Thursday, 7 February

Graphic notes of our discussion

Today we began with a discussion about the research process involved in our Egypt inquiry process.  My impression has been that some students are using their in-class research time more effectively than others.  We discussed the inquiry approach in general and why I think collaborative work is so important in the new economy.  There are too many robots on the assembly lines these days so we can't prepare our students for those kinds of jobs.  Robots aren't yet creative and collaborative, so if we prepare our kids to fill those roles, we will make them resilient in an economy that has too many unknowns.  We discussed different kinds of sources for information, and where to find them.  Next, we watched a short TED Talk by Richard St. John on the eight traits of successful people.  It is interesting to note that money wasn't one of them.

8 traits of successful people

Another, companion talk by St. John.

Success is a continuous journey

Next we had band.  I asked students who wanted to line up quickly without talking to line up on a new side of the room and left the others mingling, talking and stalling around.  Very quickly a shift occurred. I told two students they were in the wrong line because they were talking.  Rather than leave the line, they stopped talking.  This was an interesting experiment in social engineering.  Apparently the need to be a part of the group was stronger than the need for personal autonomy.  Think tells me that the students who want to be successful and who don't want to waste any more class time can be empowered to help shift the behaviour of those others: interesting.  The move down the hallway was perfect; thank you class.

After recess, the grade 7s did their math FSA exam.  The 6s read for 10 minutes and then transitioned to their math classes.  Only two students completed their practice sheets in order to be able to write their mid-unit retests.  Please remember that if you wish to do the retest, that sheet should be completed for Tuesday's class.

After lunch we did something a little different.  I asked the class if they thought they might be able to solve some of the surveying questions that the Egyptians had to answer prior to constructing the pyramids.  Specifically, could they create a solution to achieve the following:
1) a perfect square
2) a level surface
3) a flat surface
4) a square with one side aligned to the north

Sharing our learning on Twitter

We blended our inquiry teams to tackle the first three.  The collaboration process was quite varied depending on the team.  We found that harmony didn't always lead to the most successful outcomes: sometimes it was better to have divergent ideas rather than having everyone working on the same path.  There was certainly lots of creativity and imagination as the groups puzzled with limited resources.  In the end, the "square" group figured out that using a rope and a unit of measure was part of the solution.  The "level" group determined that a vessel that could hold water was a part of the solution and that multiple "connected" vessels might be used for a large space (actually, they did get one axis of the ground perfectly level and likely would have had the perpendicular axis level soon afterwords).  And, the "flat" group figured out that they needed the "level" group to be able to achieve the "flat" problem (in fact, they branched off and started to create their own levelling experiment).  I took pictures and video and we used it in our debrief.  It was a fun way to reinforce the learning AND enjoy the afternoon sunshine.

We ended the day with a game of dodgeball in the gym.

Enjoy your long weekend (but don't put off your Egypt inquiry research)!