Emily & Erin pave the way for ASL in 4J! This week we were lucky to have a special presentation by Emily & Erin on ASL (American Sign Language). Since our current Unit of Inquiry How We Express Ourselves focuses on communication and targeting specific audiences, these 2 students took action to share their learning…
This Coca-cola ad was very popular during the 1990s (when I was around 9-10 years old). I remember thinking the bears were really cute and always liking the ‘Kchshhhh’ sound of the bottle opening. At the time, I never really thought about what the company Coca-cola was intending but now I understand that they were…
Mathematical Thinking & Teaching Inspired by Marilyn Burns Re-Building 100s Chart In preparation for 2-3 digit addition/subtraction operations, it became evident early in the first week of school that grade 4s needed a major refresher of 0-100 numbers. The 1000s project completed in week 2 gave way for investigations into number patterns and number bonds…
Planning for the Grade 8s In the first week of school, Mr. Brian invited our grade fours to be clients for his Grade 8 DT project: Kite Building. We were thrilled to have an opportunity to collaborate with Grade 8s! Last week students had a chance to design their ‘dream kite’! For homework, students explored…
Student Reflections & Sharing This week students finished their 1000s project and presented their findings with the class.Everyone completed a rubric & a group reflection(see below) on their project that explained the thinking behind their maths and also the challenges they faced throughout. Students then gave their first presentation to the class, and had classes…
Day 3 of school, day 2 of 1000s Project… [Continued from previous post] Today students brought in what materials they were able to collect for their 1000s project. Most remembered and one group actually went over 1000 when they counted out their flowers and leaves! ORGANIZING their MATERIALS 1) Students had the opportunity to meet…
Today we started a 3-day project called the 1000s Project… The project has been modified from the resource book by Julie Pier Brodie called “Constructing Ideas about Large Numbers” by Creative Publications. We started the lesson by watching a keynote presentation that prompted students to ask questions about the images they saw: Some comments they…
Today I was so happy to welcome 17 smiling faces into 4J. We are still waiting on 2 more to join us which will bring our class up to 19 students! We had a busy morning multi-tasking to complete some ‘start of the year’ activities to get us thinking about our goals for Grade 4.…
Welcome to a new school year! I am so excited to meet all of you and get to know you as learners and as individuals. I am originally from Canada and this is my 7th year teaching overseas. Previously, I have taught in Kiev, Ukraine and Beijing, China and I speak 2 other languages: French…
Innovative Learning in the Elementary Classroom 