Monday, April 18, 2011

Today we began the day with our Community Circle.  This is a sharing time and for the class and a part of the Oral Communication portion of the Language curriculum.  I have decided to give the students 1 minute to share to focus their thoughts and structure the sharing like a paragraph.  "Paragraphing", as I like to call it, is the focus of our writing for the remainder of the year.

In terms of paragraphing, we spent a portion of time trying to come up with the ideal topic sentence to support a list of details for a paragraph.  Each student was able to provide an example of a sentence, but two really stood out as being ideal for the paragraph in question.  Here is an example of one of the completed paragraphs:

        I walked up to the big, empty looking house but as soon as I stepped on the porch, I regretted it.  My hands shook a little as I opened the door of the large, imposing building.  The stairs began to creak as I slowly ascended them, wondering who the last person was to ascend the stairs and whether I would ever come down them again.  Then I heard a blood curdling scream and ran as quickly as I could out of the building.  That was the last time I would ever enter that house alone.

In terms of Math work, the Grade 7s completed a test on mapping points on a coordinate grid and the Grade 8s reviewed the results of a test involving the adding and subtraction of integers.

Reminder:  Grade 7s should have an umbrella for the trip for Tuesday and Wednesday.  No lunch is needed for Tuesday's trip to the theatre, but one is required for the zoo trip on Wednesday.