What a fun day! Thank you to those of you who dressed up in a jersey and hat! If your child forgot to dress up, we have another themed day for tomorrow - Crazy Hair Day! It is always fun to further our sense of community within the school by showing unity on themed days such as these! On Wednesday is "ugly sweater day" and Thursday is "pajama day." We worked on estimating and measuring angles this morning. The students learned how to measure reflex angles (angles bigger than 180 degrees, but less than 360 degrees) by measuring the smaller angle, and subtracting it from 360 to see what the remaining angle would have to be. We helped our grade 1/2 buddies with decorating their cookies that they made with icing and sprinkles. The grade 6 students showed some icing techniques, and demonstrated how to contain all of the sprinkles on the plate. Below are some photos from our time with them:
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Dear Families,
As we close out another year, we thought we could bring some school spirit to the building. We will be having a special theme each day next week. Your student is more then welcome to participate. Monday: Jersey and Hat Day Tuesday: Crazy Hair Day Wednesday: Ugly Sweater Day Thursday: Pajama and Stuffy Day On Thursday December 20, 2019, from 2:00-3:45pm, Parent Council will be hosting a movie afternoon. The movie will be the Netflix special Klaus. Klaus is a about a simple act of kindness that always sparks another, even in a frozen, faraway place. When Smeerensburg’s new postman, Jesper, befriends a toymaker Klaus, their gifts melt an age-old feud and deliver a sleigh full of holiday traditions. Students are welcome to wear their PJ’s and bring a stuffed animal. Parent Council will be providing popcorn and a juice box. Also, students will be coming home with their report card, so please look for it and return the signed envelope on January 6, 2020. Have a great Winter Break! What an exciting day! We had the acapella group called "Hoja" come to our school this afternoon to give a very entertaining and engaging performance! Ask your child about the popular songs that they sang, and about the 3 rules for becoming successful: get involved, practice, and believe in yourself!
We are learning about writing from different types of perspectives. The students wrote about winter from the perspective of a snowman today. They were given a checklist to adhere by to guide their success. Ask your child about how their progress is going with this task! We will continue with it tomorrow. The checklist they were given is below:
Currently during our music time slot, the students are working in groups to make an a capella versions or their current favourite song. They are learning to work together to make the various instrumental sounds in the background, and they are challenged to make the song recognizable without using instruments (only their bodies). Ask your child what song their group is working on, and what role they have within the song! We will be sharing these songs with one another next week!
Students used our co-created rubric to peer-assess each others Figurative Language Books. We discussed the importance of honesty, trusting one another, and feeling safe about sharing work with each other. Ask your child about this peer-assessment process, and what they received as positive or constructive feedback! Your child should confidently be able to explain and give examples of the 6 types of figurative language as a result of this project (similes, metaphors, personification, onomatopoeias, alliterations, and hyperboles); moreover, try getting your child to write out examples of each one at home for further practice! Reminder: The PLP Classroom at Rosscarrock will be hosting a Holiday Bake Sale on Friday December 13th for all of the students at Rosscarrock School. Treats cost 25 cents each and students are limited to two treats until all of the students have had an opportunity to buy something. There will be a variety of items. The students completed an exit slip (a mini-quiz to show me what they can do) on converting units of measurement and writing formulas for perimeter. Some students are showing a misunderstanding of converting from units (such as mm) to other units (such as cm or m). Please try the following with your child, and see if they could use further support from home:
71m to cm, 29cm to mm, 6m to mm. We will continue to explore converting units throughout the remainder of the week. The students began presenting their constellation presentations today! Thank you to the students who shared their knowledge with us, and we are looking forward to the remaining presentations that will come throughout the remainder of the week! We also discussed as a class how we will be sharing these presentations with the rest of the school during our Celebration of Learning that we will be holding in our classroom sometime in January! There will be more information on our Celebration of Learning to come once we are back from the winter break. Ask your child about the 3 internal layers of the sun (core, radiative zone, convection zone) and the 3 external layers (photosphere, chromosphere, and corona). We learned facts and purposes about each layer. We will continue to explore the sun throughout the week. We were informed that Room 22 will be holding a baked goods sale for the school (staff and students) this Friday! The baked goods will be sold for 25 cents a piece. I mentioned to students that they may be able to earn 25 cents at home by doing some chores, and that they can discuss this at home with their families! Reminder: Don't forget to remind your child about their moon recording/diary homework! They should be able to see the "Full Moon" phase as of tomorrow! We would like to give a welcome to our new student, Hala! Ask your child to tell you some facts about our new classmate, and how they can support her within the classroom (language, routines, expectations, etc.).
In math, we practiced converting units of measurement from mm to cm to m to km (and vice versa). See if your child can accurately convert questions like: 4m to cm (400cm), or 4m to mm (4000mm). We are trying to solve word problems where they would have to calculate perimeter in one unit, and then convert the answer to another unit. Try the following example with your child: Rafay wants to use tape to decorate the edge of a rectangular gift box. The box is 36 mm long and 24 mm wide. He has 10 cm of tape. Is that enough? Hint: Calculate the perimeter of the gift box first (P=120mm) and then convert the answer to cm (or convert the cm to mm) to see if there is enough tape. We had a very engaging day focused around debates! The students had been working to provide evidence for their stance (position) within the various debate topics, and today they got to act them out. The students were able to provide feedback, there was respectful and successful statements being said back and forth, and the students were able to cast their ballots (votes) afterwards based on the information that was presented! Ask your child what topics were discussed, who they ended up voting for, and if they were surprised by any of their votes (persuaded by the debaters)! The class has been working every day this week on planning and writing out their dialogue skits. Today the students acted out and performed their skits to the class. Students were very engaged in this task! Ask your child about how acting made them feel, and if it is an option course they would like to pursue in jr. high!
We collaborated with our Grade 1/2 buddies during phys. ed. today for some scooter and parachute games! The older students were given opportunities to demonstrate safety and following of the rules to the younger students. Ask your child for further details about the great day of bonding that we had with our little buddies! Can your child tell you the perimeter of a rectangle if it has an length of 5cm and a width of 3cm (P=16cm)? Here is another example to try with your child: If the perimeter of a rectangle is 18m, and all we know if that the width is 6m, what must the length be (L=3m each). Furthermore, we are learning how to write formulas for perimeter, such as P=S+S+S+S for squares, or P=L+W+L+W or P=(2xL)+(2xW).
We began learning about the main layers (corona, chromosphere, photosphere, convection zone, radiation zone, and core) and associated properties/functions of the sun this afternoon. Please feel free to continue this conversation at home to support their inquiries within our Sky Science unit! Reminder: Please support your child with their Moon Recordings/Diary homework! They should be able to see the "Waxing Gibbous" phase starting to form! Highlight of the Day:
Students worked on their inquiry skills as we continued our exploration within our Sky Science unit. Students showed interest and guided the conversation into a direction that was about the possibility of life on Mars. They also expressed how they have been attending to their homework, and how they were able to see the "first quarter" phase of the moon last night. Today was the final day for their constellation project. Ask your child how their presentation has come along, and if they need to add any further components at home (students worked in their drive so that they could access their presentation from home if need be). We explored how to make formulas for calculating perimeter in math today! Ask your child what the perimeter of the following rectangle would be in cm: length of 3m, height of 50cm (first convert the 3m to cm, then add all 4 sides to get the perimeter). We will continue with exploring perimeter all this week!
Ask your child about the topic that he/she chose for our social studies project: on debating! We explored some topics as a class, and then students got with a partner, and chose a topic of interest. The partnerships are now planning for their debate, writing out supporting statements with examples that defend their stance (either pro or against). Once the partnerships are prepared, we will be having the partnerships debate/present and the students get to vote (democracy within the classroom) for which stance/partnership they align with based off of the presented arguments. We discussed how being able to communicate in an informed, persuasive manner, is important in these types of activities, and how this will transfer to persuasive essay writing in jr. high. |
Ms. Victoria GasparGrade 6 Teacher |