My classroom computer is not well... It crashed completely just after I had saved the last Blog entry on Thursday. Mr. Elliot has been away and I need to remember to do the blog at home which is not always the easiest due to the fact I have to share the home computer!!! Anyway...
Today the temperature was much more comfortable in class. I prefer the cooler afternoons- last week was very uncomfortable but we managed.
The report cards for term 3 are due in June 15th (a week today) and I have discussed the necessity of students with incomplete or outstanding assignments to get them in as soon as possible. The students know who they are and I have spoken to them individually regarding their work. I do find it frustrating (even if it is false bravado) that some just shrug their shoulders and have no intention of making the effort to submit the work. I think the old adage is, "you can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink''!!
A big thank-you to all the students who keep on making a great effort- you have no idea how much it is appreciated.
We have decided to scale back the Greco-Roman newsaper project due to the lack of time (it took a month last year and I have left it a little late). Each individual in the group will still complete an article or a feature on their topic of interest but rather than a newspaper, we can share each group's contributions in a kind of montage or 'museum visit'. The students seemed to be relieved as I think the scope of the original project was a bit intimidating at the end of the year.
Today we continued our vocabulary and context clue work with vocab-u-lous and I must say that I am pleasantly surprised at how the students have handled the old fashioned 'look it up in the dictionary' assignment. I have added a worksheet of Latin phrases we still use in our language today like e.g., R.I.P., etc., a.m., p.m., and P.S. There were too many to complete today so we will do 10 more each day until we get through them all. It is amazing to know how our language is influenced by a now 'dead' (unspoken) language like Latin!!
This kind of activity is similar to the junior high expectations of English language skills and acquisition. I hope the skills the students have learned doing vocab-u-lous will be useful even if they cannot remember the words themselves (although you would be surprised at how new words snaek into our daily life :))
I set three comprehension and recall questions for Chapter 10 in our novel. We completed a booklet of French language use conjugating the verb ecouter (to listen :)) and in mathematics we started on a set of problem solving on perimeter and area putting together all the knowledge we have recently learned about formula and using logical thinking to fill in missing information.
The group of grade sevens who went to the Science Olympics today returned a little crestfallen. They didn't rave about their experience - maybe they were tired. Hopefully I'll get a better report from everyone tomorrow!!
This afternoon time was provided for socials and the socials project. We returned to computers for research purposes. Tomorrow when we have everybody in class again we will discuss the new expectations of the project. Quiet time will be provided every day for students to work on completing and getting the overdue assignments in.
See you all tomorrow.
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