Hello!
We had our literacy reading week this week, listening to a couple of guest authors share their story. We also created a new display board, sharing some mini book reviews with the school.
In language arts this week we continued our novel study. We will be finishing up the books on Monday, so Tuesday we can begin our lit circle discussions. We also wrote a letter about our experiences at Ruth King, and our thoughts about next year.
In math, we looked at the thousandth place value, and how to label our place value digits in the decimals. Most students did well with the quiz, a couple still need to find an equivalent fraction before turning it into a decimal, so we will review that again.
In social studies, we looked at types of government, discussing democracy, oligarchy, and autocracy. We went through a couple of island scenarios, where students had to make decisions and eventually a government would be formed. Many students came up with a representative democracy, some settled on a dictatorship to run their island. We discussed that at times, certain governments are necessary for different situations. We also started our daily government experiment, where each day we practice living in a new type of government. Friday was a monarchy, where leadership is passed from parents to children. We had two students whose parents attended Ruth King, so in the morning the older student was king. He made some fair decisions, though his decision of 5 laps for being too noisy was the turning point, and the students led a rebellion and placed a new leader, the other student, as queen of the class. She allowed more freedom in her kingdom.
In science, we looked at coding. We started with trying to write a code to make a jam sandwich. The first day proved unsuccessful and a little frustrating, as many students were writing basic instructions and missing key steps. Their code had many flaws, which failed to produce a jam sandwich. After some practice on code.org, we managed to have four semi successful codes, producing a jam sandwich that could be edible.
Next week is a short week with another professional day on Friday. Each day we will practice a new type of government, starting with direct democracy, then dictatorship, representative democracy, and oligarchy. Thursday will be a quiz on types of government. We will finish our novel studies and begin discussion on the residential school experience, getting ready for our field trip on May 7th. In math, we will look at ordering decimals and working more with the place value system. In science, we will continue coding and problem solving using the chrome books. And in French, we will look at school supplies and vocabulary.
Events coming up: May 2 Decimal quiz. May 3 Types of Gov quiz. May 4 Pro D. May 7 museum field trip.
Have a good weekend!
