I want to thank all of you for helping your child through their student led conferences. It is a great part of the year when we celebrate all the learning and activity of the year. Each student had a different perspective on their learning and this was part of their presentation to you. Having a school with specific objectives for learning in the 21st century is a real incentive to the student to reflect on themselves as a learner in these areas. I do hope you got as much out of them as you expected.
Current events this week resume with the following people;
Tuesday - Stephanie
Wednesday - Tiana
Thursday - Akari
Friday - Maxim
Wednesday - Tiana
Thursday - Akari
Friday - Maxim
It has been two weeks since we had this and we have now started the Impact! unit so it is very important that an impact is shown from the news that is read and reported on.
Homework will resume this week and I am hoping that nightly reading has been happening for the last two weeks of break and conferences. I asked students to return their March reading log last Tuesday but only 4 were turned in. Please make sure that this is something that is continued right through to the end of the school year. No time requirement, but everyday is important. Students have a reading journal blog entry every Friday and one of the books they can write about may be from their home reading. April's reading log went home this past week.
Two new writing projects begin this week and will be part of our learning for the rest of the school year. These are the persuasive writing and poetry. We will start with the persuasive essay this week and continue with the poetry writing we did prior to Winter Break.
The next set of book clubs starts this week and will go for about 3 weeks. Students work in groups they select to read a book and discuss it. There is a facilitator for each session of Book Club which gives everyone a chance to experience a leadership position. As well, ideas and information can be talked about the book as a group with some people not always agreeing.
This week for the impact unit we will look at the interconnectedness of some global issues. We will start a chart with links to some world issues that both describes and attempts to solve some of these issues. While usually very utopian, it is still very interesting to listen to youth discuss their ideas for solving some of the worlds issues. Last week we listened to a young girl talk about how important it is for the youth of today to have ideas.
As always, if you have any questions or concerns please feel free to contact me.
Harold Daw
