Friday, November 11, 2011

Today was Remembrance Day at AMG. After Gym class, we headed down for the Gym for a cross-grade presentation of music and poetry.  Since I was the MC, I was not able to take that many photos of the event, but here are two.

I am hoping to link some of the topics discussed  today to the History Drama rehearsals on Monday.  The groups worked on the presentations on Thursday and I have a few images of them at work.  The group also came up with a Success Criteria chart to determine what the important things are for this project.  This "anchor chart" will remain at the front of the room until this is completed so the students can make reference to it as they practice.

I had some video footage of the group doing a warm-up exercise for Drama, but I am having some difficulty uploading it. 

We spent a good part of the afternoon doing the second portion of a Guidance activity the class started with Mr. Rodriguez.  It involved them looking at the remaining Learning Skills we did not discuss:  Collaboration, Self Regulation, Independent Work, and Initiative.  In groups they worked out what were the important points or characteristics for each of the skills.  Most of the groups only ended up missing a couple of items from the list of options.  So, it is great that they can recognize the skills needed to "master" a particular learning skills, but it will require hard work to put it into action.  This is why I believe that having these skills at the foundation of my program is crucial.  Here are some of the photos of the groups after the work.

After this, the students began a self assessment exercise on the Learning Skills on the report card.  There are six of the skills, but I will only do 1 or 2 per day.  They are required to think of a goal -- based on the skill -- and then to set a course of action to make it happen.  I did an example on the board based on one of my own areas in need of improvement.

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The plans will be available to check out during the conferences next week that we will have.

Friday ended off with watching a film on Santa Claus.  It is not intended to foster any particular religious affiliation but it was an examination of the cult figure status of Santa.  Here is the link to more info on the film:  http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1833652/ 

Here are a few images from our session of Reading Buddies that I took.  The students are really enjoying themselves. Some of the students in Room 52 are needing some direction because they are not taking the leadership role as serious as they should be.  Overall, I think the program is quite a success.  You can judge this by looking at some of the expressions on the faces of the students.

Homework:  All jot notes and reading of the Book Talk books must be completed for Tuesday; Census information sheets need to be returned on Monday; $.50 donation for Poppies for the Ontario Legion