I had a great last day with the class for the year. They’re practicing two songs for the Christmas concert. Both parodies of popular songs – Hotling Bling by Drake and Call Me Maybe by Carley Rae Jepsen. They have actions and it’s totally hilarious and awesome. One of the songs they are preforming with another class. It was interesting to see the difference in their performance with the other class present and without the other class present. They were definitely more reserved and self-conscious with the other class. This was probably because it was their first time practicing together. I’m sure it will be great come performance day. The students wrote the  parody lyrics the last time I was in class and it’s incredible how improved and how much ownership they are showing over the song just one week later.

The next highlight of my day were these decimal pockets. The students were wrapping up a unit on very large numbers – billion, trillion, quadrillion, quintillion – and moving on to decimals. It’s rare to see manipulative in Grade 7 Math but the students loved these pockets and it was a great way to check if they were getting the concepts.

When the Fine Arts block came around several students were excited and asking me what we were going to do today. One young man said  “I’m really excited because I didn’t get to do that”, pointing at the jellyfish. It was nice to know they’ve been enjoying my Art lessons. They were disappointed when I told them we would be practicing their song. However, I turned it into an opportunity to have a discussion about different art forms and how performance and sing are art too.

Note: I added the photo of the students jellyfish to the last post.

Report cards were due on Monday. Some of the students had not completed all of their work. Our day started by creating lists on the board of students who needed to turn in different assignments. I spent most of the day going through piles of student work and creating check lists for each assignment. I was also working on a large flipchart sized chart with all the students names and assignments. I marked, made notes, and handed back French booklets.

I gave a mini lesson on how to make a flow chart in excell with ten students for social studies. I helped several students work on their French and other assignments.

I also taught an Art lesson to the students who had finished all their work. First, I showed the students six different oil pastel techniques. I had them divide their first page into six sections and practice each technique in a different section. I explained warm colours and cool colours. Then let them know that they were to choose their three warm colours or cool colours for their jellyfish. Second, I walked them through a sketch of a Jellyfish and showed them how they could use some of the techniques to finish the drawing. Ms. Dolejsi had asked me to make the project assessable. Before beginning , I let the students know the criteria. They had to use at least three of the techniques in their drawing. The jellyfish had to look like a jellyfish (having the top part, middle part, and tentacles). Their colour selection reflected an understanding of warm and cool colours. Their technique practice sheet had all six techniques. The criteria I set out for the drawing made it relatively easy to mark the students drawings.

Below are some example I drew and showed the students before we started.

   

Student Jellyfish