MR. Brewer
HUMANITIES - SOCIAL STUDIES/LANGUAGE ARTS
This week in class, we began reading the novel Superfudge by Judy Blume. Before reading aloud to students, Mr. Brewer demonstrated several reading strategies such as: making connections, visualization, prediction and guessing unknown words. In visualization, we imagine what characters and setting in a story are like. It's sort of like having a movie running in your mind. Many good readers do this as they read from a chapter book that has no illustrations. Predicting is when we pause during a story and ask the question what will happen next. This strategy maintains our interest. When we did our book talks we talked about the cliffhanger or hook in good writing. Good readers will pause and wonder about what will come next. Part of the fun of reading is trying to guess what trick an author has up their sleeves next!! We talked about strategies for guessing at unknown words. Students seemed familiar with several of these strategies and could describe them: All through our read-aloud, Mr. Brewer paused often and asked students about how they relate to the characters in the story. This is a reading comprehension strategy called making connections: Students were really enthusiastic about the story, so we heard a lot of personal connections to the events that take place in the story. In particular, the main character in the story, Peter Hatcher, has many disputes with his younger brother Fudge. A lot of students with siblings could relate closely to this narrative. While the book is authored by Judy Blume, students decided that it isn't Judy Blume's voice in the book. They said the narrator of the story was in fact Peter: This week it was announced that we will go as a class to Heritage Park on June 12. Permission forms will go home on Monday next week. We encourage all students to attend and are still seeking parent volunteers to accompany us on the day of the trip. Students used the strategy of visualization to portray their ideas about what the characters in Superfudge look like. They also completed some artwork related to our study of homesteaders. Here are some of the posters students made. For this piece the instruction was: Make a poster welcoming settlers to the Canadian West (specifically Alberta) circa 1890 ~ 1900ish. The Canadian government encouraged newcomers to settle quarter sections. Land was free other than a mandatory $10 registration fee. Most homesteaders immigrated from Europe, though some came from elsewhere in Canada and from the United States. Several of these posters were selected by students for inclusion in Taste of The Arts: This week on Friday, the year end project was introduced to students. Students will make a scrapbook based on what they have learned over the course of the year in grade 4. Students must include pages for each letter of the alphabet (in order), complete with title, sentence description and pictures/photos. 4A and 4B both saw exemplars (examples from previous years) and started the project by making a planning sheet. The project is due on Wednesday, June 26. We will continue to work on the project throughout the month of June.
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This week on there were no classes on Monday due to the Victoria Day holiday and on Friday students had the opportunity to go bowling. The bowling field trip allowed students to refine and acquire physical education skills in an alternative environment. In class we continued our study of the impact of settlement on the Canadian West. Students discovered that one original idea for naming our province was to call it Buffalo. We also viewed a series of maps that showed alternative ideas for the placement of the prairie provinces. At one point there was a proposal for three prairie provinces: We could have ended up as Buffaloans rather than Albertans!! As to our province, it was named after Princess Louisa Caroline Alberta, Duchess of Argyll, the fourth child of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. This is a photo of the princess: Here is a powerpoint presentation we watched during lecture:
In this week's lessons students were asked to reflect on what they have learned in lectures and through their study of our textbook. Most students also finished a poster that promotes immigration to Alberta. They were asked to imagine that they were trying to encourage settlers to come to our province in the 19th century. We did contrast this imagery with the plight of First Nations peoples who were adversely affected by the arrival of settlers. Many students made thoughtful comments on this issue. On Tuesday, students received a word list that focuses on vocabulary related to their study of plant growth and change in Ms. Ross's class. Extending sight vocabulary to include words frequently used in other subject areas is a goal that is embedded within the Language Arts curriculum. From time to time throughout the year I have referred to Science outcomes, particularly when discussing some topics that have come up during social studies lessons. like the impact of the oil sands, and when talking about First Nations reliance on the buffalo as a natural resource. We will have a spelling quiz on Wed. May 29. Here is the list of words for this week: Spelling List - 'ing' words with double letters + Science terms related to Plant Growth and Change. Test: May 29: Marks from the May 14 spelling quiz and from Book Talk have been published on PowerSchool. Students in 4B received the Book Talk rubrics in class this week. 4A's Book Talk rubrics will be returned on Monday May 27.
Parents are encouraged to regularly log in and check on student progress via PowerSchool as I update it frequently with results from in-class projects and assignments. This week students had a spelling test and Social Studies unit test on Monday. Both of these tests were marked and students received constructive feedback on them on Thursday this week. Social studies marks were published on PowerSchool. Treaties are legal documents between the government and a First Nation that confer rights and obligations on both parties. The word 'treaty' was in our spelling list from this week. To First Nations peoples, treaties are sacred. We talked further in class about what treaties are and looked at a map of Alberta showing the areas of various treaties. Calgary is located on Treaty 7 land. This treaty was signed on September 22, 1877, at Blackfoot Crossing between the Crown and five First Nations in southern Alberta: the Kainai, Siksika, Piikani, Nakoda, and Tsuu T’ina. From the First Nations’ perspective, they understood the treaty to be a peaceful agreement of sharing of land and resources. The government's understanding of the treaty however was different because it included First Nations moving to small parcels of reservation land. In class we spoke about how major changes happened that deeply impacted the way of life for First Nations people in the 1800s and 1900s. We viewed several videos that addressed the disappearance of the buffalo herds from the prairies, settlement and building of the railway that enabled settlers to come to Alberta to engage in agriculture. The map below shows where reserves and Métis settlements are in Alberta: In class we recalled our discussions of the many uses of the buffalo. First Nations traditionally used buffalo for food, clothing and sacred purposes. The bison was integral to their way of life. When bison were over-hunted, this had tragic effects on First Nations people. We acknowledged this tragedy and spoke of how it is part of our shared experience in Alberta.
This week, humanities lessons were punctuated by trips to Vivo to participate in swimming lessons. Increased physical activity can improve your appearance, improve stamina and strengthen endurance. Walking to and from Vivo was great exercise for teacher and students! Specifically for students, having the opportunity to swim was very much worthwhile. Swimming is an essential life skill that can save your life. We thank the lifeguards and instructors at Vivo who made this week so memorable: When students were not at swimming lessons, we reviewed about resources in Alberta and moved into a study of settlers who came to our province in the 19th and early 20th century . We touched on the end of the fur trade and focused on the movement of people mainly from Europe to the area now known as Alberta. Settlers came from places like Poland, Ukraine and Germany where they had been farmers for generations to homestead in Alberta. We recognized in class that the diversity of immigrants from Europe and other continents has enriched Alberta’s rural and urban communities and that European immigrants engaged in agriculture which is a major part of our economy in western Canada. In class we viewed a poster from the 19th century encouraging people to come to the Canadian West: These types of posters were put up all over Europe. Here are some in different languages. They all have the same message and layout: We talked about what the posters said, whether or not they showed a truly accurate picture of what life would be like for newcomers and why the government offered 160 free acres of land to encourage people to immigrate. We contrasted the claims in the posters with a slide show about the realities of life on the prairies for a group of newcomers who came from Ontario to homestead in southern Manitoba: www.youtube.com/watch?v=EhwjpVfirlM
For Monday's class all students are encouraged to review material about natural resources. Students are likewise reminded that on Monday there is a spelling quiz. 4A and 4B will be swimming at Vivo next week! Mr. Brewer spoke to both classes about the importance of bringing a swimsuit & towel. There has been one change in the itinerary. On Friday we will swim from: 10:00 to 11:00.
On Monday this week we took up homework about John and Mildred Ware and had a spelling test. Students received spelling marks on Thursday and edited their sentences in class. Results from the quiz itself were very strong overall. The quality, length and complexity of spelling sentences has been a strong area of improvement for many students. Both 4A and 4B got time this week in class to class to finish typing their oil sands letters. Students could follow models to type their letters. They learned that a letter contains certain elements like a date in the upper right hand corner, a greeting, a body and closing: Before typing, they had an opportunity to look at exemplars (based on letters written in previous years). During lecture, students asked questions and explored ideas in order to understand new concepts. Through their writing they strove to identify other perspectives by exploring a variety of ideas, opinions, responses, oral, print and other media texts. In doing this, they learned how natural resources are used by Albertans. A pre-writing exercise involved having a class discussion and making a chart like this: Virtually every student wrote the letter. Many also were able to complete typing the draft copy of their legendary story during the time given in class to do so. Mr. Brewer encourages any student who has not finished their story to complete it by typing it in Google documents then sharing it with me at: [email protected] Luckily, most students now have already done so. I noticed that many students used the red flag words and phrases we studied in class and that most stories have essential story elements like main characters, story problems, settings, climax of action and solution to the story problem. A number of students were able to complete their typing and logged into Read Theory to practice reading comprehension passages.
There will be a test on Alberta's natural resources on Monday May 13. Students will be given the following list of topics for study in class on Monday May 6:
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