As we discussed our new theme of Sharing the Planet, it was clear that the children had a lot of prior knowledge about what lives on our planet, some of the different habitats and what can help us share the space and resources (being caring, respectful and responsible).
Ms. Hima joined us as the students used their own individual art-works as a jumping off point. They were asked "what might live in your picture?" and encouraged to visualise and go deeper. What might be in amongst the leaves, under that bush, behind the tree....? Later they sketch-noted their ideas about our theme, with many students choosing to work outside to be closer to nature.
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Here are the students' final comments and thoughts on our learning over the course of this unit.
Julie: Before technology it wasn't as easy to communicate and do many other things. Technology has helped us communicate, educate ourselves and has made our lives easier. Esther: Technology has changed our lives and it has made our lives easier. Things were harder to do a long time, for example in the past the phones were different and didn't let us communicate as easily- we can bring our phones anywhere now. Amy: Technology has changed what we do. There is new technology all the time that can help you. Sharanya: I think technology makes our life easier and we don't need to do as many things. It saves us time. Daniel: Technology helps us because, a long time ago people weren't able to the same things as we can do today. It helps us work better. Elias: This unit was fun because I really enjoyed making my design and using technology. Injun: I use technology every day to help me. Seungwoo: Before this unit, I thought that innovations weren't important. After this unit, I think that innovation is important and people need to keep making inventions and solving problems. Kien: Technology can be helpful and can be electrical devices. Also, you can invent new things with technology to help you learn and solve problems. Omer: I liked to do the design because I love design. It is nice to draw and make things to help people. Joshua: Technology is important because if you don't have it then you can't live easily. For example, air-cons make it much easier for us to live in Singapore. Masks and the vaccine technology will help us stay healthy. Keshav: Technology is a complicated area of learning. It can help us but it also can affect our environment and how we live our life. For example, cars have changed how we travel but they pollute the environment. In the future, they may be fast, electric and could drive themselves with computers and radars. Jean: Technology changed our lives because we don't have to go and get our own food or kill animals. We can use machines to cook our food or get our food delivered! Rania: It was good to learn about technology and how things have changed. Some things are harder now because we have buy a lot of technology to do things but I think that technology makes life easier like our computers help us find information and do our work. Gabriella: Technology in the past was very different from today because we could not communicate very easily. Things took longer to happen, like sending messages and letters. We can send presents to people far away and keep in touch with family. Mikhail: Technology has evolved over time and helped people do things more easily than before. We can see technology all around us. Also, new technology is sometimes expensive but people still have it around them, It is important and people spend a lot of time and money on technology today. As part of our inquiry into how Technology evolves over time, we have been using the Design Process to guide our thinking. This has allowed the students to work through their designs in a thoughtful and considered way. Just as people throughout time have solved problems by innovating and designing tools and devices, the students applied this to our particular place and time.
Stage 1: Empathise/Identify the Problem After first thinking about our new learning spaces and how we want to use them, the children came up with these key problems to address: A: We don't want to disturb Grade 4 next door- Noise (Kien, Injun, Seungwoo, Omer) B: We sometimes forget our snacks and are hungry- Food Supply (Elias, Daniel) C: We want to work outside but want to protect our laptops and books- Outdoor equipment (Mikhail, Amy, Jean, Sharanya, Rania, Julie) D: We want to be able to wash our hands closer to our room- Sink (Esther, Gabriella) E: Some of us find the door heavy to open and want to find a hands-free method- Door handle (Joshua, Keshav) Stage 2: Brainstorm/Research During this stage, each group found examples of existing tools and devices connected to their problem. This included: drawing school sinks to see what individual parts they had, researching waterproof materials and examining folding table and trays. Stage 3: Design a Solution Students sketched detailed designs labelling the parts and listing possible materials needed. Next they emailed or contacted people who they thought could help them, including Mr. James, Ms. Hima, classmates and other teachers. Stage 4: Prototype The fun part began as students turned their designs into reality. Measuring, cutting, gluing, attaching, securing. Stage 5: Test and Evaluate Did it work? Did it solve the problem? Was it strong enough? Stable? Comfortable? Light? Usable? Stage 6: Share We used the Ladder of Feedback method to give and receive meaningful and useful feedback at various stages of the process. Ms. Hima also joined us during these sessions to listen as students shared their progress and designs. The children are becoming very good at acknowledging strengths as well as pinpointing areas to develop or improve. Some students also created digital surveys to gather more feedback from the class. Stage 7: Iterate And so the cycle continues... as we use the students' designs, we will identify any further problems that we may need to research and design a solution for. We moved into our Primary School Village in the newly renovated Block 5, with much excitement. Everyone has been enjoying the beautiful new spaces, taking our learning outside and having picnic lunches in the shared green space. We will share more photos that the children have taken soon.
The children have relished the extra space and light as well as being surrounded by nature and the calm atmosphere that creates. We are busy settling in to our new classroom and in UOI began using the Design Process to design and create useful additions and tools. We started with Stage 1, identifying problems or needs that we could try and address. There have been a range of Christmas activities this week. Grade One organised a Christmas letter postal service and the students happily wrote letters to other people in the Primary School which were sorted and delivered by the Grade Ones.
Later, we shared our knowledge about the traditions and beliefs surrounding Christmas and made decorations. We had a Scavenger Hunt organised by the High School Student Council and a surprise visit from Santa! We also said farewell to Eiji who is moving back to Japan and we wish him all the best for the future. As part of the Hour of Code activities this year, the children used the Scratch program to code a short conversation between two characters. Their instructions were to have some connection to technology or the past and present to support our learning in UOI.
The students were supportive of each other, with experts who had used Scratch before teaching others. They played and explored and discovered how to write various instructions or code. We also continued to use Jamboard as a way to prompt discussion and share ideas and thoughts. This collaborative tool develops the children's communication skills as well as how to work responsibly with others online. Padlet was introduced as a way to visually organise information. Using the time-line feature, we worked as a class to research and share the key developments with communication technology. Later, the students will apply this to their own independent inquiries and use this tool to share their findings. The children have been inquiring into angles and triangles. They have researched the different types and noted down key vocabulary to help us describe them. They applied this knowledge to identify and sort. Later, the children made connections: where do we see angles and triangles in everyday life? Why do humans use right angles so often? Why are triangles used in building? They worked in groups to build a structure using triangles (toothpicks and play-doh) and tested to see if it could support a heavy book. Over the last few weeks, the children have been exploring new ways to share their ideas and learning. As we came to end of our inquiry into how "Understanding energy allows us to make sense of the world", we had a variety of presentations, quizzes and sketch-note posters.
The children were confident communicators and now readily use their new knowledge and vocabulary in their conversations. They were also able to identify simple actions they could take to either conserve or improve their own energy levels. Here are a few photos showing the kinds of hands-on things we got up to including: making marble or water runs to explore kinetic energy, making model guitars, ukuleles and cup telephones to explore sound energy, making kites to explore wind energy, making wind chimes to explore wind and sound energy, experimenting with Newton's Cradles and experimenting with throwing techniques. This week, the children were involved in a variety of Deepavali (Diwali) events. These included creating henna designs, rangolis and diyas, which are all important parts of this celebration. Ms. Hima shared her own experiences and the children took action to talk to Ms. Shradha and others who celebrate Deepavali. Great discussions were prompted by an informative presentation, including connections being made to other festivals of light and questions such as What do Jains believe? and Why do we represent darkness as evil?
As part of our continuing inquiries into energy, we visited Dr. Jeremiah in the High School science lab. The children planned an experiment to explore what foods produce electricity. After some initial research showed that acid, salt and potassium content were all relevant factors, the children predicted which fruits and vegetables might produce the most electricity. They then worked in groups to use the equipment and test various foods. We also had a session with Ms. Berna, thinking about how we can show empathy to others, ahead of World Kindness Day on Friday 13th November. The children enjoyed both giving and receiving compliments in their white-board displays to show their appreciation of each other (which I will share over the next few blogs), as well as handwritten notes to friends and teachers. Over the last two weeks, the students have been busy with their inquiries into energy. What is energy? What are the different forms that energy can take? How do those forms of energy work? How is energy changed or converted? How can we demonstrate a form of energy or show a transfer of energy?
They are very knowledgeable and have made many connections with their daily life and through integration with other subjects. Sound energy- how does this work in music class? PE- how can we transfer our energy effectively when we throw? Food- how does what I eat affect my energy? How can I track this data in my energy log? We have further developed our research skills with the support of Ms. Shiela in the Library using a range of online sources and books. Templates and organisers have helped the children sort and present the information they have found and they collaborated in small groups to create a book about renewable and "cleaner" forms of energy. During our Literacy lessons, diagrams, labels, captions and flow-charts have been used to make our explanation writing more detailed and strengthen our understanding of what we read. Ms. Hima joined us to explore how we can demonstrate potential and kinetic energy by making mini catapults. The children also showed the transfer of static electrical energy. |
Welcome to Grade 3We have had a great few days settling into our new campus and classroom. The children have shown great enthusiasm and enjoyed seeing old friends and getting to know new classmates.
We toured our new learning spaces and began to share information about ourselves in various ways. The students also discussed how we could create a positive learning environment which would help all of us develop our Learner Profiles. We used these ideas to write our Class Agreement. In Literacy, we have established routines for our Daily 5 programme, which will develop student independence and agency. In Maths, we tuned back into using number by discussing Place Value and how we can identify and describe numbers using Base Ten and the Place Value columns. The students showed great creativity in building with their sets of equipment and estimating the "value" or number of units their creation used. Some pieces included: :Stairway to Heaven, a lunch-box, a boat in the sea, a climbing wall, a bank vault, a tower and animals. TUNING IN TO OUR NEW UNIT"OUR BELIEFS AND VALUES SHAPE WHO WE ARE" AND STARTING SWIMMING LESSONS!This week the children started the swimming element of their PE curriculum, in small groups with lots of space in the pool!
We also continued to tune into our new unit of inquiry by unpacking some of the language. The children inquired into the meaning of "beliefs" and "values", using online dictionaries and sorting true and false statements. We began to explore the concepts of fact and opinion and how they relate to beliefs. Ms. Ranj spoke to us about why she was wearing her sari and explained how wearing these clothes helped her express and honour her religion on special days such as Onam . We used google jamboards to express our personal values and what is important and special to us. This allowed the children to learn and practise some new technological skills as well as reflect on what they wanted to add. Ms. Berna also spent time with us this week, to explore how we can influence others with our words and actions. This will lead into our line of inquiry "Influences shape our beliefs". We realised how important it is to think before we speak as our positive and negative language affects and influences other people. Ms. Berna led the children in some role-play and we practised being a positive influence on our friends and classmates. |