Monthly Archives: November 2015

Diorama Mania!

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Today was a whirlwind of a day!  This was Diorama Day in room 102!

The project started last week as we explored the work of various diorama artists. Lyn Moreno and Shannon are 2 artists who use cut paper to create their dioramas. Artist from Iraq,  Alamedy Diorama creates fantastic highly realistic miniature worlds using only recycled materials.

Then we drew some basic plans of the dioramas we wanted to create.  Then, today was the big day of creation.  We were artists, engineers, mathematicians, and art gallery curators as we worked through the process of turning plans and dreams into reality and then showcasing our work for other classes. 

Here are the masterpieces!

 

Minute To Build!

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Students were given a bin of materials and one minute to build a tower as high as possible.  Everyone had a chance to be a builder and a recorder. I then collected everyone’s data so that we could talk about our results together.

First Data Collection

Then we played again and I recorded the data in a different way.

second data collection

Students:  

  1. Which data collection method is more effective? Explain.
  2. Look at the data in the second picture.  Tell three things about our towers.

 

 

Planning

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An important part of the writing process is planning.  After our first attempts at writing a procedure we realized just how important a plan is.  Now we are all working on writing our own procedures.  All of us are experts at something! Here’s the plan we wrote together as a class.

 

Writing with Technology

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Our class is learning a lot about the tools that can be found within Google Drive.  Today we learned about Google Slides. We used the program to complete a shared writing task. Students worked in small groups to complete one step of a procedural writing task, “How to create a Remembrance Poster”. Each group was responsible for completing a slide with a picture and text to describe a specific step in the procedure. Students first needed to put the pictures in order. Then, they had to manipulate the photo. Next, they needed to decide on an appropriate transition word and details to be written. Students were reminded of what happened to the alien when specific details were not written!

We wrote a lot of good things and managed to all work on the document at the same time without too many technical problems. When we viewed the slideshow we agreed that there is room for improvement and we set our goals! Just watch how our skills grow throughout the writing unit!

 

Aliens and Teeth

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Have you ever tried to get an alien to brush her teeth?  Well, the students in room 102 tried…..unsuccessfully!  Students first wrote a procedure with instructions for the alien, who had never heard of toothbrushes before, to follow.  There were lots of giggles as the “alien” tried to brush her teeth, strictly following the directions given to her.

Well, students learned from the experience and wanted to revise their procedures. Hooray to an amazing class who asked to revise their writing!!

The “alien” had another go at following the revised writing – still unsuccessful!

Thanks to Tyson who shared his first and second drafts.  We were able to pick out a lot of characteristics of a procedure. We all agree that he did improve his writing and will continue to do so throughout the procedural writing unit.

 

Ideas About Remembrance Day

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This week we are creating posters with the theme of Remembrance Day. The purpose of these posters is to get people thinking about Remembrance Day. To help us with generating ideas we watched the video below created by a student.

Then we talked about what the message in the video is and brainstormed a list of words and symbols for Remembrance Day.

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