Hour of Code: Minecraft edition

Dear Students, 

I'm going to use this post as a holding place for some hour of code links I think will be fun for us to work on as a class. 

Let's start by trying to make a virtual dance party: https://hourofcode.com/uk/learn

I also want to test out if you can download this Minecraft Education program on your computers: https://education.minecraft.net/get-started/download

Don't worry, if you can't we can still do some Minecraft coding: https://studio.code.org/s/hero/stage/1/puzzle/1

Some other areas of coding:

https://studio.code.org/s/oceans/stage/1/puzzle/1 (ai machine learning0

https://app.codemonkey.com/banana-tales/challenges/1 (python)

https://www.tynker.com/lesson/host (tynker)

Henry Moore and Inuit Sculpture

 Dear Students, 

We created work that was inspired by Picasso and Matisse, and because we think of them as being modern, were surprised by the visual connections we found with traditional indigenous masks. Here are some sketches students made of First Nations and Inuit masks, displayed near our Cubist Self Portraits:

To inspire our own work with clay last week, we then looked at some Inuit sculpture by a variety of artists, both modern and traditional. We looked at some work available online from museums https://marionscottgallery.com/portfolio-item/modern-masters-northern-quebec/

 and work by contemporary artists like David Ruben Piqtoukun: https://davidruben.com/ 

and Karoo Ashevak: https://www.inuitartfoundation.org/iad/artist/Karoo-Ashevak

This week, we will continue to compare and contrast these with the forms and shapes used in modern art, particularly by Henry Moore. 

First a video to give us some sense of his overall style (the background musical choice is strangely ominous):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9AHF2EPxZ6A&t=60s

We'll discuss what we see, particularly thinking about how negative space plays into these sculptures, then look at an overview of Moore's work displayed worldwide:

At the Tate Museum in London:

https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/henry-moore-om-ch-1659/henry-moores-sculptures

And from the Henry Moore foundation's catalogue of his work:

http://catalogue.henry-moore.org/advancedsearch/Objects/classifications%3ASculpture%3Bdepartment%3ASculptures%3BmediaExistence%3Atrue

Finally, if we have time in class or you are curious to learn more, this is a good short backgrounder on Moore and some of his influences:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWIB_rPtTvM&t=187s

Underground Railroad Primary Sources

 Dear Students, 

For Grade 5's: You will use images from Hands On Social Studies in class to look at primary sources for First Nations early interactions with Europeans. 

For Grade 6's, here are a couple of  slideshows showing some primary sources about the Underground Railroad:

https://www.eiu.edu/eiutps/Underground%20Railroad%20Primary%20Source%20Set.pdf

https://dp.la/primary-source-sets/the-underground-railroad-and-the-fugitive-slave-act-of-1850

https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/510d47dd-ff98-a3d9-e040-e00a18064a99/book?parent=205503f0-c6b4-012f-8a4d-58d385a7bc34#page/1/mode/2up

and here is a political cartoon showing you some of the ways the Underground Railroad was discussed in popular media like newspapers: 

https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/510d47dd-e87a-a3d9-e040-e00a18064a99#/?zoom=true

Pick one image that you connect with and reflect on it using our graphic organizer. 

Math Update

Dear Parents,

I have updated the pages section above. It continues to be a work in progress, but I've added a math tab and moved information that was on a previous page to other sections as appropriate. I hope these link suggestions are helpful and I appreciate your patience as I work through the other sections to streamline information, check working links, and support student learning where possible.

If you have not already connected with the school, I urge you to do so.

For Grade 6 students, under the science tab, you'll find a number of videos relating to the most recent unit on flight for Grade 6, with a worksheet (Ms. Goegan's Questions) that helps you click through on relevant games and short texts on the Smithsonian site, accessed through the link to Mr. Polsky's Page. I also recommend exploring the Fold and Fly link, where you'll get templates for  folding a wide variety of paper airplanes. 

Sincerely,

Lisa Goegan

Electricity and batteries

Dear Parents and Students,

In science, we've been looking at how we source electricity and how electricity gets transformed into different kinds of energy, for example in appliances.

We've been discussing the pros and cons of different energy sources and whether or not they can be considered "renewable" or "green". For instance, trees and wood are renewable sources, but give off carbon when burned and simply don't scale to the level that a large Western population uses. We'd use up all the trees if we attempted to heat everything with wood. There are also pluses and minuses to even hydroelectric power, which we tend to think of as clean and renewable, when dams are built on natural habitats or disrupt the water shed.

In many electrical devices, the electrical energy is transformed into a combination of heat, light, movement or sound energy. We've looked at a lot of different examples and tried to imagine the circuits inside that power them.

Today, we also looked inside batteries and talked about chemical energy. We compared 1.5V cell batteries with 9V batteries and talked about the difference between Volts and Kilojoules. For example, a D battery has more Kj than an AAA, but the same voltage: both are 1.5 V.  A 9V battery typically has 6 cells inside it, making up 9 volts altogether because 6 x 1.5 = 9.

From Reddit, showing the interior of different 9V batteries

I look forward to making wet cell batteries with the class in our next science session, so they can see the interior more clearly. 

Sincerely, 

Ms. Goegan