Ways to Show Subtraction Knowledge

Some how we learned, practiced, and modified our subtraction stations but never actually shared what we were doing with you.  In addition after the first week and on suggestion by Roc, Ms. Lirenman stopped telling us which stations we had to go to, and let us decide how we wanted to show her what we knew about subtraction.  Most of us really liked this choice because it allowed us to be in complete control of our learning. You can see in this movie we are all doing our own thing, working at our own level, learning subtraction.

Just so you aren't confused there are 21 students in our class.  You can't see everyone in the video above because some of use are using the iPad app Educreations to draw and talk about our subtraction math. We often record our talking  in the hallway outside of our classroom because it's usually quieter. (Although there is a kindergarten class right across the hall from us so you can often hear their voices in our recordings).

Now to be honest, with all this choice we must admit that some of us do have trouble getting down to work.  Thankfully Ms. Lirenman is always there to redirect or support us when we need it. We are in grade one after all.

Also in case you're wondering, if we came up with a different way to show Ms. Lirenman what we knew about subtraction we could use that way too.  As someone only five or six it was great to have this responsibility.  It makes learning meaningful to us, and a lot of fun.

Gingerbread Man Santa and Gingerbread Man Candy Are at Our School!

On Thursday morning, just after we finished our skype call with Mrs. Fisher's class two students from Mrs. Morrison's class came into our room with two very special friends.  GBM Santa and GBM Candy were in our school!  We have no idea how they got here but we are so happy to know that they are safe. You can read about how they were discovered over on Mrs. Morrison's class blog.  Here's their post on them.

We were so glad to know where they were.  On Monday and Tuesday we knew they were safe in Mrs. Fadum's class but on Wednesday we had no idea where they were. Thankfully they showed up before our google hangout.

This week Mrs. Morrison shared a version of the Gingerbread Man story.  She read it to all three grade one classes at Bonaccord, plus Mrs. Sarchet, Mrs. Leech, and some students with Mr. Chila.  Mrs. Fadum's class couldn't join in but we know they really wanted to.  Here are a few photos from our google hangout. As you can see we had a very full classroom.

Mrs. Morrison did a lovely job reading the story and we promised the kids at Sullivan Elementary that we would take better care of Gingerbread Candy and Gingerbread Santa than Mrs. Fadum's class.

In the afternoon we got to take care of them.  We brought them outside for Run Across Canada with us.

At the end of the school day we weren't sure what we were going to do with them.  We decided to lock them in the iPad cart for the weekend, making sure they had food of course.  We thought the iPad cart would be great because it locks, yet it has holes for breathing. We also spoke nicely to Candy and Santa Gingerbread and they told us that they would NOT run away  So now we have to hope that they were telling us the truth.

Here's what they look like in the iPad card.

Not a bad place to spend the weekend.

Here's the door that they are locked behind!  We sure hope they don't escape!

Math Placemat

On Friday during math time, Ms. Lirenman encouraged us all to use our  math placemats to show what we know about addition and subtraction. We each were encourage to create two addition and two subtraction questions using pictures, and numbers.  Then some of us took photos of our work.  Some of us uploaded those photos onto our individual blogs.  Some of us went a step further by uploading those pictures into the iPad app Draw and Tell so that we could talk about what we did. We then uploaded our videos onto our blogs for the world to see.

Here are a couple of screen shots from our individual blogs. You should really go check the rest of them out.

Skyping with Mrs. Fisher's Class

On Friday we finally met Mrs. Fisher's grade two class from Flin Flon, Manitoba.  In case you're wondering who they are this is the class that we made the voice thread for our Charlotte's Web Global Read aloud.  You can find the blog about it here.

We learned many interesting things about their class. We found out that they have SNOW and that once a week they get to slide down the hill on their school grounds. We learned that most of the go home for lunch and that while their lunch time is much longer than ours (over twice as long) they stay at school a lot longer than we do too.

As always it's great to learn from different people around the world.  It was also nice to finally meet some people from Manitoba.

Here are some photos from our skype Friday morning.

Hanukkah

Because Ms. Lirenman celebrates Hanukkah instead of Christmas (or any of the other holidays that many of us celebrate) she decided to teach us a little bit about Hanukkah.  We learned about the fact that Hanukkah lasts for 8 days, and that each night candles are lit.  We learned that it is to remember a time when a temple was destroyed and oil was found. The oil was suppose to burn for only one night but it burned for eight nights instead.

In addition she taught us how to play the dreidel game, and she even brought in dreidels for us to play with.  Some of us taught our big buddies how to play.

Finally we made Menorahs for our classroom window because we learned that Jewish people put their lit Menorah's in their windows.

Oh and of course we've shared a few great stories about Hanukkah.  Hanukkah starts this weekend and Ms. Lirenman tells use that she will light the menorah during school so we can see what it looks like.

Here are some pictures to enjoy.

 The letters on the dreidel, and what you need to do if your dreidel lands on one of these letters.

Playing the dreidel game.

Making Menorahs.

Private Recess

 These pictures are here to show you how much we LOVED having our own private recess on Tuesday.  I think Ms. Lirenman really liked to too because she got to see how we interact with one another outside of the classroom environment.  She was very impressed to see how well we play together and include everyone.

Skyping with Mrs. Harrison's Class - Sharing Our We Can See School Yard Videos

This morning we tried to Skype with Mrs. Harrison's kindergarten class in Ontario.  Before the Skype call we watched their We Can See video of their school yard.  We were curious about many different things.  After recess we were ready to Skype them but... unfortunately that didn't work.  We know that sometimes technology doesn't work as it should.  But we didn't give up.  We left our computer on with our Skype open and started to blog about what happened. But then Mrs. Harrison's class was able to get a hold of us and we did Skype.  It was great to learn with her class.

Here are some of the things we wrote about on our individual blogs.  You should go check the rest of them out too.