May 16-20

We started the week with the "Journée d'Energie", a day fully focused on our study of energy. We watched the Magic Schoolbus episode from last week again, and this time I asked the kids to pay attention to the types of energy the kids in the show generated. Afterwards, they explained in words and pictures how one of the energy sources in the show worked.  Then we looked at all the energy sources we have talked about, and identified them as renewable or non-renewable. Each student received images of and labels for the different sources and had to match them. Then they made a poster of energy sources, according to the categories of renewable and non-renewable.

This activity was followed by a broader sorting activity that asked the kids to think about where the energy came from for a wide range of things, from sailboating flying an airplane.

We played a game that illustrates the energy chain from the sun to plants at the bottom of the food chain to animals at the top. Everyone starts out as the sun (making "sun" gestures) and any 2 suns can do rock/paper/scissors together. The winner transfers to the next stage in the chain, in this case grass. The kids who become grass wiggle their fingers, and they can get together and do rock/paper/scissors to become a rabbit who eats the grass. The rabbits hop around and when they compete one becomes a snake (who ate a rabbit). The snakes make snakey motions with their hands and can compete to become the eagle, at the top of the food chain, who eats the snake. Eventually everyone becomes an eagle and the game is played out. 

I asked the kids to show me what they had learned about where energy comes from and what it can do, on a mind map. It was an open-ended exercise to sum up their learning. Then we made pinwheels to take home!

In reading, we read more with the puppet character "Le Conte qui Raconte", to learn better how to retell a story after reading it. The kids practiced retelling stories I read to the class through the puppet. They learned to frame their retell with the words in French for "At the beginning", "then" and "at the end". 

We reviewed the elements of a story by watching the video of "Le Tambour Magique" and discussing the characters, the setting, problem/solution and the beginning, middle and ending of the story. Then I told the kids that we were going to write our next story by first making a plan. As a class, we planned a story by deciding on these elements. Then we began writing the story, and found that it was a richer story for the planning. The kids began to plan the characters, setting, problem/solution and beginning, middle, and ending of their next story. 

In math we finished up with patterning with a fun activity. The kids were in pairs and had a card with various letter patterns. One partner made a pattern following one of those given on the card, and the other partner had to figure out which letter pattern corresponded to the pattern they had made. 

We also did more problem-solving, with the kids in partners working to explain why a given answer was true. I find this approach helpful when the kids get too focused on finding the "right" answer, often from other classmates, without understanding why it is correct. 

After working on the problem, we looked at everyone's solutions and talked about the different strategies we saw in evidence.