Pixel Art

This week, we took up the Math-Art challenge of creating a design with a hundred grid. It relates to Fractions and Decimals and creates a pixelated art piece. Check out a few examples below!

Sending Love: Senior Picnic Baskets

This year, our class has focused on the themes of citizenship and community, and we've learned how we can better support our vulnerable populations. We had many follow-up tasks from SEED School that allowed us to take action based on what we've learned this year, such as by volunteering at the Drop-In Centre's donation centre, making and donating a quilt to Inn From the Cold, and teaching others about dignity and homelessness through our Animations and Photo Exhibit. Unfortunately, these events and experiences couldn't take place due to the cancellation of classes and COVID-19.

But, there was one activity planned that we were able to still do...we could support the Alexandra Centre Society in making picnic baskets for senior citizens who live in our neighbourhood. The whole school joined in for this optional learning task. Students drew pictures, made puzzles, and wrote inspirational cards so that every basket had a little extra love in it. Thank you to everyone who participated!

Representing the Main Idea

Owen

Sophia

This week, we continued our reading of Current News Articles. The article was about animals taking over cities because there are less people and cars on the roads.

Instead of writing a summary about the main idea, we did something a little different. Students represented the story in an artistic way. They were allowed to choose the medium they used.

This goal of this activity was to continue practicing summarizing information. This is in preparation for our Independent Research Project due at the end of May. It connects with objectives in Language Arts, as well as Social Studies.

Here are some student examples. We have such a creative class!

Jasper

Jaxton

Abigail

D

Quilting: How to Stitch your Squares Together

For previous quilting steps, click here.

STEP FOUR: Sew the Squares Together
Using a thread that's the same colour as your fabric, thread your needle.
Choose two squares that you'd like to be side by side. Put them together facing each other so that you're seeing both of the paper squares.
Starting in one corner, poke through the fabric of both squares. Try not to poke through the paper this time.
Use a whipstitch to stitch the two squares together along ONE edge only. If you run out of thread, tie it in a knot a few times, rethread your needle and keep going. When you get the the other corner, tie a knot a few times.
Then open your squares back up to see that you stitched together the edge that you wanted to. I make mistakes all the time and I use my seam ripper to take my stitches out. Ask an adult for help if you do this.
Choose the next two squares to stitch together and follow the instructions again.

Watch the videos to see the steps.

Here is what the finished product should look like:

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).

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."

Mustard Seed School: Day Five

We started Day Five with a presentation by a resident of the Mustard Seed, Les. He told us his life story and how he ended up becoming homeless. He shared with us how his perspective on homelessness has changed and how the Mustard Seed has become his home.

Here is Les’ take-home message:

“Everybody out there is somebody’s son, daughter, mother, father…they are all people. You don’t have to give money to someone on the street. Just say hello, look at them, ask them how their day is.”

We also spent some time on the rooftop patio of the Mustard Seed. We completed a Six Room poetry activity that Ms Kelsey taught us.

At the end of the morning, we walked by the site where a memorial is being built for people who have died sleeping "rough." We learned about people who advocated for that to be built so they would have a place to remember lost loved ones who didn't have a home.

Mustard Seed School: Day Four

On Day Four, Ms Kelsey read us a book called “Malala’s Magic Pencil.” In the book, Malala uses her magic pencil to help solve problems in the world.

We considered which issues we’ve learned about that we care the most about. We will be writing letters to the government to advocate for people who face these issues. Here are some of the issues we brainstormed:

In connection with our animation work, we thought of images that show how people feel invisible. We staged them in tableaux (each of us was the director for one photo). Then, we walked to Stephen Avenue and took the pictures. We will display the photos at the March conferences and our Spring Celebration.

In the afternoon, Ms Kelsey led a budgeting activity. We had to choose how we spent our money on housing, food, transportation, technology, childcare, shopping, and school. We had rockets that we used as money.

“There are only 15 rockets so it’s hard to decide. Most of my money is going towards 3 meals a day, and a 2-bedroom apartment…things that are more important than others.” ~ Isana

“It’s hard…even though it’s not actually real, it makes me think about my choices. The hardest decision was child care and the school.” ~ D

“My hardest decision was transportation and child care. If child care is at one, I’d be really busy. If I did walk, I’d be late for work. If I had a licensed day care that’s high quality, I could leave my kids there when I go to work.” ~ Nikita

We also had a presentation from Erica from Immigrant Services Calgary to hear how Calgary supports our new Canadians.

Mustard Seed School: Day Three

On Day Three, we did a walking tour of downtown Calgary. Here is a mind map of everywhere we went to and what we thought about at each place.

Mind Map from our day

Journalling at the Chinese Cultural Centre

Things we learned:

“Art can be a message to people and can enforce rules, like how the walking people say, ‘You can’t sleep here.’” ~ Jasper

“I learned the word perspective. “ ~ Chloé

“I learned about art made out of feathers at the Chinese Cultural Centre.” ~ Ina

“I learned that at one time in Canada, Chinese people weren’t welcome.” ~ James

“I learned that people can’t sleep in the +15’s.” ~ Owen

“In China, red is a lucky colour. I learned that there was a microphone in the glacier.” ~ Priya

“I learned that the winter garden is private. I learned that there is a lot of hostile architecture. I learned that the forest of trees was a cross-stitching pattern.” ~ Nikita

“I learned that water can look frozen but still be able to move.” ~ Abigail

“I learned that everyone is allowed to go in the Devonian Garden.” ~ Isla

“Homeless people can’t sleep where there’s hostile architecture.” ~ Gaby

“I learned how to make a signing bowl work. You put pressure and have perfect timing.” ~ Silas

Connections we made:

“The Winter Garden and Devonian Garden both have living walls.” ~ Jorja

“The Winter Garden and Devonian Gardens connect because they are both gardens that have water and are peaceful.” ~ D

I felt calm in both the Chinese Cultural Centre and the Winter Garden because they were both quiet.” ~ Ina

“The Winter garden was smaller and less public than the Devonian garden.” ~ Desiree