October 19th

Ms Lajeunesse has a blog! This is your link to all her wonderful lessons and assignments:

http://mslajtakesgrade8.blogspot.ca​ 

October 17th

I am so happy that Ms Lajeunesse will be teaching you. I think that you will have a lot of fun with her and learn loads of stuff.

I am recovering. Missing you all.

Actually...that isn't too far from the truth ;-)

October 12th

My last day until I recover from my surgery. I will see you around Sooke I am sure. I will email you when I have final word about my replacement.

Here are the notes;

Social Studies: Div 4 you finished your Viking boats. It was really neat watching you work and problem solve through the process of putting together these boats.

English: Div 5 We read to Chapter 8, page 178 of 290 of the PDF book and 4:07.06 of the audio book. We updated your plot outline. You finished and handed in your maps...some of you still need to get them in.

English Div 4: We read to the end of Chapter 7, page 172 of 290 of the PDF book and 3:58.23 of the audio book. You worked on your setting maps while you listened; those were due in class and some of you still need to finish.

Social Studies: Div 3 you started to build your viking boats. You will get another class to finish them on Friday.

Today's word is a phrase: Welcome Ms Lajeunesse.

October 11th

Something to think about when you see those daft people terrorizing others by dressing up as angry clowns.

Academic Notes:

Math: You assessed your progress to date using a Math rubric. You took a Square Roots and Squaring quiz.

English Div 5: You worked on your setting maps. Those maps were collected in class. You have until tomorrow to finish them. I will collect them first thing.

Social Studies Div 4 Double Block: The first part of the block you continued to take Cornell notes on the Nova Viking documentary, "Unearthed". Then, you used your notes to complete a chart that required you to identify evidence and tell what that evidence did and didn't tell you about the Vikings. Those assessments were due in class. Afterward, you began building replicas of Viking Longships.

Today's word: engineering

This week, October 11th to 14th

Div 4 Teacher Update:
Ms Lajeunesse will be working with you on Thursday and Friday. She has applied for my position and we are waiting for the list of applicants to be reviewed, shortlisted and interviewed before we can announce who will be working with you for the next six weeks while I recover from my surgery. I will keep you posted.

Academic Notes:

English: You will complete and submit your setting maps. We will continue listening to Lord of the Flies with the understanding that William Golding has been foreshadowing a violent end to this book. We are uncomfortable even at the suggestion of violence because we enjoy the luxury of civilization, law and order. Sometimes it is easy to forget how lucky we are.

Social Studies: You will do a Viking Evidence assessment and a Viking Boat Building Challenge this week. This involves building a Viking Longship, testing it for buoyancy, for performance in low and high wind. Teamwork is the skills focus.

Math: You will be estimating square roots this week after you do a test on squaring and square roots tomorrow (Tuesday). Again, many of you need to drill your doubles in multiplication to perform better and this needs to be done at home.

Today's word is: nautical

October 7 (Happy Thanksgiving Weekend)

Academic Notes:

Math: You reviewed the questions on squaring and square root. Some of you are wanting to over-apply the squaring exponent (that little two) and the square root symbol. Remember, those symbols are directions and once you have followed them, you shouldn't use them in your answer because you are done following those directions. Use the course link to review the concept.

English Divisions 4 and 5: You began a setting map for Lord of the Flies. You will be given more time when you return from break. The map is to represent all the settings for major events up to Chapter 6. The maps are to inlcude a title, a legend, labels for primary locations, reflect the descriptions that you remember from the book. This was not assigned for homework, but you are responsible for making it up, if you are away.

Social Studies Division 3: We took Cornell Notes on the Vikings. We previewed the Viking boat activity that we will be doing next week. Do you know what your Viking name would be? Follow the course link to find out.

October 6th

Today you had Mr Banister, a fabulous TOC. I was at a District meeting. I missed you.

You should have:

English Div 4: Read Lord of the Flies and took notes pulling out key quotes/parts that address the essential question on the board.

Math Div 4: Did a page of square root practice so that you are prepared for the check up tomorrow which will be on square numbers, area, factoring and square root.

Exploratories started today and Mrs Abell informed me that there were no bear encounters like I have been having nightmares about.

Today's word is: aware

October 5th

Social Studies Div 4: We used Cornell Notes to record information from a Nova documentary on Vikings. You were asked the essential question: How do we know what we know about the Vikings?

English Div 4: We read to 2:56.15 or page 126 of the pdf version of Lord of the Flies. We were listening and looking for quotes and sections that addressed this question: How do these boys revert to nature?

English Div 5: We read to 3:22.59 or page 156 of the pdf version of Lord of the Flies. We were listening and looking for quotes and sections that addressed this question: How do these boys revert to nature?

Cops For Cancer: I was so proud of you Tyler for raising so much money for pediatric cancer research. You are such an altruistic kid.

Today's word is "altruistic". Tomorrow you will have an on call teacher so you will have to wait to Friday to play this blog game.

October 4th

(Now, you understand the reference)

Math: We took notes on Square Roots ( a copy of those notes, like all the notes that I give in Math, are in the Master Binder by the Extra Copies file ). You did a practice set to try out your skill.

English Div 5: You filled out a plot diagram to Chapter 5 and we discussed the book.

English Div 4: You wrote an in class response on a question about Lord of the Flies. You were to provide 5 points and supporting evidence to back up your opinion on the question.

Social Studies Div 4: We summarized Primary and Secondary source information. Then, you took the quiz on the topic.

Today's word is: paraphrase

October 3rd

Social Studies Div 4: You continued to look at artifacts to determine what source they were, what they did and did not tell you about the past.

Math Div 4: You factored numbers from 1 to 30 and saw that square numbers have an odd set of factors.

Social Studies Div 3: You continued to take Cornell Notes on Nova's: The Vikings. You were looking specifically for the evidence that Vikings left behind and what that evidence tells us about their past.

English Div 5: You did a graded, in class response to Lord of the Flies. The goal of the activity was to have you state an opinion about the book and to support it with evidence from the text like quotes.

Today's word is: "Vikings"

This week October 3rd to 7th

Hello OCTOBER!!!

Calendar Notes:

Wednesday Afternoon TOUR DE ROCK to raise money to fight pediatric cancer.

English: You will be writing an in class response to Lord of the Flies using quotes and notes that you have collected to this point in the book (Chapter 5). You will be taught how to embed quotes to make a point and we will review how to structure a paragraph.

Social Studies: We will be looking into "How do we know what we know about the Vikings?" To do this, we will be looking at a variety of primary and secondary source information on these people.

Math: Square roots, volume and cube roots will be explored this week. Check the course link for resources.

Today's word is: autumn