December 15

Health and Career Ed
We are waiting to watch "Through a Blue Lens" in the new year as not all permission slips are in! In the mean time, students are going to embark upon a mission to find out about the most addictive drugs, their names, effects, how to get help if one is addicted. There will be time to research in the new year - so don't worry! It isn't homework over the holidays - that would be cruel!!

speaking of holidays...

Division 5
We had a bit of festivities today in our last block to celebrate as a class! There were dancers and game playing and a lot of yummy food! (Thanks to all who brought some!)

Cathy Peters Update:  YEAH, your child has an assessment to take home!  Ms. McFarland and I happy to say that we are DONE marking the first set of these assessments.  We have a snapshot of their ability to read for information, organize information from the reading, state strategies they used to learn new words they don't know, as well as tell you about their percentage of words they read correctly, and how fluid their reading is.  If you would like to see the answers they actually wrote, please contact one of us at the school.  Please return the first page of the assessment.

Wednesday December 14, 2011

Math:  The grade 7 boys are working on adding and subtracting decimals, and using "front end" estimation to check their answers.  This means that you drop all the numbers after the decimal, it doesn't mean to "round" the number.

Class Meeting:  We had a Green Team meeting to go over options for a winter fun day.  Unfortunately, this topic will have to be revisited in January because less than 50% of the students agreed to any of the ideas.  We won't be planning an event if only 50% participate, as we want it to be a "team building" activity.  Please talk to your son/daughter about the options we discussed

Food Drive:  Congratulations on a great event Green Team.  We collected over 1000 cans within the school, with more than 300 coming from our team.  It turns out that Ms. Roylance and Mr. Martin tied the event with 288 cans each.  Mr. Martin tried to explain to Ms. Roylance that individually wrapped soda crackers all count as one item, not 50 individuals....the things we do to win!




Some students and families really got into the spirit of giving




One of the organizers of the event



Over 1000 items were collected




A great showing by the Len Wood Community
















Socials:  Mr. Martin's class has had their notes and quizes returned for videos 1-5.  If your child has been absent, they need to go onto YouTube, and look up "Stories From the Stone Age".  Watch and make notes on the videos, and see Mr. Martin for a question sheet if they don't have one.

Locker Clean out:  Mr. Martin's class had a chance to clean out lockers today.  Ask your son/daughter if they need to bring a plastic bag to school to carry the rest of their items home for the holidays.  PE clothing, and extra clothing can go home for washing, and old papers should be filed properly into their binders.

Tuesday December 13th

English
Today in Miss. McFarland's English class we read Touching Spirit Bear and learned that Cole would be returning to the island in Alaska where he was mauled by the Spirit Bear.  Students reflected on Cole's anger throughout the novel and how one of the characters in the book described anger as a "memory never forgotten."  Students then made a connection to the feeling of anger by thinking and writing about a time they felt anger and the consequences of what they did when they were angry.  In Mr. Martin's class, they have a set of questions from chapter 14-20, as well as a one page assignment regarding vocabulary from the novel.  The last large assignment from the novel before Christmas is to complete their "Fakebook" entries, with 15 posts, and 10 comments back from various characters in the novel.  A link to the "fakebook" template can be found on the list of handouts on this page. 

Socials (McFarland)Students should be bringing home their Neanderthal Story assessments throughout the week as they complete their good copy. These need to be signed and then returned. 

Mr. Martin's class was to turn in all their notes and the video questions from chapter 2-5.  Unfortunately, some students still haven't turned them in.  Please remind your son/daughter that it is their responsibility to see what homework they missed

PE  We had Ms. Krystine Lucas in today to teach Hip Hop.  Here are some photos from the lesson

 

 

 

Science: Today Mr. Martin's class had a presentation from Mr. Dave Derbowka, a local expert on ground water.  The students learned about local aquifers, and about a trees ability to live off the water that runs off of a landfill site.

Monday December 12, 2011

Science:  This week will be looking at calculating density of the items the students measured mass and volume of last week.  We will review the concept of direct vs. indirect measurement.  I was sick on Friday, so I haven't seen all the ecosystem projects come in yet.  Please check that your son/daughter has brought theirs in.  Today Ms. MacFarland's class has a local water expert, Mr. Dave Derbowka, coming in during 5th block.  Tomorrow he will visit Mr. Martin's class.

Socials:  We continued our look at the transition from small communities into the first cities, all based around large rivers in what would now be Iraq, Jordan, and other areas of the Middle East.  The students should all be aware of why leaders would have arisen, and why Early Man couldn't simply go back to being Hunter-Gatherers.

Food Bank:  Remember that Wednesday is the last day for our class challenge of collecting food for the local food bank.  This entire challenge is being organized by the students of Green Team.  Way to go girls!  Mr. Martin's class is definitely looking forward to collecting more cans than Ms. Roylance, due to some good natured teasing between the challenges.  Apparently, a side bet has occured that the losing teacher between these two has to get a pie in the face!  Look below to see the poster that appeared around the school on Friday.  Mr. Martin's class did rewrite the "Grinch" song to help get the spirit of Christmas giving back into Ms. Roylance's class.  We even went and sang it to her class in the last block of the day.

PE:  Krystine Lucas will be here on Tuesday and Thursday to teach Hip Hop dance.

English:  Ms. MacFarland and Mr. Martin were unable to get together to co-mark the Cathy Peters Assessment today because Mrs. Baker was absent and Ms. MacFarland was busy in the Learning Resource Clinic.  Our hopes to get the results back to you by Friday are quickly deminishing.

The Last Week!

Presentations: Just a quick note to all students in Team Green that we will be having a guest presentation on Monday and Tuesday afternoon.  Mr. Dave Derbowka will be in to talk to both classes about water issues in the North Okanagan.  Mr. Derbowka is an expert on ground water issues, and has been instrumental in protecting our water sources.  If any parent is interested in coming and listening, please let Mr. Martin know.

Food Drive:  Just a gentle reminder to Mr. Martin's class.  APPARENTLY, Mrs. Roylance sent in some "spies" to our classroom, and took pictures of our stash of food for the food drive.  APPARENTLY, she even accused us of cheating (all in a joking manner mind you!)  JC emailed me to let me know about these terrible accusations, and all I said to her in an email was "I'm sorry if my class has more community spirit than yours does!"  I am so proud of my class for issuing the challenge to the rest of the school, and for spreading the knowledge of how much good the local food bank does with the little resources they have.  I look forward to eating the popcorn that Mr. Findlay has agreed to purchase the winning classroom.

Cathy Peters:  Ms. McFarland and Mr. Martin will be working hard to mark all of the reading/writing assessments this week, and we hope to send home a snapshot of your child's abilities by the end of the week.  Our hope is to do this assessment three times this year, and be able to track the progress of your child.  For more information, please contact Mr. Martin or Ms. McFarland.

Friday December 9th

Happy Friday Everyone! Have a wonderful weekend.

English
In Miss. McFarland's English class students worked on various assignments in the library and on the computers.  Students worked on making the final revisions to their Neanderthal Stories.  These stories are being assessed and sent home for your information and need to be signed and returned.  Expect them to be arriving throughout next week.  Students also finished their Touching Spirit Bear predictions, as well as worked on their Touching Spirit Bear Fakebook assignment.

Socials/Art
For last period we watched a short video relating to our socials investigations and then had a class discussion.  Students then worked on a creative project in which they have to visually display their favourite things about winter (hopefully their visuals are better than Miss. McFarland's skiing turtle).

December 8

In Miss McFarland's English class students participated in the Six Minute Solution for reading fluency.  Students read a new reading passage today and many remarked on how it was much more difficult reading a new passage.  We then visited the library for book exchange and finished the class off by reading Touching Spirit Bear!

December 7, 2011

Math 7- the boys are working on section 3.1 (question 4,5,6,7)  The topics we are working on are converting fractions to decimals, and equivalent fractions.

Science-  today Mr. Martin's class was in the Science lab working on practical skills using graduated cylinders, and tripple beam balance scales.  We worked on measuring mass and volume of irregular shaped objects

Socials- In Mr. Martin's class we had an open notes quiz on the 5 videos we watched.  We also read some of the introduction to civilizations, and where the first cities developed.

English - In Miss. McFarland's class students worked on a pre-reading vocab activity for part II of Touching Spirit Bear. 
Assembly- we had an assembly in 5th period.  Congratulations to two green team students who had a huge part in organizing it.  We also issued a challenge to all classes for a food bank drive.  The winning classroom will get a popcorn party!  Please do not send in any Kraft Dinner, they are really looking for canned fruit and vegetables.  Drinks and candy are also accepted as well.

Tuesday November 6

PE:  Here are some Line Dance photos from today.  Thanks to Ms Waring and 4 helpers that did a great job of leading "Cotton Eyed Joe" and "All My Exes live in Texas"

English:  Today Mr. Martin's class had 5th block in the Computer room.  They had time to work on their "Fakebook" page on the novel.  They should have at least 10 entries (posts), and at least 5 comments back from various "friends"/characters in the novel.  They should have at least 5 friends with images for their profile.  This can be emailed home if they need time to work on it at home.  This should be done by Friday of this week.  Have you had a chance to look at their good copy of the "Cave Art" story?  It should have come home yesterday.  Please sign it to let me know that you have seen this sample of writing.

Monday December 5, 2011

Math 7: The girls have a quiz Tuesday, and all the boys should have taken home their chapter 2 quiz for a parent signature.

Health and Career Education:  Permission forms are due in for the video "Through a Blue Lens" asap.  If you need more information, please contact Mme Wocknitz.

Science:  Vocabulary for Chapter 4 is due Tuesday.  Mme Wocknitz class will have 10 mins at the start of the class to finish it off.

English:  Mr. Martin's class should be reading chapter 16 of the novel, and it should be fully completed by Christmas.  Both classes should now have completed the written portions of the Cathy Peters Writing Assessment, and will be having an oral reading component before Christmas.

English: Miss. McFarland's class had library/computer time today.  Students worked on various projects including finishing the Cathy Peters Reading Assessment we started on Friday, writing their prediction for part II of Touching Spirit Bear and making revisions to the Neanderthal stories. 

Socials: Both classes are watching the videos of "Stories from the Stone Age".  Mr. Martin's class will be having an open notes quiz on Wednesday.

Friday December 2

X-Block: today the students started a new class for first block on day 2's. 

Math 7-boys: we introduced the concept of percentages, fractions, and decimals all showing the same information. 

Science-Martin: We introduced the Chemistry section today, and reviewed connections to material some had done last year, such as the KMT, and parts of density.  I assigned chapter 4 vocabulary for homework for Tuesday

PE- Most students tried a version of Dodgeball that Ms. Waring introduced yesterday.  Mr. Martin said he was upset that the class didn't get to do the "beep run" yesterday when he was away.  Apparently they weren't!  They got a second "fun day" because they agreed to not "whine" when next week they get Line Dancing, and Hip Hop lessons the following week.  Here are some of the photos of PE today.  We try to get a group of students to lead the warmup, today they really liked to give out "deep knee bends" as a final warm up.  They asked the group to perform 50!

Deep knee bends!

NOT staged at all!

 

Our Warm up leaders for the day

Cathy Peters Writing Assessment: today in 5th block, both classes were split into grade specific groups and started to write the reading/writing assessment.  Our hope is to be done with the assessment and share results with you and the students before Christmas.

November 30 2011

Vow of Silence:  many students participated in the Vow of Silence today, in support of youth around the world who are forced into child labour, becoming child soldiers, etc.  It was great to see the support.

Food Bank:  Thanks to all the Leadership students of Len Wood, and many parents who have helped transport 3-4 students each week to help sort and create the food hampers for the community.  Students can make a difference, and many students have stepped up to help out.  Thanks one and all.

Math 7- The boys seem to be ready for their test tomorrow.  Good luck, and study the review sheets we went over.

Science- I had a chance to look at a few pages of research the students are finding, and it is looking great.  Please remind your son/daughter to "reference" which websites they used for their project.  I mentioned that Google is not the site they used, it is only a "list of sites" that hold the information they are looking for.  All projects should come in next week.

English-Martin: I reminded the students that there are over 220 pages in the novel, and they should be done chapter 15 this week.  I want to finish the novel in the next 2 weeks, so they will need to be reading the novel when they have a chance to.  If they want to take a copy home, they can sign out a photocopy of the book (duotang), and put their name on the board

Socials-Martin: We finished video 4 of the series, and the students will be expected to turn in their notes, and the questions for chapter 3 and 4 on Monday of next week.

Cathy Peters Writing Assessment- Both classes will write the test this Friday afternoon.  I will be sending home (hopefully before Christmas) a quick assessment of their reading, and comprehension of the assignment.

Class Meeting- In period 5 today, we combined the classes to discuss Winter Fun day ideas.  We were dissapointed in only getting 50% of the students to say they want to go to H20 water park in Kelowna, a Winter Snow day of activities possibly at Gardom Lake in January, or skating (with helmets) at Nor-Val arena.  We will have to take a closer look at this, as 50% doesn't make the concept of Team Building a reality.

Tuesday November 29

Vow of Silence:  Tomorrow, November 30th, many students in the school will be participating in a Vow of Silence.  This is in support of all the children in the world who "do not have a voice", due to being forced into child labour, forced to be a child soldier, etc.  Students can choose their level of involvement ranging from not speaking for 24 hours, to not speaking and no communication through facebook, texting, writing notes, etc. Mr. Findlay has more information on the Len Wood web site.

Math 7-boys: We started to work on a unit review, and they should be completing the sheet for homework.  They will have a practice test tomorrow, and a real test on Thursday.  If your son doesn't feel prepared, please have him come see me at lunch Wednesday for a private review session.

PE-  Today the students had a chance to perform the shuttle run.  Many students challenged themselves and a partner to get their own personal best time.  Thursday we will run the "beep" run, with Friday being a "fun Friday" (their choice of activities)  Next week will be line dancing, with the last week before Christmas having a guest instructor, Ms. Krystine Lucas (PVSS grad 2010) teaching 2 days of hip hop dance

English-Mr. Martin  We had the last hour in the computer lab, with students choosing to finish off their paragraph about Cole's banishment.  There was some confusion regarding the due date, but it was pointed out that the date has been on the board since Thursday.  There is a link to the assignment on the right side of the blog

Some students used the time to work on their Science Ecosystem report, and some worked on the "Fakebook" assignment for the novel (long term project that we expect the students to add to each week).  Thanks to those parents who had the chance to look at the writing sample I sent home last night, and returned with a parent signature.

Monday November 28

FEEDBACK:  The three Green Team teachers would love to hear from any parents about how the blog is working in sharing information with you.  We really like to include the photos of the students, and give more details about each assignment.  Please let us know if this method is working for you.

Green Team French
Today was difficult - the remaining presenters STILL were not ready!  They MUST present tomorrow - no excuses!  Practice that pronunciation!  : )

Performance photos:  We had a great opportunity on Friday to watch Chloe Bozak and other members of the Gymnastics club and the Cirque artists perform Alice In Wonderland.  Mr. Martin wasn't able to take very good photos in the dark, but here are some from the performance

 

 

 

 

 

MATH 7 - GIRLS

* Today Math Unit 1 Tests are going home!  Please sign and return them - I will have a Student Evaluation for you tomorrow!  Also, Student Evaluations for the Mid-Unit 1 Quiz are on their way home today - please keep them!

Math 7 - guys

Today we reviewed the methods of subtracting either a positive or negative integer with a number line.  They have 1 piece of review information for homework.  Tomorrow we will work on the chapter 2 review, and have a practice test on Wednesday, with a real test on Thursday.

Science

While Madamme Wocknitz was working on French with some students, Mr. Martin reviewed information from the end of the Ecosystem unit with the rest.  The students should ALL be done finding research/background informatin for their projects by tomorrow.  If we can book another computer time this week for their projects, we will.  The students are expected to do this project at home, and they can start to bring in their final reports/projects by the end of next week.

English

In Mr. Martin's class today, I handed back all the good copies of their hunting/cave story.  They each had to do a self assessment of their work before I shared my mark with them.  Only 18 students turned it in for marking (due November 21-22)  The mark I placed on the top of the paper is a reflection of their writing ability at this time.  If you require more specific information, please contact me at the school, and we can discuss the progress your son/daughter has made.  They will have one more computer time on Tuesday afternoon to finish off their paragraph defending or arguing against "Did banishment fail Cole?"  They need to include a list of events in the first 13 chapters in which the banishment changed Cole's actions, and ways in which he still has not learned.

English

In Miss. McFarland's class we read chapter 12 of Touching Spirit Bear.  We are starting to see some major changes in the main character, it seems that eating mice, worms and other unusual meals does a lot for a person's character;). Students then completed comprehension questions on the chapter and made a prediction for what will happen next. 

Socials

Today we watched the 4th short video in the series "Stories From the Stone Age". This is a series of videos Ms. McFarland found on YouTube that directly connects to the Socials curriculum we are looking at this term, the transition from Hunter-Gatherer to farming.  The students will be getting marks on their note taking ability from the last series of videos, as well as they had to answer some questions from video 3 and 4 in their notebook.  The key ideas today were

1) how they came to stay at the Fertile Crescent area

2) how they domesticated certain wild plants to grow in that area

Socials

In Miss. McFarland's socials class we watch two parts of a short video series called "Stories from the Stone Age."  The series looks at how hunter-gatherers made the transition to farming.  Students are completing worksheets to go with the videos.  Once finished we will be using the notes taken on the worksheets to make a summary of the videos.  They important ideas covered today were the discovery of grain as a food source and the tools used to harvest it and how this discovery impacted their life style.

Health and Career Education MEETS FRANCAIS!

Beginning Next Week....
In both classes, we will be crossing over for a few weeks of HCE by listening to some French Music!  For a preview of the song, check out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bFyyATZTAG8

What ever you do - don't use google translator to figure out the lyrics!  Wait for class!

French for the Team - Le français pour toute l'équipe!

We have been presenting BULLETINS de METEO (or Weather Reports) for the last 2 weeks!  We have another 10 presentations to go...  The students were asked to pick 2 cities each and prepare a weather report with visual supports (power point, images, posters...).  Their goal was to use a variety of weather expressions that we have looked at in class.  They were allowed to be creative within reason... and some of the presentations have been really well done!  They were also required to check their pronunciation with me before they practiced - so it has been a long process!   I hope to have the LAST presentations FOR BOTH divisions on Monday!!

Advice Given for French projects:
* do NOT use GOOGLE TRANSLATOR (creates gobbledigook - and I'm not teaching "troll"!)
* come to terms with the fact that you will not yet be able to express yourself like you do in English!  You need to build a base before you can do that - like a pyramid of French!  (Imagine you are 5 again!)
* If it is worth presenting/practicing, it is worth making sure it is communicate-able (get sentences and pronunciations checked BEFORE "memorizing" or practicing!) 

Thursday November 24th Div 5 English Update

English
Today in English students participated in The Six Minute Solution.  Most students already saw improved reading fluency. We also had library exchange today so students were able to pick out some exciting new books.  After our library visit we continued reading Touching Spirit Bear.  Once again students were turning green as we read about Cole's desperate attempts to meet his basic survival needs! 


Other Reminders

• May students still need to return their signed Socials assessment. 
• We are off to Vernon to watch a performance of Alice in Wonderland! We will be back around noon.  

Thursday November 24, 2011

Math 7;  We worked on 3 possible ways to use a number line to show subtraction of integers.  This was much harder than using the colored integer tiles to demonstrate the same thing.  I have given each of the boys a handout with notes about this. There is a link to it on the right side of this blog.  As Green team will not be in the building tomorrow, the other grade 7 boys have a worksheet to do, and we will be finishing the unit on Monday with a practice test either Monday or Tuesday, and a test early next week. 

Science;  Both classes have now had computer time to work on their projects.  This will likely be the last class time strictly devoted to this project.  The rest will have to be done on their own time.  By Tuesday, each of the group should have completed ALL of their background research for the topic, as well as listed a Hypothesis for what they are going to explore.  Projects should be done in less than 2 weeks.

PE;  The girls had Yoga today, but most found it too slow for them.  I think they were amazed however at the flexibility that the instructors had.  Mr. Martin tried, but was more of an example of "how not to do it!"

English:  We spent the last period getting new library books (every 2nd Thursday), reading chapter 13-15 of the novel, working on the list of events in the novel for their paragraph on banishment, or collecting information for their science projects. 

A special thank-you to the 3 girls who asked to reorganize the back corner of the room, as it was getting very messy.  We took down all of the cave art pictures, and sent home most of the personal timelines for Socials that were on display.

Division 5 Update (Socials and English)

Socials
In Socials today students worked on their Neanderthal writing assignment.  All students should have handed in their good copy.  Students will then make some improvements on their writing, including dressing up their word choice to make their writing more descriptive.  We will be sending their final draft home for parents to see what we have been working on in both English and Socials so far this year.

English
In English, we did our first official day of The Six Minute Solution, a reading fluency program we will be continuing throughout the year.  We also practiced using descriptive language, some students really had fun with this! We then read Chapter 10 in Touching Spirit Bear.  Students were thoroughly grossed out by Cole's choice of food! Be sure to ask your son/daughter for details!

Assessment
Students should have brought home a Social Studies assessment to share with you. This will give you an idea of how your son/daughter is doing so far in Socials.   The assignment challenged students to use their knowledge of early humans to assess how fire could have been used as a technology.  Please go over this with your son/daughter, sign the assessment and return as soon as possible.

Wednesday November 23, 2011

Team Meeting:  We pulled both classes together to have a team meeting to pick our team logo, as well as discuss Friday's cultural performance (good luck Chloe Bozak), and possible winter field trip ideas.  A special thank you to Mr. Davidson for the wonderful gecko logo he designed, the students chose his design as our permanent logo.

We also talked about bringing the $6 for the performance on Friday, and came up with a list of possible day field trips to celebrate winter.  Some ideas they came up with include taking a school bus to H20, renting the local theatre for a day and having some acting/improv.  Some ideas were very costly, and others were quite inexpensive.  As a team, we will explore several ideas, and come up with options for some Green Team building.

Science/English:  In period 4, Mr. Martin's class went over the criteria for the science ecosystem project (see the link on the right for details).  They also had time to read the novel Touching Spirit Bear (they should be between chapter 13 and 15), with a goal of being done the novel before Christmas.  Some students also chose to work on their Science project, and in their planners were to write down that they should have an "If..Then" statement, as well as background research well under way (rough copy is fine at this point)

Socials:  We spend the last period of the day watching part 3 of a series of videos entitled "Stories from the Stone Age".  This is a continuation of the information I gave in a previous post, with todays lesson based on how long the "nuetoothians" were around; why they build a permanent community, how they honoured their dead, and why they had to move away.