Welcome to Classoom 6/7-Long

Each morning, the students are presented with a macro (close-up) image of an everyday object to see if they can figure out what it is.  Give it a try!

It's been a minute, but the Terrific Kid Awards have returned to Madoc Township.  Congratulations to Cooper for being the 6/7-L Terrific Kid Award recipient for the month of October.  The theme was self-regulation, which is the ability to understand and manage your behaviour and your reactions to feelings and things happening around you. The theme for the month of November is organization. Thank you very kindly to the Kiwanis Club for sponsoring the Terrific Kid Awards.

We have launched an activity called 'Create-a-Society.'  In groups, the students have designed island countries.  The climate, natural resources and natural features on their islands were all determined randomly by a spinner.  Groups will receive marbles for things like good behaviour, great answers, work completion etc.  They will use those marbles to purchase items for their islands such as roads, towns, power generation facilities, harbours, tourist destinations ect.  The better the students perform as a group, the more marbles they receive and therefore the more features and money-makers they can purchase for their islands.  Over the course of the game, the islands become more and more modern and industrialized.

We usually take a mid-morning break in 6/7-L to get ourselves up and moving.  Other times, we'll pop outside for some Daily Physical Activity.  Studies show that these brief "body breaks" are associated with improved cognitive performance and classroom behavior, and an increase in student test scores.  

From the gym...  Now that the soccer season is behind us, we have turned our attention to volleyball.  Gym class is all about participation and trying your best, and most students in 6/7-L do exactly that!  Thanks to student photographers for many of these images.

In dramatic arts, we are examining movement.  This includes drama activities such as mime and tableau.  Here, the students are participating in a group activity that involves 'moulding' a partner into specific emotions, characters and actions.  For example, groups might select an angry old man grocery shopping.

Although our main focus in math is currently on patterning - discovering, extending and creating patterns using manipulatives such as coloured tiles and toothpicks - we usually begin the day with a math game or challenge.  Here, the students are playing a game that involves flipping coins and practices concepts and skills involved in probability.

In science, both grades are focusing on biology, specifically on biodiversity - the diversity of living things on planet Earth.   Here, the students are learning about how things are classified based on similarities.  For example, coyotes and wolves would have similar characteristics that would have them placed close together on a classification system.  To get them started, the students are creating a classification system to organize a variety of transportation vehicles.

As preparations continue for Remembrance Day, the students are working on the annual poster contest.  Several of our students will be recounting the stories of relatives who put everything on the line for their country and for the values we hold dear as Canadians.   It's not too late.  If you have a family war story that's dying to be told, tell it to your child so it can be recognized and remembered.  On Thursday, Ms. Burr and I will be video taping those stories for our Remembrance Day ceremony.  Several families have emailed pictures to be used as the students recount their stories.  You can email them to me at blong@hpedsb.on.ca.