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Today my Grade 10 Essential Math class was introduced to their unit project to conclude their unit on Measurement Systems . If you can remember back to my previous posts, they created board games as their unit project in their last unit on Personal Finance .   Here is what they were tasked with today:   - Time For A Change - The United States is the only leading nation not using the metric system, despite doing business with metric countries thousands of times a day. Your mission is to create a persuasive Public Service Announcement (P.S.A) designed to convince the United States to convert to the metric system.   Your P.S.A can be in the form of a(n):                       - Recorded Podcast                    - Filmed or Performed Commercial      ...

     I only see my Grade 9 math class 3 days a week... Now, I will note that although this is a high-school class, it is not broken into semesters and I will see them all year long. The problem, however, is that these 3 days are back-to-back Monday to Wednesday. This means that my students do not have math for almost 5 full days with the way our class times are laid out.      Furthermore, our school functions on a 5-day cycle which means that anytime there is a holiday on a Monday, I only see my students 2 days a week. To put this in perspective, we have a potential of 38 school days in the months of September  & October. If there was no holidays, extra-curriculars, etc, we would potentially have 24 math class. The way our holiday & extra-curricular schedule has worked out, however, we will only have 19 classes (3 of these have less than 1/2 the students in attendance due to other extra-curriculars).    ...

After a 9 day hiatus I am finally back in the blogging world. Trust me, it is not for a lack of writing topics... the opposite actually. Since I last posted my life has been a whirlwind of activities:   - In-school meetings - Supervising student council dances - Driving 3 hours to watch our football team play their first play-off game - Driving an additional 3 hours to attend a PD session .... .... .... Oh ya... all of those were on the same day actually (but trust me, the remaining days were just as busy. On top of that, our home internet went on the fritz!   Any-who, things are somewhat back to normal now. Be prepared for a post overload :)

 This weeks started our back-to-back short weeks as Monday of this week was Thanksgiving and this upcoming Friday is our provincial professional development day, S.A.G.E. This week seemed to go by very quickly even though I didn't actually teach that much. Most of my classes are nearing the end of their units and I had 2 classes write their unit tests on Friday. Two things that I think went really well this week are: 1 ) Introducing Formal Lab Reports in Science - We have been working with the Scientific Method since the beginning of'   the school year and we have practiced a few different methods of   "Communicating our Results". We've had sharing circles, made posters,   completed blog posts, and made presentations in class. This week,   however, I wanted to introduce formal written lab reports with my students. - On Wednesday we completed a very simple diffusion experiment as a large   group. I purposefully chose a simple experiment s...

      One of our school goals is to build in classroom spirit activities/routines for our students as a way to help foster school spirit and classroom community. One activity that I came up with for our class is #FunShirtFriday that I've seen on Twitter.      Every Friday, I encourage my students to wear a "fun shirt" to school. Over the summer I found a lot of funny and interesting shirts online related to math, science, art, and teaching in general so I was pretty excited to share these with my students.      To take this spirit activity one step further, we have begun charting our class #FunShirtFriday participation using a bar graph. Our final math unit of the year is Statistics & Probability so I plan on creating a project out of the data that we'll collect throughout the year! _________________________________________________        Today both my Grade 8 and Grade 10 math classes had...

We're at that point where the majority of my classes are finishing up their first units and preparing to move on. As such, I wanted to share some of my favourite projects and activities from some of my classes. Grade 8 Art Our first project in Art this year was a Famous Artist Research Mobile. Students picked an artist of their choice, created  mobile using their pieces of art, and included artist bio's and references on the back. These are now laminated and permanent fixtures in my room!         Grade 8 Science In Science we explored cells and systems and did an interesting comparison between the Cell Theory and the Aboriginal Medicine Wheel. While the Cell Theory breaks down life into microscopic calls, the Medicine Wheel breaks down life into four central components. We created two illustrations to compare these two perspectives.     Grade 10 Math My Grade 10s have been working on board games as their unit project for Personal Finance. The...

     Lunch hour... in any other profession I've been involved in this meant that I left the premises (or at least moved to a cafeteria/staff room), ran personal errands up town, went to the gym, relaxed and enjoyed my food, etc.      Lunch hour... in the teaching profession, however, is a somewhat less-structured continuation of the rest of your day. As soon as that 12:00pm bell rings you are: - Supervising extra-curricular activities - Providing extra support for students who need to catch up - Meeting with colleagues or admin - Holding meetings with students - Making phone calls home - Photo-copying - Preparing for your afternoon's class      This list goes on... and on... and ON... before you even factor going to the bathroom...  not to mention actually eating anything that resembles a full lunch.      Now don't get me wrong, I absolutely love my job and this is the first time in my life where I...

     Holy moly, has it really been 3 weeks since I had a Resources To Start Off Your Week post?!? It seems like it has been forever. I have been posting, I just have been posting other awesome things on Mondays... Anyways, today is Thanksgiving and I was reminded of how thankful I am for all of the amazing people who are willing to share their ideas and experiences online. To honour this, I wanted to make sure that I shared some resources with you! As always, I will be adding these to my lists of resources under the Fav Websites heading. 1 ) U of A: Aboriginal Science Education Resources - This page features a lot of awesome resources for teachers who are   interested in incorporating Aboriginal perspective into their science   classes. - By clicking on the Aboriginal Lesson Resources , users can search   through resources specifically designed for high school biology or   elementary classes. Even if you are not teaching in one of these specifi...

     Twas' the week before the long weekend... That's right, it is Thanksgiving this weekend! Not only that, but it is also our community's big rodeo event and our school's Spirit Week. All together, this resulted in our student's having that "Friday afternoon" mentality ALL week long! It was a bit of a nut house, but we all made it through unscathed. Two things that went really well this week are: 1 ) Having My First Evaluation! - On Monday I had my very first evaluation as a first year teacher.   I was asked to submit a list of possible dates that fit my schedule   and my principal decided to evaluate me on Monday morning   during our Grade 8 math class. - I was nervous in the sense that I wanted to do well, but wasn't   worried about how the actual class would go. We spent the first   half of our class doing a student lead review of fractions &   integers and finished with a discussion on rational numbers. - I was given some verba...

This week our Student Council organized a Spirit Week leading up to the long weekend. Here are some pics from  the week:    Backwards Day & "Pie The Teacher" Fundraiser, I couldn't think of  better shirt to wear to this event!   I got off pretty safe in the pie-throwing event!  Twin Day! Thing 1 & Thing 2 Movie Character Day: Katniss Everdeen from the Hunger Games

          I am participating in the wonderful #MTBoS World this fall as a way to learn  more about teaching and assessing math as well as to connect with math educators and grow my PLN. As a new math teacher (teaching Grades 8, 9, & 10 math) I am interested in learning as much as I can and am so thankful to all of the wonderful educators who are willing to share their experiences online!      First off, if you haven't heard about #MTBoS (or the MathTwitterBlogosphere), it is an 8-week series of missions designed to connect dedicated math teachers who are willing and interested in sharing their tips, tricks, and experiences. Sounds awesome right?! You should definitely head over to their Wordpress site and learn more about it! Mission #1: The Power of the Blog What is one of your favorite open-ended/rich problems?  How do you use it in your classroom? (If you have a problem you h...

     September is behind us and here is my first 2 Stars & A Wish post of October. Teachers always say that the year goes by so quickly and I definitely understand that now! It honestly seems like yesterday was the first day of school and it is almost already Thanksgiving. Two things that went well this week are:   1 ) Reinforcing our Risk Free Environment Policy - I do not have a formal list of rules in my classroom, but I do   have a Risk Free Environment Policy that reads as follows:   "Our classroom does not discriminate on the basis of disability,   gender, race, religion, sexual orientation or any other means.   It is of the utmost important that every action we undertake]   demonstrates respect for those around us. If at any time a   situation occurs that does not illustrate this practice please bring   it to my attention. I strongly believe that we are all part of a team   within this ...

     One of our school goals is to build in classroom spirit activities/routines for our students as a way to help foster school spirit and classroom community. One activity that I came up with for our class is #FunShirtFriday that I've seen on Twitter.      Every Friday, I encourage my students to wear a "fun shirt" to school. Over the summer I found a lot of funny and interesting shirts online related to math, science, art, and teaching in general so I was pretty excited to share these with my students.      To take this spirit activity one step further, we have begun charting our class #FunShirtFriday participation using a bar graph. Our final math unit of the year is Statistics & Probability so I plan on creating a project out of the data that we'll collect throughout the year! _________________________________________________         My Grade 8 class decided to begin featuring a weekly ma...

     I am writing this post from my brand new Microsoft Surface tablet that I got from my husband for my birthday! I've really wanted a tablet for quite some time because I am always online doing something for school or for the blog but couldn't decide what brand I wanted. I have an iPhone and really like the way it functions... but I haven't had awesome experiences with the iPads we have at school. While I'm a fan of awesome apps (who isn't), I spend 95% of my online time on my blog, reading other blogs, researching for school, or on social media. It is also important to note that I've always had a PC and our school is all PC as well. Point being, if I was going to invest in a tablet, I wanted it to meet my needs (not just be a shiny toy that still required me to go to my computer).      After using my Surface for the week: - I LOVE the snap-on keyboard and built-in screen stand - I love the available USB port as my school has inconsistent inter...

     My Grade 8 Science class has been learning all about Cells & Body Systems (you can check out their blog here ) and lately we've been discussing the difference between Plant Cells & Animal Cells . After working with the appropriate vocabulary and completing labeled illustrations, we decided to create 3D models of the different types of cells... using edible materials!!      As a class my students brainstormed an ingredient list , set a budget, and put themselves into groups of 4. We even went shopping for the ingredients as a class during our math period! Today was the physical creation of the cells and I can say that they turned out pretty darn good... and delicious! Students were required to create a model that showcased a cell with: - Cell Membrane - Cytoplasm - Nucleus - Mitochondria - Vacuole - Endoplasmic Reticulum - Cell Wall (for plant cells) - Chloroplasts (for plant cells) I also asked that each group submit a written...

           If you haven't encountered a " Currently " post before, it is just a fun post at the beginning of each month that serves as a way to share what is  Currently  going on in your life! You can link up and share your own " Currently " post by visiting the wonderful  Farley  over at  Oh' Boy 4th Grade .         It is finally my favourite month of the year... October !! I LOVE October! October means that fall is officially here, the leaves are changing, my birthday is in October, Thanksgiving is in only 12 days, Halloween arrives, hunting season is upon us, football is in full swing, my husband starts hockey in a few weeks... well you get the idea. Needless to say, I will be loving every day of this awesome month!