Weekly Recap

What a glorious week! With this wonderful weather has come more smiles, co-operation and fantastic attitudes!

We have had a busy week which seems like it will be the trend all the way to the end of June.

On Monday, we arrived at school to determine that our Literacy in Action 5B texts were missing -- the exact ones we needed to start our new unit! We found some interesting clues in the classroom and finally tracked the texts to Miss Baker's Kindergarten rooms! In other news, we started an ELA unit on Mysteries.

On Tuesday evening, I certainly enjoyed the carnival (and free face painting)! I hope you did too.

On Wednesday, we made grass heads with our Kindergarten buddies. We also started a new Health WebQuest in Grade 4. We will be helping a school cafeteria to develop a healthy eating menu after learning even more about essential vitamins, minerals and food groups. Grade 5s began their Puberty unit (with mixed levels of excitement). 

We also introduced the idea of 'inferencing' this week. We infer when an author doesn't give us all the information about a character or event. We use clues from the text and our background knowledge (schema) to figure out what's going on (an inference). We each created 'Mystery Bags' and then determined, using inferencing, what was located in each other's. We are also practicing inferring what's going on in pictures.  

On Friday, Grade 5s helped Mr. Billy Bonka (of no relation to Mr. Willy Wonka) to determine which of his prototype spinners would be the most fair for inclusion in a new board game 'Spin It to Win It'. This allowed us to practice using the probability words likely, unlikely, impossible, possible, and certain.

 Finally, we have been working on our plays which we will present to the class on June 9. We are practicing tongue twisters to help with enunciation, playing charade-like games to help with body movement and doing focus exercises like 'Pulse'.


Important dates of note:

• June 1: Grade 4 instruments & Grade 5 Rube Goldberg machines due
• June 2: Track & Field Day (Rain or shine -- come prepared)
• June 4: Music quiz
• June 5: Bowling money due; Library books due; Menchies orders delivered
• June 9: Drama presentations
• June 12: PD Day

Weekly Recap

I hope you've been enjoying this amazing weather lately! We've been skipping, had a picnic and been very happy for recess! On that note, it would be wonderful if everyone had a water bottle to reduce the number of trips to the water fountain! 

Here we can see Cassy & Jacob being sun safe this afternoon with hats!

In Science, we are designing Rube Goldberg machines to pop a balloon. These machines take a simple task & make it overly complicated (and much more fun)! Grade 4s have begun designing a unique instrument which can change pitch & volume. We have been thinking about what will vibrate in the instrument to produce sound. 

We have also been completing mini-STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics) challenges. This week we built & tested button racers. 

We also had a fantastic contemporary dance performance on Thursday morning from our artist in residence. It was quite amazing to think that, in just two weeks, students were able to learn about 20 minutes of choreography!

Finally, we were visited by Constable Costanza this week. We learned that bicycles are vehicles that must follow all the rules of the road & obey all signs. We also learned that we can cross an intersection in cross walks, if we want, but we must get off our bikes to walk. 

My favourite part? We finally got an answer to the sidewalk question! If the diameter of your wheel is greater than 40 cm, you should be riding your bike on the street according to the City of Regina by-laws. 

Upcoming Dates/Notes: 

• Please return Track & Field permission notes as soon as possible
• A email (or letter to two families) was sent home regarding the Grade 5 puberty unit. Please contact me with any questions. 
• May 25: Rube Goldberg machine/ Instrument blueprints due
• May 25: Essays due (no additional class time to complete; submit through Google Classroom)
• May 26: End-of-Year BBQ & Carnival from 6-8pm
• May 28: Swimming
• June 2: Track & Field Meet
• June 5: Bowling Money & Notes due (sent home today)

2V1

Heading out for a bike ride this weekend? Don't forget the 2-V-1 rule for checking your helmet's fit!

2: Your helmet should sit two fingers above your eyebrows.

V: Your side straps should form a V-shape around your ear.

1: You should be able to fit one finger comfortably between your chin & your chin strap.

Have fun!

Weekly Recap

Things we have learned this week:

• Simple machines make our lives easier by reducing the amount of force needed to complete a task and/or by changing the direction of force (also, catapults are levers which are fun to test!)

• Pitch is a measure of how high or low a sound seems. High pitched sounds vibrate quickly & low pitched sounds vibrate slowly. We can see sounds using an oscilloscope. (Miss Foell downloaded a free iPhone app that works as an oscilloscope - which Jasmin was kind enough to test out with her recorder).

• Foley is created by a sound artist who adds sound effects to movies, tv shows and video games using everyday items.  We know that sound, from watching the opera Hansel & Gretel on Tuesday, adds greatly to mood. Grade 4s have begun working on short skits that will incorporate 5-8 sound effects. 

• First-hand data is data that we collect ourselves (like survey Ms. Gilroy-Beck's and Miss Mullen's classes about how they get to school). Second-hand data is data that other people have collected. Sometimes it is better to collect first-hand data because, as one student put it, "you can't Google how many birds come to the feeder in your yard." 

• When we read, we can use context clues like antonyms, synonyms, explanations and examples to understand new words. We practiced this on Wednesday using a Scoot! game. Ask your students for more details. 

• Grade 6 students do an average of 2 hours homework/ week -- but it can be up to 50 minutes/night if you're not working well in class. This isn't including at-home projects like novel studies. Is your Grade 5 student ready for that? 

• It's Bike Safety Week in Saskatchewan! Check out the post below for more details!

• When you eat a lot of candy & then dance, you feel really sick. Aloha!

Upcoming next week: 

• Monday: Victoria Day holiday (no school)
• Tuesday-Friday: VAA-W (Writing assessment)
• Tuesday: Road rules talk from Constable Costanza
• Tuesday: Grade 5 clothespin racers due (instructions here)

Other upcoming dates: 

• May 26: Year-End Carnival/BBQ from 6-8 pm
• May 28: Swimming from 1-2 pm

Bicycle Safety Week

Happy Wednesday!

I just wanted to share some of the events we've been working on to celebrate Saskatchewan's Bike Safety Week!

We started our week with some helpful bike safety tips from Bill Nye, the Science Guy. We've been practicing our hand signals while walking to ensure we can safely indicate our intentions while cycling. 

We were very happy today to have Mr. Mitchell talk to us about the importance of helmets. While the STARS bandages were exciting, I really appreciated what he had to say about helmet safety. I found it interesting to think about the word 'concussion' - which has become quite common. Mr. Mitchell helped to re-frame our thinking about the word .... concussions are brain injuries. After his presentation, we looked up some really cool helmets, found Moosimin on a map and then got to work  designing helmets we thought kids would like to wear! We are going to work on a bulletin board to convince students that helmet safety is important.

Tomorrow, students are invited to bring their helmets to school. We will be making sure that they are fitted properly  -- and then doing the same for our Kindergarten buddies next week. On Tuesday, we will be visited by Constable Constanza from RPS who will be talking us & Mr. Hollinger's Grade 5s about the rules of the road. Based on the Kahoot! quiz from earlier this week, we definitely need to work on what road signs mean to cyclists (We are vehicles too!)

Reminders for tomorrow: 

• Bring a bike helmet for fitting
• BBQ order forms are due
• It's Luau time! (K-4 dance from 1-2 & 5-8 dance from 2-3)
• There is no school on Friday & on Monday

Our Weekly Recap

We have had another wonderful week here at Jack MacKenzie in Grade 4/5! 

In Health, we've talked about how 'Organization' doesn't just mean being neat & tidy! We have to plan ahead, set goals and develop plans to reach them. To practice, we chunked our ELA essay assignment into mini-deadlines so we can keep on track. We have already finished our graphic organizers & T-charts (Well, mostly all of us). 

In Science, the Grade 4s have continued talking about sound. We are learning how woodwind, percussion and brass instruments change pitch -- all the while thinking about our final assignment to design a unique instrument. The Grade 5s are starting to investigate our simple machines make our lives easier. We are learning about the different classes of levers -- and thinking how we could use a lever in our final assignment (Special note: You can find out more about Grade 4 & 5 Science Assignments this term under the 'Assessment' tab above). 

In Math, we are beginning a new unit on Statistics & Probability. Today, we collected data from the Grade 2s and 3s on how they got to school to practice making tally marks. We compared our first-hand data to second-hand data from other schools in Canada. We finishes our unit Shape & Space unit on 2-D and 3-D shapes on Thursday by testing student-designed bridges. Congratulations Cassy & Isaac whose bridges both held up to 130g! 

Upcoming dates to note: 

• Week of May 11th: RAD testing (Reading assessment)
• May 11th: Body paragraphs of essay due (2 for Grade 4, 3 for Grade 5)
• May 12th: Special performance of Hansel & Gretel by Saskatoon Opera in Schools
• May 14th: DNA testing (Grade 5 Math assessment)
• May 14th: Spring Fling dance (Grades 1-4 from 1-2 pm & Grades 5-8 from 2-3 pm)
• May 15th: PD Day (No school)
• May 18th:Victoria Day (No school)
• May 19th: Day 1