After we finished these neighbourhoods we used them to play a partner game back in class called "I'm Lost!". In this game, one person chooses two places on the map of their partner and asks how to get from here to there. We wrote our questions and answers using pencil and paper and some people recorded their conversations using Fotobabble. Here are some examples:
We'd been working so hard on making group decisions in our class community structure, that it was time to take a rest and just let our own ideas flow. We collaborated with Mr. Gallagher in the IT lab to represent these ideas by making a neighbourhood on Kidspiration. We used our notes from class about which features and places of communities we thought were important to inspire some ideas. After we finished these neighbourhoods we used them to play a partner game back in class called "I'm Lost!". In this game, one person chooses two places on the map of their partner and asks how to get from here to there. We wrote our questions and answers using pencil and paper and some people recorded their conversations using Fotobabble. Here are some examples:
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As we were building our community, some people started to use shape names and vocabulary to describe the pieces and structures they were talking about. This lead us to a discussion about the FORM of 2D and 3D shapes: I then asked the students to spend some time studying the shapes in our community and record some of their observations in answer to the question "What shapes do you notice in our community?". We used the I Used to Think/Now I Think visible thinking routine to record our initial thoughts. We then We knew that Grade 3 had been learning about 3D shapes earlier in the semester, so we also tweeted our friends in 3SS some questions to see if they could teach us anything new. We noticed that they were really knowledgeable about shape names and features...especially complicated ones like hexagonal prisms!! One of our learning centres also asked us to record our ideas about the FORM of 3D shapes. We did this using one of our favourite web tools called "Popplet". We made comparisons to real-world objects and described the features of the shapes using words like 'sides' and 'corners'. We also had an opportunity to record our perspectives on the shapes in our community using the ipad. We photographed the structures and made notes about their shapes and features using the app Skitch. After about an hour in these learning centres we returned to our thinking routine to see if we'd learned anything new. We completed the "Now I think" section of our work page, as also noted some Aha Moments and Seeds of Thought. The next day we shared our learning with our Grade 4 buddies. They were very impressed with how knowledgeable we were! For three weeks now we've been building a community right in the middle of our classroom! We've have made decisions as a group and made additions and changes to the structure as our thinking has evolved. One of our favourite additions was mini versions of ourselves! The community we have now represents our combined thoughts as a class and over time about what places and features are important in a community and how they fit together. We've loved using our community as an inspiration for story writing and maths work. We hope you like it! As you may know, we've developed a good friendship with Mrs. Frazier's class from Ohio over the last month or so over Twitter. This class has been very helpful to us in our learning and we've enjoyed sharing our ideas and inquiries with them as well! One Saturday, Ms. Alison and Mrs. Frazier got to talking (at 12 noon in Singapore and 12 midnight in Ohio!). They knew how many favourite books all of the students have and thought about how great it would be to share some book recommendations. Mrs. Frazier's class got us started with a VoiceThread full of incredible suggestions! Over the past week we have been listening and re-listening to their advice, searching for and reading these books, and responding to them on the Thread. We also made our own VoiceThread for their class with our recommendations. We look forward to them listening to the Thread and leaving us comments about our book suggestions here on the blog! For the last few weeks we've been exploring a new central idea under the transdisciplinary theme "Where we are in place and time": Places in communities help people connect and change over time. Our lines of inquiry are:
As a "Tuning In" or "Invitation" activity we thought about the places we know from our own neighbourhoods in Singapore and our home countries. We made made big lists of as many places as we could think of. We then explored maps, as well as map books and atlases to see if we could gather any other ideas about the different places in communities. Once we were finished, we each had our own individual list of places in communities. But how did our own lists compare to the lists of our friends? Had we listed the same places? Were there some things we had not thought of? Were all of the things we listed actually places in communities?
To answer these questions, we made a HUGE list of all the different things from our own lists. We cut out the different ideas and decided to sort them into categories: public place, private place, a bit of both, or neither. This was a variation on the "Trash or Treasure" thinking routine that we had done before. We used the FORM concept key to unlock our thinking about what private and public places in communities are like. We quickly started to see some patterns. For example, we discovered that public spaces are shared spaces. Everyone can go to them, but sometimes you need to buy a ticket, make a booking, or pay a little bit of money. Sometimes these place are open and sometimes they're closed. As we progressed through the activity, we also started to realize that some of the places we wrote down on our original lists were not actually places at all! Instead, they were ways we get around communities, including taxis, buses, and trains, so we created another sorting category. We all demonstrated very strong thinking skills during our sorting work, as well as an ability to revise our previous thinking. We learned a lot from sharing our ideas and reflecting as a group! The theories and information that developed out of this activity have been very useful to our investigations and inquiries as we continue with the unit. What a fun day we had on Friday at the Elementary School Swim Gala! We felt lucky to be in the water on such a hot Singapore day and were thankful to all the mummies and daddies who came to support us in the heat! Thanks too to Mr. Nathan and Mr. Keef for all of their organization. We loved showing our swimming skills off at all the exciting stations! We're already looking forward to next year! A video of Swim Gala is now available on the ISS Phys Ed website. CLICK HERE to see it. Thanks to Mr. Vic for his great camera skills! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday dear Jack! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to Jack D who turns 7 today! We celebrated Jack's special day by singing "Happy birthday" and digging into some delicious cupcakes. Did we mention they were army-style? Thanks for the special treat! We hope you have a great birthday weekend! Love Grade 1AC We'd been waiting a long time to go on our Forest Adventure field trip. When we were first supposed to go, there was a HUGE thunder storm that kept us at school, so we rescheduled for May 2 and started counting down the days! Our high ropes course adventure was connected to our unit of inquiry about peace and conflict, during which we investigated how we can help each other through personal conflict. To prepare for the trip, we read the books Courage by Bernard Waber and Ish by Peter Reynolds. They both have themes of supporting other people when we don't feel brave or confident. In Ish, Marisol compliments and encourages her brothers art work that he thinks is not very good. The last page of the story Courage says "Courage is what we give to each other". So we discussed: How can we give someone courage?
We put these and other strategies to use to encourage each other to take big risks on the high ropes. Congratulations to everyone in Grade 1AC for supporting their friends through their fears, problem-solving, and decision-making. Well done! |
Grade 1ACWe are a group of Grade 1 students at the ISS International School in Singapore. Our teacher is Ms. Alison. Take a look at how much we're growing and learning! VisitorsWhat's happening in PE?What's happening in Art?What's our Principal up to?What's happening in Literacy?Grade 1 Classes We Follow:Ms. Cassidy's Class (Moose Jaw, Canada)
Mr. David Bullio's Class (Tokyo, Japan) Mrs. Frazier's Class (Ohio, USA) Archives
August 2013
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