Independent Research Projects

The Penny

Throughout the month of May, students had the opportunity to learn more about a topic of their choice. Our Independent Research projects spanned from cats to Martin Luther King, and from diseases to Star Wars. The engagement seen in our Online Learning sessions and through the work sent in was exciting.

This project scaffolded and reinforced many learning outcomes in Language Arts and Social Studies. We practiced our note-taking and paraphrasing skills, learned about online searches and safety, explored ways to organize our information, and took down the sources we used. Google Docs ended up being a great tool for searching, organizing, and sharing information. Students created detailed research questions at the start of the project to guide them through their research and were successful in the end. It was truly a pleasure to read and listen to each child's project and presentation.

Cats

Students were asked to represent their learning in a creative way through an artifact. Here are a few examples that were easy to share. This is a project that deserves celebrating!

White Horses

Plague Doctors

Evergreen Trees

COVID-19

Pandas

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

Virtue Stories

This year, we learned about the 7 Virtues of Moral Intelligence. We each read a storybook and connected it to one of the virtues. (Click here for the assignment details).

Here are the stories we chose and the virtues they connected with, in case you'd like to re-read one you heard. :)

Summary Writing

For the next few weeks, our class will be working on writing summaries. This is in preparation of an Independent Research Project that will be introduced at the end of April.

Key skills we are working on with these summaries include:
- Finding the "main idea"
- Paraphrasing information in our own words
- Making personal connections with the text

Here are the two articles we read and summarized last week, with some student samples attached.

Turkey Chased by Police!

For the original article, click here.

The main message in this article was there's no need to call 911 because of a turkey. It's important because then the police are wasting their time when they could actually be helping other people. This article makes me feel happy and worried. It made me feel happy because it was kinda silly how people would call 911 over a turkey. I felt worried because if Turk does it again but people don't see him he could get lost. ~ Isla

The main message in this article was that too many people were calling 9-1-1 about the turkey. People must call 9-1-1 only in emergencies. This article makes me feel happy because the Turk is in a safe place which is Ramsay. ~ Nikita

Calgary Cheers!

For the original article, click here.

The main message in this article is that people are cheering on their balconies and porches to support frontline workers! It is important because it's nice to support people that help us. This article makes me feel happy because so many people show appreciation for all the frontline workers! It also makes me feel thankful because people are willing to take the risk to protect us! ~ Priya

The main message was that people are banging pots and pans to say thank you to health care workers. This is important because people are notifying the health care workers to say thank for fighting covid 19 and taking in sick patients with covid 19. This article makes me feel happy and good inside because people are supporting the doctors and our doctors are trying their hardest to fight against covid 19. ~ Jaxton

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

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

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/

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

Mustard Seed School: Day Two

Acting out, The Rabbit Listened

 

On Day Two, we learned about the word: consensus. We used it during the Lemon Activity.

For the Lemon Activity, Ms Kelsey asked us to learn the story of our lemon. That was a weird thing for her to ask us to do. As a small group, we imagined the life story of our lemon, what its name was, and how it was feeling. Then, we shared with the class.

After we shared, Ms Kelsey collected our lemons and mixed them up. She asked us to come up as a small group and find “our” lemon. We had to use consensus to make sure everyone in the group agreed that it was our lemon. At the end, we discussed.

Why was it so easy to find your lemon?

“Because every one has a different shape. Our lemon had a weird lump.” ~ Jaxton

“Our group’s lemon had a little face.” ~ Charlotte

“Our lemon had a tattoo, like the others, and a green tip and a brown dot which made it special.” ~ Desiree

“It’s because lemons are all the same (sour, flavourful) but they look different.” ~ Priya

We thought that all lemons were the same but then we learned that they are each unique and special.

How does that connect to our work at the Mustard Seed?

“Everyone has a story to tell and a gift to give.” ~ Nikita

“When you meet a person, you might think that all homeless people are the same but if you meet them, you’d realize they’re completely different.” ~ Ina

“Everyone is different because everyone has a different story.” ~ Owen

“Once you see a person, you think all homeless people are the same but once you learn their story, you see that they’re different.” ~ Gaby

“We need to be kind to everybody.” ~ James

We discussed stereotypes and how harmful they can be. They can make an entire group of people feel unwelcome or unsafe.

In the afternoon, we had a presentation from Jenny from Help Seeker.

She told us that the word community means strength together.

Then, we imagined what it would be like to be different people (like a senior citizen, someone sleeping rough, etc.). We discussed the challenges that person would face. For example, a senior citizen might need help in the areas of health care, disabilities, financial aid, transportation, or recreation.

Help Seeker is a website and app that helps people find the information they need to get help in different areas.

Then, Ms Kelsey showed us a stairwell full of art in the Mustard Seed. It was created after the creator of the Mustard Seed, Pat, saw people spray-painting grafitti on the walls outside the SEED. Pat invited the guys inside to instead create a beautiful stairwell full of art. We spent some time journalling.