It's time for our next social skills update. Of course, we talk about problem solving on a daily (sometimes hourly) basis, but today we completed our dedicated social skills activity. The challenge was to build a tower using mini-marshmallows and toothpicks. During this challenge, students had to focus on working as a team (we talked about how this involves compromise), problem solving together, and following instructions (i.e., not eating the marshmallows).
Everyone loved the activity, and afterwards, we completed our self and teacher-evaluations. Please have a look at this today and take some time to discuss the activity and how your student feels it went, with regard to the skills we were focusing on.
THIS IS IT! We're beginning to assemble the pieces for our social studies research project. I've mentioned this a couple times already, so you may already have some pictures in mind. Each researcher needs a picture of him/herself with his/her special person or people. (Of course, if you don't have a picture of them together, a picture of the special person is fine, and if all else fails, we can do a drawing).
Ways to send pictures to school:
1. Original photo clearly labeled (I'll make a photocopy and send the original back)
2. Copy (let me know that it's a copy and that it's ok for us to glue it down)
3. E-mail to tamara.mitchell2@tdsb.on.ca (I'll print it out)
The timeline template is also ready to be worked on and is coming home today. Each student needs to add 3 important events to their timeline. We brainstormed a list of significant events in class (see below). This could be helpful if you're not sure what kind of events are timeline-worthy. The squares are for pictures of each event, including the two events that I put on (when I was born & starting grade 1). I don't expect you to shrink your own photos, you can send your choices to me via one of the methods above and I will do the shrinking and printing and your student will take care of assembly.
When completing this work with your little researcher, please encourage them to do as much of the brainstorming and writing as possible. I know that you will need to help a lot, but really try to make it their responsibility to do their homework so that they can take pride in their project later. Also, while I encourage the use of dictionaries (such as Word Reference, linked), I strongly discourage the use of online phrase translators (such as Google Translate). They don't force us to think about how something might be said, and often don't do a good job translating anyway. I don't care one little bit about proper grammar or spelling right now, but I do care about each student trying their best to communicate their thoughts in French.
Please try to have all pictures sent in and timelines completed by Friday October 24th. Monday October 27 at the absolute latest. Hopefully this gives everyone lots of time, even if you have some busy evenings coming up. We definitely want to have our projects up on the wall by the end of October.
Thanks for all your help!