Week 3

Hello Grade 5/6 Ramsay Families!  

We had another great week!  Just a few reminders on upcoming events: 

- Conferences will take place Thursday, September 23rd and Friday September 24th. Conference manager is now open, so please make sure to sign up. We are looking forward to connecting with families! 

- September 30th is National Day for Truth and Reconciliation so schools and offices will be closed.   

- Please return all forms back to the school with your child as soon as possible. 

 

Social Studies 

Over the course of the week, students prepared for the Student Vote, which aligns with the Federal Election on Monday, September 20th. Students were introduced to the main political parties and had an opportunity to use relevant online sources to interpret, synthesize and critically analyze the leaders and political platforms.  

Here is a snapshot of our learning in Social Studies, written collaboratively by the students: 

There are three levels of government in Canada - municipal, provincial and federal. In the federal political parties, they pick one person to be the leader. And if that party wins, that person becomes the prime minister.  When voting, a political platform is important because it shows you what the politicians are thinking of doing, so you know who to vote for. It can help you decide as it’s a lot of decisions, so it can be hard to choose. You don’t want to vote for someone you don’t know because they might make bad decisions. You vote for the person that will do the best job. If you don’t vote, then the votes would not have gone as they should of.  If you think your vote wouldn’t make that much of a difference, what if half of the country thought that?  Then there wouldn’t be enough votes to fairly decide, and if you don’t vote, you may not get what you want. 

Math 

In math this week, students continued to work on numerical patterns, and began identifying and charting the pattern rule between two sets of numbers. Learning outcomes also included: 

-       writing a mathematical expression to represent a given pattern (e.g. r + 3) 

7, 10, 13, 16, 19 

  

-       describing the pattern relationship in a given table or chart, using a mathematical expression. (e.g. t + 4 = s) 

  

t	s
1	5
2	6
3	7
4	8

The Tree in Me 

    This week, we read this beautiful book that inspired a great conversation around the metaphor of the tree that can be found in all of us. We then applied this thinking to our conversation about Terry Fox, who is an excellent example of resiliency. What would Terry’s Tree look like? Who do you think supported him during his journey? What kept him going, despite the many obstacles that he faced? What characteristics did he demonstrate and shine into the world? Students represented their thinking and reflections through a visual journal page. 

 

    In Science this week, we learned about the different layers of the forest. We first reviewed note taking strategies, which students then applied while watching a short video and after reading an article. They then represented their learning through a visual journal page to demonstrate their understanding. Our next steps will be to examine and describe the role of trees in the nutrient cycles and in the production of oxygen.