Personal Narrative Unit Celebration

 

This week, we celebrated publishing our second personal narrative pieces by reading our books out loud to our classmates!  

We worked very hard as authors during this writing unit, applying different techniques we learned to write true stories, zooming into small moments in our lives. 

During this writing unit, we increased our confidence and identity as authors so that we can work through the writing process of planning, drafting, revising, editing, and publishing with growing independence. 

Here are some of the techniques we were introduced to in the mini-lessons. 

We considered these techniques when we set goals for ourselves to work towards with the support of the teacher and our writing partner. 

One key learning intention for most of us was that our stories conveyed an idea or a lesson. 

We also kept in mind the general structure of how stories tend to go as you can see in the photo above. 

Here is a video for you to see our celebration in action!

We also have postings on Seesaw Blog of us reading our books aloud so families, please use the password to log in and listen! 

Play in Grade 5/6

 

Play is not only for little kids! 

In Grade 5/6, we inquired into the following question during visual arts: 

How can we use watercolor in different ways? 

What better way to learn than through play?

We curated resources on this Padlet to help us learn new techniques. 

Some of the techniques we tried out were...

• dry wash
• wet paint onto a wet wash
• water drops onto a wet wash
• color blending
• underpainting
• layering
• watercolor blooms

Some of us used different tools such as salt and plastic wrap to see what kind of effect there would be on the paint. 

Sometimes, our art turned out differently from what we had initially expected. 

This is OK because we learn through experimentation.

 The process of questioning, trying different approaches, and reflecting with a growth mindset is so important for developing new skills and understandings!

Now that we have learned some techniques, we can't wait to create more complex pieces starting next week!

In our Unit of Inquiry, we finished our unit on human migration last week. 

Check out our unit wall and how much we learned!

Grade 5/6 Band!

 As a connection to our first unit with the central idea "Our mindsets and understanding of the process of learning enable us to build skills and habits to reach our goals" in music, we have been working towards the goal to learn to play instruments we have never played before. 

Rather than waiting for the teacher to tell us what to do, we demonstrated agency by researching resources that would help us learn to add to this Padlet. 

We worked together in groups and partnerships and supported each other to reach our goals. We shared strategies, gave and received feedback to improve our skills!

Once we were able to play some melodies on our own, we were ready for the challenge to play a song as a group. 

Take a look at our Grade 5/6 band!

 

People who Represent Attributes of the Learner Profile

In visual arts, we have been learning about the seven elements of art. 

Check out the sketch-notes below! 

Because we are all different people making meaning through different connections, our sketch-notes are all unique!

Over the past weeks, we have been inquiring into different ways the elements of value and colour are used in art.

For our first long-term project, we practiced using acrylic paint to tint and shade colours. 

Once we developed this new skill, we applied it to create monochromatic paintings of a person who represents a Learner Profile attribute. 

We also used our research skills to find out about these people and explain how the person represents that particular attribute. 

 

Below are our finished paintings!

 

These paintings will be hung in our classroom throughout the year as a visual reminder of the attributes of the Learner Profile. 

Learning Zones, Fractions, and Halloween!

 

This week, we learned about the learning zones. The tasks we work on as learners can be sorted into the following categories: panic zone, stretch zone, and comfort zone. 

Tasks in the panic zone are too hard for us at the time. Even with help, we wouldn't be able to complete them yet. 

Tasks in the comfort zone are too easy. We would be able to complete the tasks without making mistakes. This is not good because mistakes help us grow. 

Tasks in the stretch zone are just right. They are challenging enough that we need to stretch our brains to complete them, trying out different strategies, working with other learners, or asking for help from the teacher. This idea of learning zones is an adaptation of the Zone of Proximal Development, coined by an influential psychologist Lev Vygotsky. 

As self-regulated learners, it's important that we choose tasks that are in the stretch zone. 

Once we learned about the learning zones, we applied the concept in math. 

In the task you can see in the photo above, we inquired into the following question: How can we represent fractions in different ways? We used tangram shaped paper representing various fractions to create other fractions. 

The problems become increasingly harder towards the right. 

For example, in the example above Keira used pieces representing 1/4, 1/8, and 1/16 to represent 7/4. She also converted the fractions into decimals and percent as well. 

Friday afternoon was filled with so much fun! 

We had an MPP (Multi-purpose Party) for the following purposes:

• A birthday party
• A going-away party
• Celebration for reaching our reading goal
• Halloween!!!!!

The "first student of DSKI" and "bat" above set up a treasure hunt with clues for us to solve! 

Below, you can see our decorations for the DSKI Halloween Door Contest! 

For this project, we used our social skills and communication skills to create these two AMAZING designs!

Happy Halloween everyone!

Have a fantastic fall break!

Bookshelves and Reader's Notebooks

 Boy, have we been reading a lot in Grades 5 and 6! 

In our "bookshelves", each book color represents a different genre.

You can see that many of us are challenging ourselves to read books in various genres!

In Readers' Workshop, we are almost finished our first unit on analyzing themes in interpretation book clubs. 

During this unit, we used our Reader's Notebooks in creative ways as a tool to develop our comprehension.

Take a look at some of the pages inside!

Stay safe in the typhoon, everyone!