Friday 30 June 2017

Happy summer!


It's 9:00am and the halls are quiet. I'm still surprised at how quickly this year has flown by.

As I look around my semi-boxed-up, half-painted classroom, it astounds me to think how much learning and growing we did this year together as a team. Through ups and downs, we set goals, celebrated successes, worked hard, had fun, learned and shared some hard lessons, collaborated with our peers, shared lots of laughs, set new standards for ourselves, set out on field trip adventures and truly grew into our roles as great Knights.

And, because this blog was created for and truly belongs to you, the students, I am signing off by letting your words share what this year has meant to you. Wishing you all the most wonderful summer!

À la prochaine, mes amis!
Mme Careen 😊

*****************************************************************

J'aime quand on est allé au piste et pelouse parce que j'aime les sports. J'ai aussi aimé quand notre classe est allée au musée. - Shaan C.

I liked the memory name game! - Claire B.

What I really liked doing this year with Mme Careen was the funky fish where we stretch by dancing! - Elsir O.

I liked when we took brain breaks. One of my favourite brain breaks was the funky fish. I also enjoyed when we went to Festival du Voyageur. Mme Careen is really fun and I'll miss her next year. - Ava N.

I liked playing the name game with the class. - Gavin DG.

I loved the first day we met as a class and we all played the name game together. - Nina KLB.

This year, I loved to do the funny brain break games that Mme did with us, like the funky fish. - Sofia S.

J'ai aimé quand Rachel Bawn est venue chanter pour nous. I liked when Rachel Bawn came and sang songs for our school. - Kacey C.

My favourite memory is the residency because we learned a lot. We were in different groups and Miss Sandy was really nice. - Ebony F.

Manitoba Museum field trip. - Graeme F.

We had an AWESOME year. My favourite part was when we went to Festival du Voyageur and had a fun time game and learning about "les voyageurs." - Bronwyn H.

The best part of the year was when we did stuff together, such as the Festival du Voyageur or fun Kahoot quizzes. - Aurora A.

Quand on a fait le projet Tomatosphere. - Wyatt M.

My favourite memory I had this year was when we went on our Exchange District field trip because we learned lots about different things. Also, how we did it together. Merci pour une bonne année. - Jessica K.

I loved it when we played Kahoot. Gavin C. 

J'aime quand nous avons appris à propos de Bernoulli. J'ai aussi aimé la sortie de piste et pelouse parce que j'aime les sports et il était très drôle. - Pablo CD.

I liked doing the alien classification project with Mme Careen. - Owen G.

I really liked all the fun activities we did.  Had a lot of fun learning when we went on our field trips. Thank you for a good year. - Lucas L. 

The thing I liked about our class is when we did Q-Bitz and Math Mobiles and mostly everything we did. Go Ness Knights! - Kaedan B

 My favourite memories of Grade 6 is when we started playing Kahoot and when we read those Math books as a class. Grade 6 was a fun year with Mme Careen. - Josh P.



This year I really liked how welcoming Mme Careen was. We did a lot of fun things in Room 208. I loved being part of 6F3! - Courtney B.

Thursday 29 June 2017

Happy Last Day!


We had a great last morning together!



We started off in the art room, combined with Mme McKenzie's class, to do art! We had full access to the art supplies as well as a ton of colouring pages. Some of us painted and drew pictures, while others did summer-themed crosswords and chatted with friends.


Next was the Q-Bitz Extreme challenge! The pictures we needed to create were WAY tricker to figure out at first, but after the first few rounds, we got the hang of it!

Before heading off to period 4 with Ms. Miller for our next fun last-day activity, we had one more task... signing the first printed copy of The Method of Math Mobiles - the manual we started during our Writer's Workshop with
Ms. Sandy back at the end of April!
(Be sure to read the blog post about our book launch to find out more)!

 And what's the last day of school without one final group shot?

Clearly, Grade 6 didn't make us any less silly! :)
Thanks for a fun morning, 208!

The Method of Math Mobiles


Room 208 is very excited to announce the launch of their manual, The Method of Math Mobiles!

We started the preparing for this writing project back in April in anticipation of our four-day Writer's Workship with Ms. Sandy Figueroa. We took our knowledge of writing and solving algebraic equations and turned it into a step-by-step guide to teach others about how they, too can solve Math Mobile problems.

After many hours of editing, reformatting, negotiating and revising, our manual is saved, printed
and ready to share with everyone!

To celebrate the completion of our project, we decided to have an ice-cream-party
book launch on the last day of school!

Here is our room all set-up and ready for our book launch party!


Here we are making our ice cream creations and spending time together as a class on our last day.
Celebrating a book launch with an ice cream party is such a yummy idea!


We invited the other teachers who were also a part of the Writer's Worship to join us, too!
We were happy to welcome them to our celebration and share our manual with them!

Our The Method of Math Mobiles manual will be on display in Mme Careen's classroom and will also be available for students to read in our school library. An additional copy will be also be accessible to all school visitors who stop by our school office.

Many thanks to everyone who helped us on our writing and publishing journey! :)

P.S. You can see read The Method of Math Mobiles by clicking HERE!

Wednesday 28 June 2017

Wednesday!


The time is ticking down. Only two days left!


We started our morning with SkyScrapers! Working in randomized groups, we got started right away to see how many different puzzles we could solve in 45 minutes. We have shown so much growth with this activity since the first time we tried it back in the fall.

Next, we took time to hand back/sort out all of our assignments from Term 3. It was a paper free-for-all!
Some of us kept our assignments to bring home... most of us used all of our strength to rip everything into as many pieces as we could!

We ended our morning writing down a favourite memory of the year (which will be posted on our blog at the end of the week) and spending a short time in the computer lab with a chance to play a game of choice on the computers (which doesn't happen often, so it was a real treat)!

It's hard to believe that tomorrow is already our last day together for the year! There are a lot of fun and exciting things planned - special activities, Q-Bitz Extreme challenge, book launch ice cream celebration and more - so be sure to rest up and be ready for one final day in Room 208! :)

Tuesday 27 June 2017

Three days and counting!


Happy Tuesday, everyone!
We had a great morning together!

We started our day with a team Q-Bitz challenge. We worked in teams of three to create different pictures with our set of patterned blocks. We were tested on both accuracy and speed as the first three teams to correctly complete the picture and show it to Mme Careen won points for their team; 1st: 25 points, 2nd: 20 points, 3rd: 10 points.
Our teams were randomly selected, and after every 6 puzzles, we changed teams. We played three rounds in total.
Our next challenge will come on Thursday of this week as we attempt the same challenge using the
Q-Bitz Extreme blocks. So fun!

Next up, was our paper airplane challenge. We each received 3 sheets of paper and had 20 minutes to create the best airplanes we could. Some of us chose to follow one of the six templates posted around the class while others decided to come up with our own original design.

After our airplanes were ready to go, we headed down to the gym to test them out!
Some of our planes flew SO far!


We headed outside for the last part of our morning to put Bernoulli's Principle to the test. We started by looking at the different shapes and sizes of the frisbees and then tried to compare the differences in their flight paths as we passed them to our partners. It was pretty windy outside however, so most of our time was spent running and chasing after the frisbees rather than catching them.
Mme Careen also requested we yell out "Bernoulli" each time we threw a frisbee, which was pretty silly, but she was fairly insistent that it would make our frisbees fly a bit better. ;)

Friday 23 June 2017

Fidget spinner Friday!


Happy Friday!

Mme Page was back with us today for another 3-Act lesson...
and we got to use our fidget spinners to kick-off the class!
Today we had to, first: figure out what information we would need to calculate how long a fidget spinner would spin for and second: actually complete the calculation itself.
To solve today's math problem, we had to use long division which some of us found a bit tricky.
Mme Page showed us a cool way to do long division that made dividing bigger numbers seem not so bad! Thanks, Mme! :)

Watch the fidget spinner video HERE!

This afternoon we also had a chance to welcome our incoming Grade 6s (this year's current Grade 5s) to our building. We all met in the gym for a message from Mme Buckwold before the 5s headed off to see their new classroom spaces and we stayed in the gym as a group to watch a video.

A group of us worked very hard at organizing the class and decorating the boards 
to ensure our new students felt very welcome! Thanks, team! 

          
Have a great weekend! :)

Wednesday 21 June 2017

A visit from Mme Page!


We were happy to welcome Mme Page back into our Math classroom this morning.
She really made us think hard!

We started by watching THIS VIDEO and then shared what Math we noticed in the video.

Next, we watched the video again and came up what Math question we were going to try and solve. This was a different type of Math thinking for us, as we are usually told the question first.

Working in teams and using materials (post-it notes and a large paper to represent the large post-it note) we got to work to figure out how many small post-it notes it would take to cover the large one. At first, we estimated it would take 16, but then quickly noticed the fourth post-it in each row was a bit too big to fit.
How would we figure out the answer now?

After folding, drawing dotted lines, cutting and reorganizing our post-it notes... and using what we already knew about fractions, we were able to come up with a solution!

Do you think you could solve a question like this? Check out the video and give it a try!
Good luck! :)


Félicitations!


We started our day together in the gym celebrating our Term 3 successes.
Congratulations to our classmates who were recognized in this morning's assembly!

Félicitations Kaedan, Kacey et Nina!
Also recognized this morning (but without picture proof, unfortunately):
Nina - for her continued success in athletics (presented by M. d'Auteuil)
Josh - for his great improvement in Art this year (presented by Ms. Arsenault)

Tuesday 20 June 2017

Field Trip Day!


What a great day for a field trip!

All ready for our Exchange walking tour!
Here are the first few stops on our tour! Our guide was very knowledgeable and shared so many great stories about Winnipeg's history.
We learned about the Winnipeg General Strike on our tour and saw the alley of the infamous "Bloody Saturday."
We also got to go inside the Pantages Theatre and learn about Pantages himself, and how many believe he still haunts the theatre to this day.
Next up was lunch! I don't think Smoke's Poutinerie has ever been so busy!
Also, as part of the Winnipeg Jazz Festival, there was free performance on the Cube stage in Old Market Square, so we all had a chance to enjoy some great music while we ate!
We started our afternoon with a guided tour in the Manitoba Museum and explored the Nonsuch (aka: the big pirate ship), too.
We ended our day in the Science Centre and had so much fun exploring and being silly, too!

All students were great ambassadors of our school and even received recognition from the 
Exchange Tours guides complementing them on their respectfulness and enthusiasm! 
Way to go, Knights! :)


P.S. Our class was divided into two groups for the day, with one group starting in the Exchange and the other group starting at the Manitoba Museum with M. d'Auteuil. We all met up for lunch in Old Market Square before switching activities in the afternoon. Unfortunately, that means I only got photos of half our class... but I do know that the other group also had a great time with both activities and had fun spending the day with M. d'Auteuil, too! :)

Tuesday 13 June 2017

Last call for missing/incomplete work!


Happy Tuesday everyone!
We are one day closer to the end of Term 3, and with that, comes a last call for any students who may still be holding on to work that is now past due.

(Please excuse the not-so-great quality of the picture).
With the exception of "Questions: Songdo" and "Processus de design: aéronef" (which we have just started/will be starting in class tomorrow), all items on this list should have already been completed and handed in.
My classroom will be open tomorrow (Wednesday) and Thursday at 12:15 for students to complete their work.

Many thanks for your continued support!
Have a great afternoon! :)

Monday 12 June 2017

Happy Monday!


It's hard to believe that we're already counting down the days to the end of Term 3.

We still have lots to do before the end of the year and didn't waste any time getting down to work this morning.

We started with our mental math assessment on the "Halve and Double" strategy and then moved on to reviewing and completing a "Math Mobile" assessment we had started a few weeks ago. Mme Careen read our work and gave each of us specific, written feedback on how to more clearly communicate our thinking and include algebraic equations. We used these written notes to help guide our steps for the remaining two questions.

We spent the rest of the morning together in groups at the white boards working through two of the last problem-solving questions for the year! We collaborated with our groups to approach the question using different strategies. It was important that each group member understood how we arrived at the solution and that the solution itself did indeed make sense.


Our next step will be to take our own question sheet and to show and explain our work independently.
We will be assessed in three different categories:
Process and Strategies
I can identify important information in a problem.
I can choose a reasonable strategy and make an attempt to use it.
Mathematical Knowledge
I can use my mathematical knowledge to carry out my plan and arrive at an answer.
Communication and Reasoning
I can use words, diagrams, labels, etc. to give a complete picture of what is going on in my work and solution.
I can show my answer is reasonable by writing it in a complete sentence.

We have done a lot of work on showing and explaining our work through problem-solving this year, so these last two questions will give us a chance to show how much we have grown as problem-solvers (well beyond simply finding the answer and stopping there).

Looking forward to a busy, busy week of learning! :)

P.S. A note from Mme Careen:
While I have done my best to stay on top of students to complete and hand in their work, there are students who have not yet completed/handed in one (or many) of the assignments/assessments completed in Term 3. I will do my best to check in with everyone, one on one, over the next couple of days, but encouragement from home would certainly be a great help, too! My classroom will be open over the lunch hour (starting at 12:15) this week if students need to check in or would like a place to work. Many thanks for your continued support!

Friday 9 June 2017

Bernoulli


We have spent the last few days learning about Bernoulli's Principle and how it relates to flight.

By creating zones of low and high pressure, lift (la portance) is created. Low pressure is created by fast moving air, and high pressure is created by slower moving air. High pressure will always move towards low pressure and will push an object in its path as it does.

We saw Bernoulli's Principle at work when trying to remove a ping pong ball from a funnel (without dumping it out). Blowing on the bottom of the funnel does NOT pop the ping pong ball out of the top as many of us thought. In fact, the opposite was true! We had to blow air on top or across the ping pong ball in order for it to pop out of the funnel. Cool!


We also watched THIS VIDEO to see other examples of Bernoulli's Principle at work.


Today in class, we did what may have been the funnest activity of all... spraying our friends with water! Using a small paper cup, water and two small straws, we re-created a spray bottle! This activity is very easy to replicate at home and is really one of the best ways to see a real-life application of Bernoulli's Principle in action.
Next week, we will complete our experiment write-up in class and really review just how we were able to get the water from our cup up and out of the straw.

Have a great weekend! :)

Wednesday 7 June 2017

Math Assessment Tomorrow!


Tomorrow will be a busy day in Math!
We will be correcting Section A of our newest mental math strategy, "Halving and Doubling" and we will also be completing a short assessment on fractions and percents.
We reviewed for our assessment today in class, looking at different types of questions and examples
that will be on the "quiz."
Two previous blog posts: "Equivalent Fractions" and
"Ratios, Fractions, Equivalent Fractions and Percents!contain links that will serve as a great review.
The links on the "Mathématiques" page of our blog are great, too!

Un discours improvisé


We are challenging ourselves by presenting 1 minute mostly-improvised speeches en français.
We had 30 minutes in class yesterday to brainstorm 6 topics of interest to us.
Today, we wrote down our 6 topics on a cue card and handed them into Mme Careen.
When our card gets selected from the pile, it is our turn to present! Mme Careen rolls a die and the number on the die indicates the topic of our speech. We get 30 seconds to think before the 1-minute timer begins!
Today we heard speeches about summer, dolphins, elephants and cars.
Who knows what we'll learn about tomorrow?!

Tuesday 6 June 2017

Our new mental math strategy


This week's mental math strategy is making our brains work SO hard!
We are focusing on the multiplication strategy - "Halving and Doubling."

If one number is even, you can cut it in half and double the other number.
This can give you an easier problem to solve!

Ex: 4 x 15
Half of 4, Double 15.
2 x 30
= 60

Ex: 6 x 65
Half of 6, Double 65
3 x 130
= 390

Ex: 15 x 8
Double 15, Half of 8
30 x 4
= 120

You can even keep on halving and doubling if it helps...

Ex: 18 x 8
Double 18, Half of 8
36 x 4
Double 36, Half of 4
72 x 2
= 144

We will be correcting Section A of this lesson on Thursday and Section B of this lesson on Friday.
Practicing our multiplication and division skills will help us review our basic facts and will help us as we continue our work with equivalent fractions!
Bonne chance! :)

Monday 5 June 2017

Equivalent Fractions


We are continuing our review of proper fractions and equivalent fractions in Math. These are concepts that were taught in Grade 5. We are spending time in class reviewing these concepts so that we will be ready to apply our fraction knowledge as we move on to improper fractions and mixed number fractions later this week.

Here are three videos that we can watch at home to help solidify our understanding of these concepts:

Comparing Fractions

Simplifying Fractions

Equivalent Fractions

Here are two Math games that will also help:

Dolphin Race

Fraction Frenzy

Spending a bit of extra time at home working on these concepts will help us tackle our work
in class with more confidence!

Friday 2 June 2017

Friday Fractions!


We were a small but mighty group today!
Even with 8 of our classmates off playing beach volleyball, we still got lots of learning done!

We started our morning reviewing equivalent fractions using "les reglettes" (Cuisenaire rods). These math manipulatives help us create and compare different fractions.


Next, Mme Careen read us Cindy Neuschwander's newest book Sir Cumference and the Fraction Faire. 
Mme Careen had the chance to meet the author back in the fall and was very excited when this book arrived in the mail earlier this week! Perfect timing really, as we just happen to be learning about fractions in Math!


We ended our morning together playing Kahoot! We tested our fraction and basic facts skills and learned that having quick (and accurate) reflexes can help us come out on top!


Wishing you all a sunny weekend! 
À lundi! :)

Wednesday 31 May 2017

Talent Show!


Tomorrow - Thursday, June 1 - we will be celebrating some very talented Knights!
Our singers, musicians, thespians and Rubik's cube masters will be putting on a show like none other, and all for a great cause. Our social justice team has decided that they would like raise funds for 
The Children's Hospital Foundation and here's how you can be a part of it all.
At the end of the show, students will have a chance to donate to The Children's Hospital Foundation by putting their coins or cash in their favourite act's donation station. 
The act that raises the most funds will be named the WINNER of Ness' Got Talent.
The show will begin around 1:00 pm in the school gymnasium.
Families and friends of Ness students are welcome to attend!
Hope to see you there! :)

Friday 26 May 2017

A A i M


Happy Friday, everyone!
We had a great morning of activities, information and fun!


Here are some of the activities we took part in:

COMPOSITES:  Students learned about the evolution of composites and how they are used to build aircrafts. Students also made a small composite panel.


ROCKETRY: Students learned about rocketry by experimenting and launching straw rockets.




SPACE: “Crater Fun” participants became scientist-detectives by participating in asteroid impacts simulation and reporting on their characteristics. 


HERC THEATRE: Students learned about and observed various careers in aerospace and aviation, both in the air and behind the scenes! 



FLIGHT: This station taught us all about the Bernoulli Principal, along with many other scientific principles through a mini-lesson and through experimenting with different designs of paper airplanes.


 Have a great weekend!
✈ ✈ ✈ ✈

Wednesday 24 May 2017

We're pretty much famous! (A Writer's Workshop Update)


Ok. First things first. And, it's kind of a big deal.
In the teaching world, there are certain educators - subject-specific experts - that many teachers look up to.
They have earned "rock star teacher status" in their own right. Regie Routman, while many of you outside of the educator world may not be familiar with her name, is certainly considered one of those people. Our staff (and many schools within out school division) have been studying, learning and applying Regie's "Reading Writing Connection" for years. And, Ms. Regie just happens to be best friends with Ms. Sandy - the very Ms. Sandy that was in our classroom but a few weeks ago!
So, why does that matter?

At the end of our Writer's Workshop, the wonderfully kind Ms. Banks (who was one of the admin/teacher observers in our class during our week with Ms. Sandy) tweeted Regie with a link to our classroom blog to share all that we had accomplished during the week. And... Regie retweeted it! A rock star status educator shared a link to our wonderful work with her 10.4K followers! How AMAZING! And, as a result of that, our classroom blog stats went through the roof! Our five Writer's Workshop related blog posts have almost 400 unique page views (compared to a typical post that would get 15 or so). This is a true testament to how hard we all worked during our week with
Ms. Sandy and how inspiring our time together was for everyone involved.


Now, putting all of Mme Careen's starstruck-ness aside for a minute, here is what we've been up to with our 
math writing since Ms. Sandy's visit.


We've reviewed and finished our drafts and have had the chance to work with Ms. Toth once again to review our Math thinking. Both Ms. Toth and Mme Careen have been reviewing our Math to ensure that each step of our thinking includes both the algebraic equation as well as any other Math used to arrive at the solution.


Mme Careen then typed up our drafts and we worked in teams to review and edit our writing. Once we finished making changes on our printed copies, we headed to the computer lab to make all necessary changes directly in our team's Word file. We also collaborated on what vocabulary words should be in our manual's glossary and identified them in our own Math Mobile writing by making them red and bolding the font.

What's next? 
Once all groups have finished making their final edits our Math Mobile problems will be printed and we will write in the math that goes with each step. We will then work as a class to negotiate the order in which all the problems will be presented, so that a table of contents can be typed up. 
From there, all pages will be scanned to create one digital file that can be published, printed and shared!

So, we're getting close!
Our weeks of hard work are about to come together in the form of an amazing final product!
Be sure to stay tuned... exciting book launch news to be announced soon! :)

Les monstres!


We've finished our monsters!
Using all of these wonderful monster-themed books as our monster-creation inspiration, 
we created some pretty fabulous looking creatures.


We worked hard describing how to draw our monsters step by step. We also included specific details about each of our monster's features so that other students would be able to re-create our monsters as closely as possible.


Most of the monster recreations were pretty similar, meaning we met our learning goal of 
writing a specific set of instructions to create a monster-ific final product! 
Bravo!

Friday 19 May 2017

Reader's Theatre

It's time for Reader's Theatre!
We've chosen our roles and are now working on reading over our scripts and adding presentation details such as gestures, movement and props. 
We are also focusing reading our lines with proper pronunciation and speaking with expression and fluidity.






Our Reader's Theatre presentations will start Wednesday of next week.
We are looking forward to seeing what all of the other groups have been up to!