EQAO Math tomorrow and Scientists in Schools

Tomorrow we will begin the math section of EQAO. We have been reviewing for quite some time and playing lots of Kahoot and Plickers games to help us a little.

Also, tomorrow in the afternoon our class will have Scientists in Schools come in to teach us about Air and Flight. Their presentation is really fun and students enjoy the activities. We are looking forward to it!

For those attending the Confirmation tonight at St. Patrick's Fallowfield, I am looking forward to seeing you there.

Information for Confirmation

Confirmation for the grade 6's will be on May 31. Last year, it was requested that students arrive with sponsors at 6:30 PM and gather in the Parish hall. I have not heard if they would like to gather in the same manner this year, but I think it would be a good idea to arrive between 6:30-6:45 in order to get students into the correct order for the ceremony. Parents and guests are asked to find a seat in the church. Seating will be first come first served basis, and it is requested that seats not be saved.

As far as dress is concerned, there is no need to buy a fancy dress or suit. A nice sundress  is appropriate for girls, and a shirt, tie and slacks is good for boys. If you have already bought something, that is great, but there should be no need.

If you have any questions about the ceremony, please feel free to contact me at school and I will try to answer questions for you, or you can try the Parish.

Looking forward to seeing everyone May 31st!

Vote for Your Valedictorian!

Please click the link below to vote for the Grade 6 Girl & Boy Valedictorians this year! Please remember that you can only vote once, and please vote before Friday!

Vote Here!

Upcoming Events in Grade 6

The next few weeks are going to be very busy ones in Grade 6! In an effort to keep everyone informed, here is a breakdown of the main events:

1. EQAO testing - see this post for the specific dates we will be testing on. For these tests, it is important that students are at school if at all possible, since missing a test will reflect in their scores. When students miss, we try to give them time to catch up, but I find they have a more difficult time writing in a different setting than the classroom, so it helps them to write on the correct date if possible. If it is not possible, then we do our best to have students write the test when they can. 
2. Scientists in Schools - for my afternoon class, we will be having Scientists in Schools come to teach us about Air and Flight on June 1 in the afternoon. This is an excellent presentation, and students usually quite enjoy it. 
3. Confirmation - Confirmation will take place at St. Patrick's in Fallowfield at 7PM on May 31. 
4. Public Health Nurse - on June 6th, the Public Health Nurse will be coming to the school to speak to the 6's about the effects of drugs on the body. This is an important part of our Health curriculum in Grade 6.
5. Retreat Day - our retreat day and BBQ is set for June 13th at school. We are very lucky to have the Knights of Columbus prepare a BBQ lunch for us on this day. For students who do not like hamburgers or hot dogs, please send a lunch of their choice. On this day we also do a lot of activities to reflect on our time here at St. Anne and think of our future as we head to Holy Trinity. Father Paul will also be coming to speak to the 6's this day.
6. Year End Trip - this year the trip will take place on June 15th. A note is going home this week with more information, but this is definitely an all day affair! We will be arriving back at the school at about 6PM. This is a day I know the students look forward to all year!
7. Leaving Ceremony - June 27th at 1PM. We will be preparing for this day during the weeks after EQAO. There will be the ceremony, followed by cake, coffee and juice in the Hall afterwards. 

As you can see, it is definitely a busy time of year in grade 6. If you have any questions about what is happening, please feel free to contact me any time. I look forward to seeing you all soon!

A Great Problem!

Here is an awesome problem for students to try to solve. Good Luck!

Grade 6 Testing Dates for EQAO

The dates for the Grade 6 tests of Language and Math will be:

Thursday, May 25 - Language
Friday, May 26 - Language
Monday, May 29 - Language
Tuesday, May 30 - Language
Thursday, June 1 - Math
Friday, June 2 - Math

Testing will take place during the first block of each day. Students are given as much time as they need to complete the tests. Please ensure that your child is at school on time on these dates so that they have as much time as possible to complete the tests and so that they do not disrupt others who will be working.

If you have any questions about the testing process, or the tests themselves, please feel free to contact me at any time.

Education Week Events at Holy Trinity

Students from grade 6 are invited to attend events at Holy Trinity to see what happens at their next school! See the flyers below for more information.

Transformational Geometry & Open House Tomorrow

We are beginning to learn about transformational geometry (moving shapes on a grid) in math this week. Today in math we reviewed and played some games using the three types of transformations we have learned about - translations (slides), reflections (flips) and rotations (turns). We learned how to reflect a shape over a diagonal line, and how to rotate a shape around any point on a coordinate grid.

Both of these tasks are challenging for many students. To rotate around a point, I ask students to use a piece of tissue paper, trace the original shape, then put their pencil tip on the point to be rotated around. Then they rotate in the correct direction and degrees to place the image. When they are sure they have the image in the correct place, I ask them to record each vertice. We will be doing much more of this on Wednesday.

When performing a reflection over a line, I ask students to count the units away from the line for each vertice, and then simply do the same in the opposite direction from the mirror line.

Here is a blendspace unit with resources for learning and reviewing the different transformations.





For our Open House tomorrow, we will be doing a vertical learning surface activity. It will be quite a difficult problem, so bring your thinking caps! Before the day starts you are welcome to come and visit the class, visit the book fair, and see the variety of things going on in our school. I look forward to seeing you tomorrow.