We started off our day by doing some Math. The Gr. 4 students are working with equivalent decimals. This is not too challenging, as they have a good understanding of tenths and hundredths. With equivalent decimals we are exploring ways to represent that decimals are the same.
Eg. 0.4 = 0.40
We do this through modelling, drawing pictures, diagrams, etc. The Gr. 5 students are working on adding decimals. We learned three different strategies from our text today. We discussed adding using base 10 blocks to model, adding from left to right and estimating the decimal point, and adding left to right by keeping the decimal point. Left to right strategies can be challenging at first. Take a look at the example below:
Eg. 2.987 + 4.9
2.987
+4.900 (Use equivalent decimals to make this 4.900!)
6.000
1.800
0.080
0.007
7.887
Students are also welcome to use a more traditional right to left addition strategy, and we have demonstrated this strategy in class as well.
We will be having a class celebration on Friday! We are celebrating the completion of our FRIENDS program. Students will be finished our final booster session tomorrow. We also have a student leaving us. We will miss her a lot, and we wanted to have a little good-bye party. So… this Friday will be a class pyjama day, and we will be having a healthy food buffet. Please feel free to bring in some healthy treats! We will be playing some party games as well.
Homework: Read 20 minutes
Reading Journal – Friday
Multiplication Quiz – Friday
Spelling – NO QUIZ this week (CAT-4 Spelling Instead)
We started our day with some Math. The Gr. 4 students looked at the hundredths place today. This required that we once again review how to model decimal numbers using base ten blocks, and using the place value chart to help us. Students are doing very well. The Gr. 5 students worked on estimating sums and differences using decimals. Students practiced rounding to the whole number. This is a great skill because it requires students to have a strong understanding of what the decimal numbers mean, in order to make the more accurate decision when rounding. Tomorrow we will begin addition and subtraction of decimals.
We also began our CAT-4 testing today. This is a yearly test that is done from Gr.1-12 (excluding Grs. 3, 6, 9, 12) that is used to monitor student achievement and areas of need. Today we completed the Reading portion of the exam. Students were given 60 minutes to answer 48 multiple choice questions. Students read a selection/excerpt/article and answer questions related to the reading. The questions can be on comprehension, but also include questions on structure, grammar, etc. Students did a great job today. I know working on such a large test can be stressful, but everyone was on task and ready to get started. We will be continuing the exam throughout the week, with a new section each day.
In Health today we returned to our FRIENDS for Life Program. This program requires two booster sessions to be completed. Our first booster today was on reviewing the concepts that we had learned in the FRIENDS programs such as: positive/negative thoughts (green/red), our body’s reaction to stress, the importance of a support team, relaxation strategies, and our coping stress plans. It was great to see how much students remembered about the program. Students do have a small amount of homework in their FRIENDS books that will be due Wednesday. Students are going to be sharing their support teams. Take some time this evening or tomorrow evening to discuss what a support team is, why it’s important, and what can be done to make it even stronger!
Our class is currently #1 in Canada on the Mathletics website, and we have students in the top 50 for Canada, and in the top 100 for the world! Go check it out, and keep up the good work everyone!
We had a great day today. In computers we were able to each do a Science activity. The Gr. 4 students were working on a Light and Shadows activity, and the Gr. 5 students were working on an Electricity activity. The links are below. Students are asked to investigate an incident, and then help to arrest the true criminal in both activities. In order to solve the case they must explore the information, which is all Science related activities. If you want to check them out at home or look at some of the online lab activities, check out the links below.
We also worked on our Mathletics accounts. If you haven’t visited mathletics at home this year, I highly recommend it. Mathletics is an online program directly aligned with our curriculum. Students are able to work through different units, take lessons, get help, look up concepts, do extension activities, practice problem solving, and play live mathletics. I am also able to review students results on lessons, assign extra tasks, extend student work, etc. Plus, students are able to earn points, certificates, and a place in the hall of fame, all while maintaining a pretty cool avatar. All of our students have a username and password in their student agenda. Check it out below:
In Art today we continued with our exploration of watercolours. Today we finished our backgrounds, which required us to practice our wash, and wet-wet techniques from last week. We also went back through and added some images to the forefront. In order to do this, we discussed how important it can be to let the paper dry before continuing a project. Student were also able to explore using the watercolours to add details and different colour values. Our finished projects are posted below, have a great weekend everyone!
Homework: Read 20 minutes
Math: Gr. 4 – pg. 198-199 #1-8
Gr. 5 – pg. 195-196 #1-13
Picture Day: April 30th (Tuesday)
Our new Art Board!
All of the projects came out beautiful.
You can see the application of some of the techniques that we discussed.
Welcome to another “Watch it Wednesday”! Students have started to call our Wednesday by this title, and hopefully it sticks. I like it anyways. We started our morning with another French listening activity. The song we listened to, “Arc-en-Ciel” by Alain le Lait, was a lot of fun. Mostly because the lyrics are very silly. The song tells you about a character with rainbow eyes, a wooden head, and who likes to drink lemon and mushroom juice just like Napoleon. It is a cute song, and you can check it out at the link below. It is a great way to review colours.
We also had another video that we watched for “Watch it Wednesday”. We watched a video of Canadian astronaut Chris Hadfield wringing out a washcloth in space. The result may surprise you. I just wanted to share it with the students because it was so interesting. You can also check out some of Chris Hadfield’s videos at the canadianspaceagency youtube page. Check out the video we watched today:
We had Writer’s Workshop again today. Students are making a lot of progress! It is great to see how many students feel that they are ready to hand in their first piece of writing after so many weeks of hard work. Today we even had students share in our “Author’s Chair” for the first time. This is the name of one of our writing stations. When a student has a piece of writing that they are proud of or want to share with others, there are two options. They can use a “Share Pass” or “Author’s Chair”. The “Share Pass” allows you to share a piece of writing with a friend. This person is part of your editing process, and is supposed to give you tips to help you make improvements to your writing. The “Author’s Chair” takes place at the end of workshop. Students are able to sit on the front stool (the teacher’s stool) and read a piece of writing aloud. Then they get some claps or snaps from the class. It was great to have students brave enough to share their work today.
Homework: Read 20 minutes
Reading Journal – Friday
Spelling Test – Friday
Multiplication Quiz – Friday
Science: Gr. 4 – Building Things Books!
Gr. 5 – Electricity Unit Test
Book Orders – Friday
Tomorrow – Sports Day! Dress up in your favourite sports gear!
Today in Math, the Gr. 4 students looked into comparing fractions with the same numerators, and the same denominators. We had some strategies they could use to help. To compare fractions with the same numerator:
Turn them into unit fractions (numerator = 1).
Draw a diagram (picture).
Use a number line.
To compare fractions with the same denominator:
Draw a diagram (picture).
Compare the numerators.
The Gr. 5 students learned to transfer some of our decimal skills over to measurement. Students already know the following
There are 10 mm in 1 cm.
There are 100 cm in 1 m.
There are 1000 mm in 1 m.
Today we worked some more at going backwards with some of these conversions. We did a small bit of this in measurement, but now that we have worked closer with decimals, it makes this skill a little easier to understand.
“Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s need, but not every man’s greed.”
~Gandhi
Good afternoon! Happy Earth Day!
We had a great start to our week, and a busy one! We started our morning off with Math. The Gr. 4 students are now discussing comparing unit fractions. A unit fraction is a fraction that has a numerator of 1 (eg. 1/2). Students were asked to compare and to order unit fractions.
Eg. Compare 1/2 and 1/ 8.
1/2 > 1/8
The Gr. 5 students continued to look at thousandths, but today we were discussing ordering decimals. Students were asked to order decimals from greatest to least, or from least to greatest. We had three strategies that could be used to help with this task. Students can use a place value chart, use equivalent decimals, or use a number line.
Eg. Use a Place Value Chart
Ones
. Tenths
Hundredths
Thousandths
0
. 3
4
5
4
. 4
0
2
0
. 0
2
1
Eg. Use Equivalent Decimals
Compare 0.345, 0.021, and 0.39 and order from least to greatest.
Well…
0.345 = 345 thousandths
0.021 = 21 thousandths
0.39 = 390 thousandths
So… the decimals from least to greatest are 0.021, 0.345, 0.39
Eg. Use a Number Line
Place the following decimals on a number line, and then order from least to greatest.
0.345, 0.021, 0.39
0 0.5 1
0.021 0.345 0.39
So… the decimals from least to greatest are 0.021, 0.345, 0.39
In Science today the Gr. 4 students discussed sight. We learned about how light travels in straight lines. It shines on opaque objects. Opaque objects absorb some light, but reflect some light in a straight line into our eyes. We need light to see. We also discussed the difference between transparent and translucent objects. We have also started to discuss white light. White light is made up of different wavelengths of light, which are the colours of the rainbow. Just think ROYGBIV (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, and violet). Red has the largest wavelength, and violet has the smallest. The reason that we can see colours, is that the opaque object absorbs the other wavelengths of light and reflects one wavelength to our eyes. For example, our workbooks are green because the paper absorbs red, orange, yellow, blue, indigo, and violet, but it reflects green into our eyes. The Gr. 5 students finished their discussion on how to measure electrical usage. Tomorrow we will complete our final electricity experiment. Wednesday will be a study/review day. Our Unit Test will be on Thursday.
Our “Stuff Swap” was extremely successful! Thank you to everyone who contributed. I know the students were excited to get to take some new things home, and I was really impressed with the diversity of things that were donated. Just look at all the things that we are going to be donating to the Center of Hope, Mercy House, and the Salvation Army. That’s a lot from just one class, and it was such a fun afternoon!
We also had a special guest in our classroom today! Nancy Gauthier from district office came to visit us today (she used to be our head secretary), and she brought “The Cremation of Sam McGee”. Students were able to hear this chilling poem read with the beautiful illustrations. This is of course a rather spooky poem, and we have a Social lesson planned later this week to discuss it further as part of our “Stories of Canada” unit. Want to hear it at home? Check out the link below. This version is read by Johnny Cash, and I think his deep voice adds to the mood.
“Painting is silent poetry, and poetry is painting that speaks.”
– Plutarch
Happy Friday everyone! Another busy week finished! Can you believe there are only 10 more weeks of school left?
Today we started a new mad minute sheet. This is the third sheet that we have worked on this year. Whenever we start an new sheet, students are allowed to reset their time back to 3 minutes. Our sheet today focused on a lot of 5’s, 9’s, and 12’s, but there were plenty more mixed in. Students are reminded that the best way to improve your score each week is to practice your times tables at home. Pick a times table and see how high you can get, just for fun!
We also had computers today. Students read a comic called “Zoe and Molly Online” which was all about Internet safety. Then we visited www.zoeandmolly.ca and participated in some of the activities. Students can take a quiz, be story detectives, and write their own ending. Check it out. You can also view the comic online if you don’t have your own paper copy.
In Art today we started a Unit on watercolour painting. Today students were exploring the medium, and we practiced two techniques. We experimented with making a graded wash (colour goes from dark to light), and painting on wet paper. It was a lot of fun. We will continue to learn new techniques and to work on new projects, but check out some of our work below!
Homework: Read 20 minutes
L.A.: Couplet Poem (Monday)
Math: Gr. 4 – pg. 187 #1-4
Gr. 5 – pgs. 185-186 #1-13
Social: Look for Our Alberta texts
Science: Gr. 4 – Building Things Books
Gr. 5 – Unit Test (Thursday)
Book Orders – April 26th
Stuff Swap – Monday!
Monday – Backwards Day and bring canned goods!
Some of our initial works.You can see how the colour moves from dark to light.Look what happens when we paint on wet paper!
Spring is officially here, or at least it is at Timberlea school! Our playground and field are wet! Makes me glad that I wore boots today.
In Math, all the students are doing a fantastic job. Our current unit for both Gr. 4’s and Gr. 5’s has been fun and challenging, and it is great to see all the hard work that everyone has been putting into learning these new skills, and practicing them at home. The Gr. 4 students reviewed our lesson from yesterday before moving on today. It was a tricky one. Students are feeling more confident now. We also discussed comparing fractions of different wholes and sets. For example, 1/3 of 12 will be smaller than 1/3 of 21. We know this because 21 is the bigger whole or set! However, we can also check our estimate by using the skills we learned yesterday. 1/3 of 12 = 4 and 1/3 of 21 = 7. The Gr. 5 students have started discussing thousandths. This required a review of some of our place value concepts from earlier this year. We are practicing our expanded notation, as well as learning how this new place value place affects some of our modelling strategies.
Eg. 91.456 = 90 + 1 + 0.4 + 0.05 + 0.006
In Science today our Gr. 4’s completed their Unit Test. I saw lots of students reviewing their study guide this morning, and I hope that everyone felt prepared. Please don’t forget to bring in your green workbooks tomorrow. The Gr. 5 students are finishing their Electricity Unit. They will be writing their Unit Test next Thursday. Today we continued our discussion of measuring electrical usage.
In Language Arts today we worked with couplet poems. We reviewed our lesson on rhyming from last week, and students started to write their own couplet poems. They were inspired by Maya Angelou’s “Life Doesn’t Frighten Me” and I heard some really great rhyming pairs being discussed today. I heard about: creatures with strange features, robbers in the night being a fright, a teacher getting mad at us and being late for the bus! That one made me laugh. I hope I don’t get mad too often! Stay tuned to hear more about our completed poems, which are due on Monday.
Special Note – Thanks for all the questions and concerns I received about my father this week. He is safe. He had finished his race before the explosions. The concern from students and parents definitely made a stressful week much easier for me, and I will be sure to pass on all your lovely messages to him.
