How to Change the World

Every year, I enjoy doing projects with students that are purposeful in as many ways as possible. Whether it be checking our school for leaky faucets during Fix a Leak Week, making bannock for over 250 people by integrating math and AAA initiatives, or selling popsicles to help raise money for the Canadian Cancer Society, I love doing projects that engage students to help others.  This year in our Social Studies/ELA section we will be looking to do similar projects that can help others in our community and around the world.  What social causes are close to your heart? If you could do something to help others, what might you do? Do you know any other students your age who have made a difference, big or small in our community? Comment below to share your ideas!

In the meantime, here is some inspiration!

Need to Brush Up On Your Canadian Geography Skills?

Need to brush up on your Canadian Geography skills? Check out this site to test your skills!

A Great Place to Learn From

Hey Everyone! As I begin building my Middle Years Learning Lounge, I am looking to other great teachers who have some pretty incredible blogs and websites that give us excellent examples of French Language Classrooms.  Today I stumbled upon this one and I can't wait to check out some of the resources and use them in my classroom. See anything you'd like to try? Take a peek here and let me know what looks fun to you!

Check Out Our Classroom Library

Having a great book to read with you at all times is a great idea.  You never know when you can fit in a few minutes to catch up with you favourite characters and see what they are up to.  Taking a break from social media and spending your time with a book where you can make your own predictions, and observations is time well spent.  Once school starts we will be organizing our library based on categories of interest but in the meantime, check out some of the titles we have.  Like what you see? Leave a comment and let me know which books you think we should include in our library!

Over the summer I worked hard to build our library! I'm looking forward to seeing the categories students will choose to organize the books!

I'm very excited to fill these display shelves with new books!

A cozy area to read! A must in every room!

Some of our titles! We will be reading Stargirl this year!

Welcome to Room 28

Amazing Videos from French Language Students

Learning a new language is not easy.  When I was living in Quebec and all I wanted to buy was Kraft Dinner to easy my feelings of being homesick, the man working at the store had absolutely no clue what I was asking for! It was a crazy, eye opening experience not being able to communicate with someone. I was determined that day to build my skills, not just to learn French but to problem solve better by using the written clues all around me to help when I was unsure.  Surrounding yourself with the language, speaking ONLY French in class, and taking risks by trying new words and expressions will only help you get better. Want to be inspired? Click here to see even more videos created by students in Ontario! They are really incredible and we will often start and end classes with them. Which one is your favourite? Here is one of mine!

Voici une vidéo!

Writing Without Roadblocks

Last year I had the wonderful opportunity of having Nancy McLean, a teacher who works alongside Regie Routman for a week long residency in my classroom. It was a wonderful experience where when know looking back, I can say I learned just as much as the students did that week, if not more! We focussed on writing stories about Kindness and had them published in a beautiful book. This year I am very lucky to continue talking with Nancy as I transition into middle years. She has already been a wonderful help, directing me to some excellent articles written by Regie herself.  Here is one about how to help your students avoid writing roadblocks. I definitely plan on spending time diving into Middleweb - looks like there are tons of wonderful resources. What strategies do you use for writing with your middle years students?

Places You Might Find Me

Hi Grade 6's!

Today you are going to copy and paste your poem into a shared document so we can publish our writing! You will need to do the following steps:

1) Open your word document with your poem

2) Copy your poem (right click, copy)

3) Paste your poem next to your name in the shared document (link below)

Ms. Mooney and Ms. Baluk will demonstrate this.  Good luck and have fun! We can't wait to see your published writing!

Click here to paste your poem