The 10 Spot: January 2015

Sunday 25 January 2015

Book Clubs

By: Emily

Hello blog readers! I would like tell you about a new thing that Room 10 is doing. Room 10 is starting book clubs. The books we are reading are by author, Roald Dahl. The books the class is reading are: The Magic Finger, George's Marvellous Medicine, Fantastic Mr. Fox, Esio Trot, and The Twits.

In each book club group there are 4-5 people. We meet with our book clubs once or twice a week. At our first meeting we each got a Reading Response Booklet and we discussed the pages we would be reading. My group agreed to read up to chapter 6, "The Race," in the book Fantastic Mr. Fox.

Our book clubs will be meeting again to share ideas about what we read, some golden lines, exciting juicy words that we found, and the summary of the book (well, the pages we have read so far).

I thinks these book clubs are going to be really fun for the rest of the year!

Sunday 18 January 2015

Making Connection: Siloam Mission Field Trip

Students had an opportunity to see, firsthand, how Siloam Mission is helping support Winnipeg's less fortunate. Our field trip to Siloam Mission on January 16th was an eye-opening experience, as students saw the faces of poverty. From the line-ups on the street to the people gathered in the common area, students got a glimpse of our city's homeless. Some students felt uncomfortable and a few were scared because they didn't know what to expect, being in such an unfamiliar environment.

Students soon learned the many ways Siloam Mission reaches out to help those in need. As they toured the site, students saw how donations are received, processed and stored. They saw where people eat, sleep, shower, and work-out.

They also learned about the other ways Siloam Mission helps people. Students toured the art room where clients create, display, and sell their works of art. They saw the Clothing Boutique where folks can get the clothing and personal care items they need. Students learned about Siloam Mission's supportive housing and employment training programs, and a lot of facts about the other services the they provide.

One of tour guides, J.J., shared an important message about how we can show compassion and empathy in our daily lives:

Connect your life to people
who are nothing like you!

Siloam Mission Classroom: Learning about the mission and its services

The Art Room

J.J. describing how the Clothing Boutique operates

Clothing donations being processed

Learning about the Emergency Shelter

Clothing donations receiving area

Statistics

Tuesday 6 January 2015

Collaborating on Padlet

Students recently wrote about a small moment from their winter holiday and shared their writing on a collaborative "wall" called Padlet. It was their first time posting on a Padlet wall, but they did a good job navigating the site and writing their posts. You can read students' posts by following the link below to our Padlet wall.

Winter Break Padlet Posts

Thursday 1 January 2015

Siloam Mission Field Trip

As a follow-up to our clothing drive in November, Room 10 will be taking a trip to visit Siloam Mission. Our field trip is scheduled for the afternoon of January 16th. Permission slips will be going home with students on January 5th. Some parents have already expressed an interest in volunteering for the field trip. If more volunteers are needed, I will send home a notice.

The purpose of this field trip is to give students an opportunity to see, first hand, how organizations within our community help support individuals who are less fortunate. Understanding social justice issues, such as poverty and homelessness, empowers students to be advocates for positive change.

Room 10 students sort through clothing donations

Celebrating the Holidays with Our Buddies

Students had a great time hosting a Holiday Get-Together with their grade one reading buddies in Room 22.

First we made reindeer food to share with our guests. We made our reindeer food from Chex Rice cereal, melted white chocolate chips, crushed candy canes, and powdered sugar. It was a big hit! We prepared hot chocolate and served it with the reindeer food in the library.

We also made holiday ornaments and read holiday stories with our buddies. Everyone had great time!

Our Completed Dioramas

November and December were rather crazy with report cards, preparing for Triad Conferences, Triad Conferences, holiday concert practices, and so on. Nevertheless, we wanted to share our completed diorama projects, so here are they are!