The Sochi Olympics, How to Summarize and more.....

Well..... if this e-card doesn't say it all. Ugh!

What a winter we have had in Ontario, Canada, so far. Snow and cold and snow and cold.....and more snow...... and with more cold comes more indoor recesses. We have been cooped up inside for what seems to be close to 3 months (with an outdoor recess peppered here and there). It has made for a LONG winter and a tired teacher.

Any way.... enough whining from me (For now! Ha!)

We have embraced the Olympic spirit in 7E!

This week I used a little of Erin Cobb's 2014 Sochi Olympic Pack to sew together some Geography with various Olympic competing countries, located around the world.

Our focus was to look at patterns and characteristics of major climate regions around the world and start to get a sense of where various countries are located in relation to our own.

 We also used our measurement skills from past math units to analyze population and area.

For our problem of the week in math, we analyzed the Vancouver 2010 Olympic medal standings & data.

Students were asked:

1.) How many medals were handed out in total?

2.) If gold=3 points etc., how many points were distributed to each country?

3.) What percentage of medals did Canada win? Where percentage of Canada's medals were gold, silver and bronze?

4.) Make 3 or more assumptions about the data.

In Literacy, we focused a lot on understanding simple and complex texts by summarizing important ideas. I am really trying to get my students to cite various details that support the main idea.

**Text support, text support, text support!!!!**

 

I was getting frustrated with the summaries I was receiving, so I decided to present a visual for my students this week. I picked up Deb Hanson's Summarizing Fiction Powerpoint and her interactive notebook freebie, to go along with it.

I do not have my students use the words "beginning, middle, end"...... etc...... rather I tell them to think of this in their minds as they recall and write. Their summary should be prepared like an ice cream sundae.

We also looked at various Olympic articles from Newsela and discussed various news sources, such as The Globe and Mail. We also dove into some "non-fiction summaries" of articles and news.

Using this inverted pyramid, the students were able to keep this visual in mind when reviewing their news article more closely.

Another freebie we tried out this week at the end of one of our nutty days was this Geometric Star visual arts activity. A very calming activity to end the day with.

Finally, since moving to the intermediate division this year, my teaching world has significantly changed. There was a big *sigh* this week as I reflected on my past Valentine's Days--- HERE.

The 12 and 13 year olds in my class could care less that it was Valentine's Day, so we embraced the day by writing letter to their parents/guardians. As a pre-teens/teenagers, they love their parents, but often do not tell them. This was the perfect opportunity to show the love.

I hope that you had a great weekend filled with love, laughs and smiles.

Have a great week!

~Kaitlin~