Grade 7/8 History, a few corrections to the letter home, 7/8B Mathematics, Housekeeping (including Curriculum Night date)

History:  Lesson #2

When I knew I would be teaching Grade 7, I wanted to use one of our final class discussions to move the discussion forward about key aspects of Canadian History.

July 1, 1867 was the day the British North America act took effect, establishing our great Nation.  Using government archived maps you can catch a glimpse of what the initial nation looked like and then move backward in time to see the initial colonial roots of the nation.

https://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/confederation/023001-5005-e.html

To celebrate the 150th birth of our nation, there were many celebrations.  For many, it was a time to pause a re-think some of our nation's history.  Here is Canada's current Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau:

The popular Canada 150 award winning icon can be seen hhere:  http://canada.pch.gc.ca/eng/1469537603125#a1

The finalists for the contest can be seen in this from this page:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/canada-150-logo-contest-finalists-1.3155808

To be mindful of what PM Trudeau said, Canada, as a nation, has not treated its First Peoples very well.  As a result, this prized and beautiful logo as been "reimagined" by another artist, Eric Ritskes.  The idea of reimagined came from our class discussion last year and was suggested by David Gasser.

http://canadianart.ca/news/artists-resist-canada150-social-media/

In History class, we will be using our sense of Historical Thinking to reimagine and rethink some of the things we have learned or not learned about our history.  To help you with this initial group inferencing exercise, we look at a short clip from a Globe and Mail news video around the Canada Day celebrations. https://beta.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/editorials/globe-editorial-after-150-years-canadas-indigenous-citizens-are-finally-being-heard/article35506457/?ref=http://www.theglobeandmail.com&

This connects with today's group exercise.  We will be using some inferencing skills to record some observations around the following painting by Kent Monkman.

https://beta.images.theglobeandmail.com/523/news/article33515222.ece/BINARY/image.jpg

Who is this artist?  Here he is explaining why he creates some of the things he does.

Mathematics

I sat down with the Grade 7 and 8 curriculum and was looking for points where concepts overlapped.  We will be beginning in the Number Sense unit and looking at multiples and factors and using this as a springboard to a unit on fractions.  For both grades, we will be doing a review and then, down the road, break into grade specific groups for developing particular skills.

Understanding this particular unit will be a lot easier if you know your multiplication table or in the process of learning it.  I have been a great fan of the Jump Math program (https://jumpmath.org/).  They have publicly posted the strategies for learning your 1-10 multiplication table in 5 days:

https://jumpmath.org/jump/sites/default/files/TipSheet_Times.Tables-01.pdf

Housekeeping

I completed a letter to go home today but there are a few corrections to it and I apologize to the families who have it.  I will print it out again so you can have a new copy.
As I find my groove, as I suspected I would, I am feeling more comfortable in articulating my approach to teaching and excited about the coming year.  I do not know the specific details, but Curriculum Night will be on Thursday, September 28.  

- a second timetable is available for the locker and to bring home