Minor Details - October 3

October 3 - 7, 2022

Class Microscope

Thank you to my friend Eric LeGresley who generously donated and mailed a microscope (safely) to our classroom. We are looking forward to creating our own slides to observe parts of plants.

Energy Flow in Ecosystems

We had a great discussion today connecting energy flow in an ecosystem to why 8 billion humans on the planet is unsustainable if we continue our current ways of living.

Only 10% of the energy held by an organism is passed on to the next organism in the food chain. Most of the energy goes to movement, creating heat, supporting growth and healing. Because of this, ecosystems need a very large amount of producers to support primary, secondary and tertiary consumers.

What is happening on Earth now, is that we are starting to tip the pyramid upside down. There is less and less plant matter to support more and more humans. This is not sustainable. Another reason to support why we should not waste good soil by planting grass!

Please take time to listen and ask questions at home. Students came up with some very thoughtful questions and ideas about the perils of human self-centred behaviour if we want to limit the effects of climate change and avoid ecological disaster.

Problem-Solving with Technology

One of the skills we will be working on in Technology this year is designing solutions to problems.

I shared an example of a very low-tech solution to a problem that I had with the Nutri-Tower. Because our classroom floor is not level and there aren't feet that are adjustable on the bottom of the tower, some of the plant buckets tend to slip out of their harnesses. To solve the problem, I wrapped popsicle sticks with masking tape and used them as shims in the harness slot to keep them from slipping out. You can see this in the bottom right corner of the photo of the basil plant.

Today students used online tutorials to help them learn how to code microbits. Over the course of the year, we will be improving our coding skills so that we can design our own solutions using this technology.

Oral Presentation Criteria

We had a discussion about why many people of all ages find public speaking uncomfortable. The reasons ranged from the fear of being judged to being unprepared. We all agreed that if we avoid doing things that make us feel uncomfortable, our fears become our limitations.

We also discussed why building our oral presentation skills is so important. The reality is that none of us escapes having to speak in front of people at some point and the best time to master oral presentation skills is NOW.

We determined the criteria for effective oral presentations and will use these criteria for our lawn vs garden presentations next week.

Breast Cancer Fundraiser

Thanks to the efforts of student council and the generosity of DeWitt Carter students, we raised $163.50 for Wellspring Niagara to support women fighting breast cancer.

These "edible ribbons" were a hit with students.

Using Equations to Represent Relationships

We are continuing to learn how to model relationships with equations. We are able to identify the multiplier and constant in composite rules and are using a variety of strategies to determine equations.

Our next step is to apply what we are learning to write equations to model relationships in word problems.

We also discussed the importance of recognizing when you don't "get" something during Math and making sure you ask questions right away. Please take some time at home to discuss what we're learning.

Ice Dogs Visit - Trust, Teamwork, Talking Positive

We had a visit from the coach and 3 members of the Ice Dogs hockey team on Wednesday.

Each hockey player discussed how trust, teamwork and talking positive were key to their success as a hockey team. They made connections to how we could benefit from those skills at school and at home as well.

At-Home Work

Class time is always provided to complete work. At times, students need some extra time to complete work we're doing in class. When this happens, students usually have a choice whether to stay in at breaks or to complete the work at home.

Now that we're entering the first week of October, there are several projects that are either due or overdue. In every case, we will be using this preliminary work to build on for other projects.

Please take some time to make sure that your child has completed this work. You can head to the Google classroom for complete details and criteria for all of this work:

Procedural Instructions for the food separator project (due September 22)
Dream Bedroom Project (due October 3)
5 paragraphs on lawns vs gardens (due September 30)
Lawns vs gardens media presentation (due October 4)

Understanding Interactions in Ecosystems

Students are thinking critically about ecosystems as they make predictions about the impact of changes on food chains.

We learned that producers are always at the bottom of every food chain and that a range of consumers rely on this food source.

So what would happen to the food chain in this image if 75% of the grass was removed? Would the immediate effects be the same as the effects after 2 years? What happens when humans interfere?

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