEAM Project Results

Well, that was a fun afternoon!

We

Totally Random: STAR WARS Mrs J #2

In honour of the new STAR WARS film which will be opening soon (December 18th), Mrs. J will be posting a daily random STAR WARS for the next 4 days...

Here's the SECOND one.

Totally Random: Robert

In which I pull a name at random and ask: what do you want on the blog?

Roberts wants to remind you this moving is coming out soon...just in case you didn't know...

Totally Random: SPECIAL EDITION! Star Wars by Mrs. J

In honour of the new STAR WARS film which will be opening soon (December 18th), Mrs. J will be posting a daily random STAR WARS for the next 5 days...

Here's the first one.

Totally Random: Felix

In which I pull a name at random and ask: what do you want on the blog?

Felix wants to introduce you to Emily Batty, Canadian Olympian (Mountain Biking)

Engineering STEAM Maker Project

Today's maker project objectives are related to Rube Goldberg Machines, like in this music video




Recently I participated in a cool STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts, math) PD session and we created our own Rube Goldberg machines using everyday objects (and things like hot wheels tracks).

Here are the objectives from that PD session, which I will use here as well:

A Rube Goldberg machine is a contraption, invention, device or apparatus that is deliberately over-engineered to perform a simple task in a complicated fashion, usually including a chain reaction. The expression is named after American cartoonist and inventor Rube Goldberg (1883–1970). (from wikipedia)

RESULTS COMING SOON!

Guest Blogger: Hannah

As an extension to learning, each student will have a chance to write a short blog post for this class blog! Here is Hannah's contribution!

Totally Random: Carina

In which I pull a name at random and ask: what do you want on the blog?

Carina wants you to enjoy 1D's Best Song Ever!

Tech Buddies!

Our class is becoming tech buddies with Mrs. Nitert's Grade 3/4's!

The students in our class know quite a bit about tech and media. Now they are able to share their knowledge. In the new year, we will be doing some collaborative projects with Mrs. Nitert's class.

To start, my class is going to make sure all the Gr. 3/4 students have their google log ins set up.

Then they are going to answer this online SURVEY together....so we can get a good understanding of their interests and likes/dislikes!

More projects to come in the new year! Stay tuned!

*survey now closed*

Totally Random: Blake

In which I pull a name at random and ask: what do you want on the blog?

Blake wants you to consider this message.

Guest Blogger: Chase

As an extension to learning, each student will have a chance to write a short blog post for this class blog! Here is Chase's contribution!

The best video game in the world is Pokemon because it has awesome designs for every Pokemon. I hear people say “only the 1st generation is the best” or “the new Pokemon designs suck.” Whereas I disagree, I think that every Pokemon is unique in its own way. Although some are stronger than others making them overused, but that's just life, there will be the strong and the weak. But just because one is stronger than the other, or looks cooler than the other, doesn't it make it worthless.

Also, Pokemon has a terrific story. It’s all about bonding with your Pokemon and friendship, and using them in battle and displaying the friendship  and trust you have in one another. and i know this sounds silly because it’s just a game, but to me, I like to pretend that i am a Pokemon trainer while playing the game, beating the gym leaders, catching rare Pokemon.

Lastly, the music in Pokemon is fantastic! Such beautifully crafted songs really make me feel part of the adventure! The music is so outstanding I even went to a symphony that only played Pokemon songs!

I hope one day, Pokemon won’t be fiction anymore, that science will be able to make Pokemon and release them into the wild  for me, to catch them all and continue my quest of being the best pokemon trainer in the world!