Minor Details - April 25

April 25 - 29, 2022

Investigating Buoyant Force and Average Density

In this engaging investigation, students' ideas about what floats and what doesn't float were challenged.

Why do some cans float and others sink? And if the density of water is 1 gram per cubic centimeter, and the density of aluminum is 2.7 grams per cubic centimeter, how is possible that any of these cans float at all? And why is one can floating on its side?

These are some of the questions we will be investigating as we learn about buoyant force, average density and apply these concepts to solve real-life problems.

Film Review - "Robin, Robin"

Today we watched an award-winning stop-motion animated feature called "Robin, Robin". This delightful film explores the ideas of consumerism and what it means to be who we are.

Students are writing their second review (the first was for the Volkwagen commercial) for this film in preparation for writing a theatre review for the live performance of Mama Mia next week.

An Hour with David Suzuki

The Big Project has recently received recognition within DSBN because the video we shot a month ago was featured in a board-wide Earth Day presentation last Friday.

We were also invited to participate in a live presentation with Dr. David Suzuki. His presentation has really inspired us to be part of transformative change. What does that mean? In part, it means we will challenge our own thinking about our relationship with our environment and we will also challenge the thinking of our parents and care-givers.

Solving Problems with Fractions

We are using our understanding of operations with fractions to solve word problems like this one.

An important step in solving all problems with fractions is to estimate a reasonable answer first. Estimating requires a deep understanding of the mathematical concepts involved and is a "real-life" strategy that we need in daily life.

Strategies to Add & Subtract Fractions

Please check out the notes posted in the Google classroom for the "money" and "clock" strategies to add and subtract fractions. These are strategies that many parents haven't used and they are very useful.

We had an extensive discussion about why we can't add fractions with different denominators. When you understand that sixths and fourths are different "sized" parts, it makes sense that you can't add fourths and sixths. Instead, we need to make equivalent fractions with the same sized part (ie. denominator).

Please take time tonight to build confidence by practising some adding and subtracting problems. Here is the most challenging problem we solved today.

Diego Rivera Mural Collaboration

Thank you so much to Macy who shared her artistic talents as our "art coach" today during our second collaboration.

Introduction to Coding

Coding does not require a computer! Essentially, a "code" is a set of instructions similar to writing a step-by-step procedure.

In this introductory coding challenge, students had to analyze the code, determine where the mistake was and then re-write the code so that it worked.

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