Nove 19th, Thursday

What a whirlwind of a day!!

Homework
MATH : Students who did not complete the maple leaf graph are expected to finish it tonight- only a handful managed to get it done in class time but everyone made a good start on it.
other than that... no new homework BUT that means assignments that were set earlier in the week that have not been completed are still on the radar!! I do a double check tomorrow.
Reminders for tomorrow
popcorn sale $1
hot lunch orders are due (last day)
band support forms?
Bazaar support forms?
Tomorrow is our spirit day 80's style so if you want to break out the tie dye and give peace a chance!! Friday is the day to let the eighties go!!!

General Day
At the end of some days (weeks) I feel like the deflated balloon- all my air is gone!!

After the collections of forms and money and the reminders about Christmas MC auditions (now changed to Monday!) and our class Christams song vote, we prepped for and did the Unit 8 spelling test.

Just before music we had a quick discussion and made a list of our favourite Christmas songs as we reminisced on Christmas concerts' past!!

Music- intro to instruments

Math- graphing 'show what you know' independent practice worksheet. Students worked on their own on a one page practice sheet- the intention is for me to see who is understanding- listening to the instruction and who is still having difficulty so I can provide more assistance where it is needed!! Then, we used our graphing skills to draw, label and plot points which created two different designs (one a Swiss flag cross and the other a Canadian Maple leaf).
A handfulof students are struggling with the precision necessary to create accurate graphs and plot points according to the ordered pairs direction. Rulers and sharp pencils help but the biggest factor is drawing a straight line (on a line on graphing paper) and accurately numbering each quadrant of the graph with the same spacing. Even connecting the points is not as easy as drawing a line from one to the next if the direction is to join the points in a certain order!! It was a good exercise that challenged everyone including me! lol

Family groups- our last half hour beofre lunch we met and decided on names and a corresponding colour for our group names. We had some fun today thinking, deciding and voting.

DEAR time was generally okay- not sure how to encourage the small number of students that  are not reading and continually have difficulty focussing for 10 minutes on anything!! If I don't address their behaviour, I have a group that becomes disruptive and it wrecks our quiet time - I will keep on with the same message and maybe they'll catch on ... but it is November!!!

Math- took a bit more time to help the students with math from this morning's activity as we didn't get our whole 50 minutes. Mrs. Kurki gave me a hand with the students who were having difficulties :)

Personal Planning- the students have been asking for their marks- today I returned their Term 1 goal sheets that they wrote in September and in their journals they were asked to make an end of term response to their goals saying /reflecting on how they think they have done for the first few months. Then, I distributed their academic achievement and asked them to respond to what they thought or how they felt it reflected their Term 1 learning. Results were interesting and all over the map.
Some students said they thought their results were fair, some said they were disappointed, some felt they deserved better grades or they didn't 'get' how they received a certain grade and one student wrote that he didn't care! The majority wrote about working smarter next Term :).

 There is certainly a disconnect between the grade that the students generally WANT and the understanding of the effort and the consistent work that it takes to actually reach those goals/grades.
I hope that with clearer understanding of the criteria and my feedback necessary for quality work students will be able to see what and where they need to 'pick up their socks'. And while I do not grade behaviour, students really need to understand the BIG connection that exists between their behaviour in class/on-task and their achievement. I always find reporting assessement a bitter sweet experience- I don't like to see students disappoimted but if that's what it takes to get them to reach the next level it is part of the teaching and learning continuum.

Art- we are planning and creating soda can (or two liter bottle) labels including a slogan, ingredients, nutrition information, French- bi-lingual marketing and an original flavour- name for the product- it was noisy but the ideas were flowing well. I think it will be neat to have them 'sell' their product by creating commercials once the planning and art part are completed. Some weird and wonderful ideas (BeiberFeverJuice, Strawberry BlondeBlend, BlueBull- mellow in a can!) It shouls prove to be interesting.

Pack up- homework and reminders review dismissal bell 3pm
Girl's have a volleyball game at Stawamus - good luck girls.

See everyone tomorrow- stay warm - the temperature took a bit of a dip last night and, as the snowline creeps ever nearer, I can't wait for the first screams as the students catch a glimpse of the first snowflake(s) of winter. They are excited already!!