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Zoom Meeting with Mrs. Grieve & Mrs. Hayward
Zoom Meeting with Mrs. Grieve & Mrs. Hayward
The progress our class is making in Phys Ed is so exciting! We are now up to a minute 15 seconds of planks, 7 push-ups and most of us are running the full distance around the field. This is a huge improvement from the beginning of the year and the pride in their achievements is wonderful. We have even been discussing the possibility of starting a training program for anyone interested in running a 10K in the spring.
Today, we invited Andrea Grieve and Paulette Hayward to talk about their experiences training for, and running the Niagara Half Marathon in 2016 (you can read more about them and their achievements here).
A big part of their success was a result of believing in themselves, setting small goals and choosing to follow through to meet those goals.
Whether we're running a marathon or learning math, that is great advice.
As the caption on the poster of Muhammad Ali on our classroom door says, "Impossible is Nothing!"
Our Slogan Ideas
Our Slogan Ideas
It seems to me that the creativity of our class knows no bounds!
Here is just a small selection of the slogans that students have written for Dewitt Carter and our class. (Before brainstorming slogans, we discussed the purpose of the slogan for DWC is to highlight the difference between us and other schools in DSBN. The purpose for the slogan for our class is to express what we believe and what we're about).
Dewitt Carter Slogans:
"The nicest school in the DSBN"
"Working hard. Staying safe"
"Dedication. Will. Creativity. DWC"
"One big family"
Our class slogans:
"The nice group"
"Respect, trust, perseverance makes fun"
"We got this!"
"The active learning class"
"Where the only thing nicer than the teachers are the students"
"We believe in you, now you believe in yourself"
"Our second home"
Visual Art Update
Visual Art Update
We have started creating the rough drafts of our Remembrance Day art. An important part of this process is to test out different graphic designs. What style of writing? What is the best layout?
NEW Student Blogger!!
NEW Student Blogger!!
I am so excited to share that Julia will be joining me in writing blog posts! Her writing will bring a fresh viewpoint and a new voice to minor-details.ca. Thanks so much for taking on this challenge, Julia!
How to Write a Great Slogan
How to Write a Great Slogan
From Julia:
Have you ever heard a phrase that you couldn't forget? Slogans are quick, memorable catchphrases that communicate what the creator wants readers to perceive. They are often used to promote or represent the contrast and value of things.
In class, we reviewed outstanding slogans and the criteria that many of them follow to achieve a long-lasting memory in readers.
We also discovered the types of slogans and how they help define the goal of the slogan in different ways. These types include Business, Advertising, Descriptive, Commanding, Persuading, Creative, and Emotive. Examples of these genres were dissected and given specifications. For example, Apple's slogan, "Think Different", is a commanding line that grabs the reader's attention and calls them to action. Brilliant words were used to pitch the company's purpose.
Then, the names of familiar places were presented to our class. Our town, school, and class require slogans, to be made individually. Applying our steps for excellent slogans, we are beginning to produce our own meaningful phrases.
The assignment encourages students to identify and develop remarkable slogans and learn the methods of their authors.
Slogans are innovative, original, and clever things. Without them, we would lose a valuable source of creator-to-reader communication.
What is the Caption?
What is the Caption?
Some of the funny captions students wrote about this image are:
The day Kamron got his G1
What happened when the Corvette entered self-driving mode
"The tree hit me!!"
"Honestly, Officer, I wasn't drinking"
"Dad, there's a small dent in your car"
What happens when you drink too much coffee (or ... what happens when you don't drink enough coffee)
"It wasn't me!"
Sometimes you just have a bad day
Converting Units for Area Measurements
Converting Units for Area Measurements
Converting units for linear measurements is fairly simple. If you need to convert centimeters to meters, for example, you divide the number of centimeters by 100 because there are 100 cm in 1 meter. So, 35cm would be 0.35m.
But how do you convert units of area?
In order to convert units of area, you need to remember that area has 2 dimensions. Each measurement needs to be converted (see image opposite). We will practise solving area conversion problems over the next few days.
You can find the complete notes for today's lesson in our Google classroom.
Visual Art & Dramatic Recitation Project
Visual Art & Dramatic Recitation Project
Canadian artist and cartoonist Rob MacDougall has created some beautiful Remembrance Day art that combines the geometry of gravestones from cemeteries in France and Holland, real maple leaves and the poetry of John McCrae.
Inspired by MacDougall's art, we are creating our own artwork that uses a maple leaf from a tree on Dewitt Carter's playground and reflects a poem from World War I or World War II.
Abbie chose the poem "Arms and the Boy" by Wilfred Owen
Logan chose "Two Minutes Silence" by Robert Irvine
Julia has chosen "Death that need not have been" by Flora Hendricks
William Laur chose "The Guns went Silent" by Robert Longley
In the weeks leading up to Remembrance Day, we will be rehearsing a dramatic recitation of our poem and completing our work of art. More details about the project can be found in our Google classroom.
This short video called "Doing Poetry Right" has 5 tips to help prepare an excellent dramatic recitation (click here)
Map Investigation
Map Investigation
As we continue to learn about landforms, today we spent some time investigating a large map of Ontario. We located major lakes in Ontario (Lake Nipissing, Lake St Clair and the Great Lakes etc.), we calculated the area of Algonquin Park (about 7,500 square kilometers), tracked the Trans Canada Highway across Ontario and used the map scale to figure out how many kilometers you'd need to drive to travel from St Catharines to Ottawa (about 500 km).
Confirmation Bias
Confirmation Bias
In the age of the internet, it is very easy to stay in a "filter bubble" of information that agrees with our own views.
Today we read an article on "confirmation bias" that helped us understand how our posterior medial prefrontal cortex is hardwired to "search for and believe information that agrees with what (we) already accept — and to walk away from information that shows (we) might be wrong". You can read the article here.
Why is it important to avoid confirmation bias? When we do science experiments, we do not want to ignore observation data that doesn't agree with our hypothesis. When we debate, we want to make sure we research all perspectives of an argument.
It is important that we continue to be aware of our biases, that we nurture our curiosity of views other than our own and that we seek out different perspectives if we hope to meet the challenges of climate change, systemic racism and economic inequity.
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