Quilting: How to Baste

Here are the steps for completing your quilting squares at home. If you didn't come into the school to pick yours up, you can make a new one with any scrap fabric you have around the house. :)

STEP ONE: Measuring your Squares
Measure accurately so that the quilt pieces will fit together. 
You need four small squares and one large square.
The small squares need to be 6.3 cm on each side.
The big square needs to be 12.7cm on each side.


STEP TWO: Cutting the Fabric
Choose five pieces of fabric that are the same colour palette (monochromatic). The patterns can be different.
Cut out fabric so that is a bit bigger than your paper so you can fold it over on each side (approximately 1 cm extra on each side). This measurement does not need to be completely accurate.


STEP THREE: Basting the Fabric to the Squares
Thread the needle and sew the fabric to the paper. This is called basting. 
Make sure the side of the fabric you want to see is facing out. Whatever side is touching the paper, you won't see.
Watch the video to know how to baste.
(I had to decrease the quality to low to be able to upload the video so I hope that you're able to see it!)
For basting, we usually use a different coloured thread than the fabric so that it stands out easily. We will be taking these threads out later.

Check back soon for a video on how to hand stitch the squares together!

Re-Designing a Social Agency Logo

Here are the current logos for 4 Calgary agencies.

Last week, we took a closer look at the Social Agencies we have learned about this year and their logos. We discussed which logos reflect the organization and the population they serve. We also looked at the symbolism used in the logos. Overall, the class favourite was the "Inn From the Cold" logo because you can see in their logo that families use the space as a shelter. Our least favourite was the Drop-In Centre because you can't learn anything about the DI from their logo.

We then got to choose one of the four organizations to design a logo for. We used graph paper so that we could easily make our logos symmetrical, as well as use polygons in our design. Then, we counted the total area of our logos, so there was lots of Math used in the making of these!

We also coloured ours and described how our designs and colours used represented the social agency. We'll share this work with you at our next Student Learning Conferences (date to be announced).

Multiplication Quiz Wednesday

This is a reminder that students have a quiz on Wednesday, March 18.

They will be expected to:
- Represent Multiplication equations using arrays, pictures of groups, and Base Ten blocks
- Solve equations up to 9 x 9
- Solve 2 or 3-digit by 1-digit equations showing their thinking (ex: 231 x 6) see picture example of the Algorithm
- (Grade 5's Only): Solve 2-digit by 2-digit equations showing their thinking (ex: 24 x 63)

For a review of the different strategies we've used, click here.

To practice, students are encouraged to complete activities on Mathletics under the "Multiplying" heading.

Guess My Number

We had fun today playing "Guess My Number" in Ms Elder's Multiplication group.
We used Yes/No questions to figure out the number on our back. Here were some questions we brainstormed:

Six Room Poetry Art

When we were at the Mustard Seed, Ms Kelsey led a Six Room Poetry activity on the rooftop patio (click here to see pictures of us there).

"I like Six Room Poetry because it's calm and peaceful. You get to listen to the sounds of nature, even if there are cars. I really like listening to the birds and being on the rooftop." ~ Desiree
"What I liked was painting my background to connect with my poem." ~ Sophia
"I liked how it was really quiet and I could concentrate really well. When the geese came, it was not quiet!" ~ Priya
"I thought that it was calming until I heard a really loud siren." ~ Charlotte
"It was very hard to concentrate on our Six Room Poetry work because there were so many loud noises like geese and a bunch of cars." ~ Owen
"I think we are doing this project to learn descriptive words." ~ Jaxton
"We used our five senses in our Six Room Poetry because we had to see, and hear." ~ Owen

Quilting

Last week, Ms Elder read us the book, The Quilt-Maker's Gift. Most people thought it was an agreeable idea to make a quilt as a class. We would like to make our own quilt to give away to someone in need, just like the woman in the book. "Some people want something but they don't need it."

This week, we're making the quilt!

First, we had to measure the paper to make squares. We need to measure accurately so that it will fit together to make a quilt, like a puzzle. We measured each square side as 6.3 cm to make a big square that's 12.7cm long and wide.

After we measured the paper, we cut out fabric that is a bit bigger than your paper so you can fold it over. We had to pick fabric of only one colour (monochromatic). You could choose five different fabrics of one colour.  We agreed to make the quilt colourful so in the end, it will be a rainbow.

Then, Ms Elder taught us how thread the needle and sew the fabric to the paper. This is called basting. Later this week, we will finish basting and hand stitch the pieces together.

"We are measuring our squares."

"We had to be really careful. If we messed up, it wouldn't fit in the quilt."

"Some of us are choosing the pieces of fabric for our quilt." 

"We are practicing basting."

"This is Ms Elder's demo. This is what the finished squares will look like."

Letter Writing to the Government

After all of the learning we've done this year on homelessness, we felt we needed to take action to help others. We wanted our voices to be heard so we wrote letters to the government to advocate for people experiencing homelessness.

See our post from Mustard Seed School about this (click here).

Listen to the news article we watched about the budget cuts announced last week to Affordable Housing maintenance (click here).

Here is the letter we wrote as a class about Affordable Housing. We each wrote our own letters in partners about an issue of our choice (affordable housing, pet-friendly shelters, public bathrooms, affordable clothes and food, or tiny homes).

We are mailing our letters to the municipal government (our Mayor Nenshi). Our class letter is going to the provincial government (Premier Kenney) because it was provincial budget cuts.

Dear Premier Kenney,

We are Ms Elder’s Grade 4/5 class in Ramsay School, Calgary. We are learning about homelessness this year. We know that homelessness is very complicated and there are many ways that people become homeless. We participated in a week-long program at Mustard Seed School, and we had presentations from the Drop-In Centre, Alexandra Centre Society, and the Calgary Immigration Society. We know that everyone has their own story. We want to help people experiencing homelessness in Calgary.

We are mad that you are cutting $53 000 000 to affordable housing. We know that giving people homes is actually cheaper than having them live on the street. When people are homeless, we spend more money on hospitals, police, prisons, and homeless shelters. People who are living in an unsafe environment might be scared to move out and become homeless so they may stay where they shouldn’t. After people leave our affordable housing units, there needs to be money to repair them so someone else can move in. We want to solve the problem of homelessness, and by taking money away, it will only make it worse.

We find that your choices with our province’s money, is just making the problem of homelessness worse. Finland solved their homeless problem by putting homeless people into homes, so why can’t we try too? They did the math and realized it costs less money than having people be homeless. For example, studies indicate in Alberta, we would SAVE $34 000 per person!

Please consider our ideas. Never give up. The future depends on you.

Remember, as the Lorax speaks for the trees, we speak for the people experiencing homelessness.

Sincerely,

Ms Elder’s Grade 4/5 Class

Conference Booking

This is a reminder that the conference booking system opens at 8:00 am tomorrow morning.

Please book online. Here is the Parent Conference Guide if you have any trouble: https://portal.cbe.ab.ca/staffinsite/Forms%20%20Manuals/School-Conferences-Parent-Guide.pdf

If you need extra assistance, contact Ms Calhoun in the office.

Optional Writing Contest

Here are the details for a Kids Writing Contest if you are interested in entering at home.
We unfortunately are busy working on other things in class right now so we won't be entering at school.


Calling All Kids Who Love to Write
 
Know any budding young authors who dream of seeing their winning story published for the whole world to read? We know the next great Canadian youth author is out there – in your classroom or your neighbourhood. Please share this information about this fabulous opportunity with your students in grades 4-8.
 
The winning story will be published in both print and digital format. Net proceeds from any book sales are donated to the winners’ choice of charities and the winner will be part of the judging panel for the following year’s contest.
 
Who: students in grades 4-8
Submission deadline is March 31, 2020. 
 
More about the contest, including submission guidelines and regulations, can be found online at https://www.ripplefoundation.ca
Meet our Judging Panel at https://www.ripplefoundation.ca/kids-write-4-kids/published-winning-books/
 
Entries must be submitted on-line by the student’s teacher, parent or guardian. 
Previous winning titles can be found online at https://www.ripplefoundation.ca/kids-write-4-kids/published-winning-books/

Long Multiplication Strategies

We are learning strategies to solve larger multiplication problems. Here are three strategies we learned yesterday:

Base Ten Blocks

We can use Base Ten blocks to show numbers. We can multiply by the ones place, then the tens place, and so on.

Breaking it Down

For this strategy, you break the number down into the ones, tens, and hundreds place (and so on) and multiply by each. This works well if you're multiplying a one-digit number by a multi-digit number. It can be tough to keep track of the multiplying if you're equation is a 2-digit by 2-digit problem.

The Box

Draw a box. If you're multiplying a 2-digit by 1-digit number (ex: 28 x 7), you would draw a box with two rows and one column. Then, you would multiply each box (ex: 20 x 7, then 8 x 7). Then, you need to add up the numbers in each box.

We are learning these different strategies to show our understanding of Place Value. It shows our steps really well. (This is called "conceptual understanding"). After we have explored different strategies, we get to use the one we like the best.