mrsbarker.ca - Millgrove 2B

Dance Performance

6/23/2019

The grade 1-4 students at Millgrove were very fortunate to work with Asha from Sound Kreations this past week on a dance performance! Pairs of classes worked on unique dance routines, and we had our big dance performance on Friday where students got to show off all that they had learned with Asha. The students were inspired to push themselves far as dancers this week, and their performances were spectacular!

Invertebrate Guests

6/23/2019

Our class has been excited to host a variety of invertebrate guests in our classroom recently, which have included hornworms, superworms, crickets, silkworms, and earthworms! It's been very informative to observe their diet and behaviour up close, and to get a sense of their normal daily activity. Feeding them, observing them, and drawing them has been a favourite activity in 2B this month!

Math Fair in 4C

6/22/2019

We got to visit the expert mathematicians in 4C this week who helped us explore a variety of math concepts as we rotated through their presentations and activities. The grade four students had prepared lessons, games, and online suggestions for our class to work on curricular math concepts, and we had a blast learning about math from them!

Science Professor Guest

6/11/2019

Today we were very lucky to be part of a presentation from a science professor who visited our school! Our class learned tons about hot and cold temperatures, magnetism, states of matter, and a variety of other science topics from him, and he showcased the fun and excitement of science. There were plenty of explosions, and the students were amazed by the scientific principles he was teaching us about. Our professor guest certainly made the case for why we should keep working hard to develop as scientific thinkers!

Frisbee in PE

6/8/2019

In PE this week, we followed up our track meet by using a frisbee to throw like a discus, and also learned how to pass and catch a frisbee and play frisbee golf. The students were especially impressive with their distance of frisbee throws!

Botanic Garden Visit

6/7/2019

We had a wonderful visit to the University of Alberta Botanic Garden this week! Thanks to our gracious parent volunteers, we got to learn all about invertebrate animals that live in Alberta, explore an aquatic habitat, and see so many interesting plants that invertebrates (and humans) consume. Our guide Colson was an impressive expert, and took us a long way in our unit on Small Crawling and Flying Animals!

Science-Inspired Art

6/1/2019

This week the students drew invertebrate animals that they then painted with watercolour and tempera paints. We had learned about iridescent insects from a book and used that learning to paint our invertebrates with bright, eye-catching colours. You can even watch below to see some art made by invertebrate animals and check out some more science-inspired art here, here, and here!

The Great Canadian Career Fair

5/30/2019

The students' Canadian Career Fair was a great success! They've put so much thought and effort into their businesses, and it was neat to see that work pay off as they pitched their companies to prospective employees from 2W and 2S. There were many big hires made, and it was great to see 2B share their learning and creativity with their peers. You can watch the video below to get a sense of our exciting morning!

Tenebrio molitor (Mealworms!)

5/29/2019

Our class has welcomed some new guests over the past week as we started our science unit on invertebrate animals (small crawling and flying animals). We’ve found it interesting to learn about the diversity of invertebrate animals, and the students are quite fond of their mealworms that now reside in the classroom. We’ve observed a few changes in the mealworms so far, and suspect that they may be undergoing some sort of metamorphosis…

Here are our learner outcomes for this unit on small crawling and flying animals:

Recognize that there are many different kinds of small crawling and flying animals, and identify a range of examples that are found locally.
Compare and contrast small animals that are found in the local environment. These animals should include at least three invertebrates - that is, animals such as insects, spiders, centipedes, slugs, worms, ants.
Recognize that small animals, like humans, have homes where they meet their basic needs of air, food, water, shelter and space; and describe any special characteristics that help the animal survive in its home.
Identify each animal's role within the food chain. To meet this expectation, students should be able to identify the animals as plant eaters, animal eaters or decomposers and identify other animals that may use them as a food source.
Describe the relationships of these animals to other living and nonliving things in their habitat, and to people.
Identify and give examples of ways that small animals avoid predators, including camouflage, taking cover in burrows, use of keen senses and flight.
Describe conditions for the care of a small animal, and demonstrate responsible care in maintaining the animal for a few days or weeks.
Identify ways in which animals are considered helpful or harmful to humans and to the environment.

Track Meet

5/28/2019

Millgrove’s second annual track meet was a great success today as students got to try out all sorts of track and field events and enjoy a beautiful morning outside. We tried out long distance running, hurdles, three-legged races, and all sorts of other challenges. Our class has been working on various track and field skills in the past couple of weeks, so it was great for students to make use of their growing PE abilities. 2B also watched some of the track and field footage the last summer Olympics in Rio, which they found very exciting!