Self Portraits

Posted on January 29, 2015 by mrsrp

Our first foray into the world of visual art this year will be straight through the looking glass… Self portraits. We will use a variety of techniques to create our own self portraits, and also examine the work of other artists; discussing their processes, stories, and techniques.

During this unit everyone will complete the first self-portrait (as outlined below) and then choose two other styles in which to create two more self-portraits. These ‘other’ two pieces will be accompanied by a short ‘artist’s statement’ explaining your technique and choices. Each student will also investigate the self portraits of three artists (including one of Nora Heysen, Mike Parr or Gordon Bennett) before deciding on one artist to profile. These short profiles will be published on student blogs.

In the meantime, here is one of my favourite Australian self portraits. Nora Heysen painted a number of self portraits in her life time but this one captures my attention most. I think it’s because she looks like she’s deep in thought and barely conscious of the world around her – a feeling I can relate to.

Nora Heysen Self portrait 1938 Queensland Art Gallery Gallery of Modern Art

Here’s a short video interview with Nora Heysen that supports my idea that she was a deep thinker.

Do you already have a favourite self portrait? It might not be painted, but perhaps photographic or sculpted?

Onto the creation of our first self portraits.

To successfully create a human face that looks like a human face it helps to understand that there are some basic ideas to follow. Here are some links to help you get started on that journey:

Here you can see my sketch as I did my own research.

Face proportion

Drawing facial features

Drawing ears

Step 1: Use your iPad to take a (sensible) selfie. You will need to be have a clear view of your face.

Step 2: Referring to your research on facial proportions, lightly sketch your face on an A3 piece of paper.

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Step 3: Erase most of the lines, leaving only the ‘outline’ of the bigger shapes.

Step 4: Very lightly fill those shapes with words that describe you.

Step 5: Use coloured markers to go over your writing. Do not outline the shapes with the markers.

Step 6: Erase ALL pencil marks.

I’m not sure my neck is quite that pink but it’s OK. What would you change? How could I improve?

Welcome to 2015!

Posted on January 11, 2015 by mrsrp

This is going to be an AMAZING year full of learning, full of growth and full of fun.

Are you ready?

Project in a Day

Posted on November 25, 2014 by mrsrp

Hi VRPs.

Our time together as a class is fast coming to an end. We’ve been through a LOT this year: some of it positive; some of it not; some of it wonderfully fun; and some of it awfully difficult. At the end of it all though, I can honestly say that I wouldn’t swap our year together for ANYTHING.

As I write this I’m not sure what year level I’ll be teaching, or even at which school I’ll be next year BUT I do know a couple of things. And I need your help with a few of them:

1. I want my new students to know about you because you’ll all be part of the one big family. Remember that once you’re one of my kids, y0u’re always one of my kids.

2. I want my new kids to know the highlights of our year together so that they have an idea of the kind of awesomeness I expect from my kids.

3. I want you to share your tips and advice for how to make the most of their time with me.

This will be your project for Wednesday 26th November. Working with a partner you will need to produce a digital response to each of these points. (That means you need to create THREE responses.) They are three VERY different tasks so I encourage you to think creatively. You might like to create a pretend family photo (you could use Pic Collage perhaps?) for task 1… Or perhaps a timeline (maybe a Keynote presentation with a new slide for each month?) for task 2… Or even do an interview (create an iMovie maybe or write a letter on your blog?) for task 3.These are just suggestions though, you are free to use whatever digital tool fits your purpose. And remember: your audience will be other kids. Not me. Not other adults. KIDS. (So think carefully about the language you choose and the text structures you include.)

This project asks you to reflect on our year together, on me, and on the students in our class. You will need to think back and try to remember what we did in the first half of the year. You will need to analyse the behaviours and attitudes that have helped you succeed (or not) this year. It’s a big project but I know you can do it.

And here’s the exciting part of the project… For me at least… The day after the project finishes we will view all responses and vote on the best one for each point. I will show these to my next class.

So. Help me? Please. Put in your personal best. Show me – and my next class – how creative, reflective and helpful you are.

Love,

Mrs RP.

It’s Time to Run Away from these Run-on Sentences

Posted on November 18, 2014 by mrsrp

Yesterday I read a sentence – written by a VRP – that had 97 words in it. 97! It didn’t make much sense, and I was worn out by the time I worked out what they were trying to say. It was a sentence that looked a lot like this: I went to the shop and I bought lunch and I ate my lunch at the park and I walked home and I played on the playstation and I called up my friend and we hung out at the beach and I came home exhausted from trying to write all of this in one sentence. This sentence also has a name: they are called lazy sentences. Yes. Lazy. This is collection of simple sentences joined together with a co-ordinating conjunction (and) to make it seem like a compound sentence instead of the writer putting a little effort into making them interesting compound or complex sentences.

There’s an easy way to correct that kind of sentence: stop writing them. You’re all better than that. Be interesting writers. Go on. I dare you.

There is another kind of long sentence that pops up quite often in writing too. It looks more like this: I like shopping I don’t like shopping centres I like to go to Rundle mall. These long sentences also have a name: they are called run-on sentences.

There are a few ways of correcting this kind of sentence. We’ll explore them in more detail in class but here’s a quick summary:

1: Make separate sentences. I like shopping. I don’t like shopping centres. I like to go to Rundle Mall.

2. Join the clauses using a semi colon. I like shopping. I don’t like shopping centres; I like to go to Rundle Mall.

3. Link the clauses with a co-ordinating conjunction (for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so) I like shopping but I don’t like shopping centres so I like to go to Rundle Mall.

4. Make one of the clauses dependent by adding a subordinating conjunction (since, which, that, because). I like shopping although I don’t like shopping centres; I like to go to Rundle Mall.

It’s time to get running away from these long sentences. (Long AND run-on.)

Copy this text and correct all of the long and run-on sentences.

I woke up early on Sunday morning and had a shower I decided that I was going to cook my family pancakes and went to the fridge to check that we had all of the ingredients we did I got them out and started cooking there were only 5 people home I was lucky I didn’t have to make lots like normal when I was nearly finished I woke everyone else up and they all had showers and then set the table and we sat down to eat our breakfast together one of the children had lemon and sugar and the other two had jam I like golden syrup and cream Geoff only likes maple syrup the boys cleared the table and did the dishes and it was a lovely breakfast.

THEY’RE Sitting Over THERE With THEIR Friends

Posted on November 14, 2014 by mrsrp

An interesting challenge – even for really confident spellers – is knowing the difference between homographs, homophones and homonyms. I’m going to let you in on a little secret though: if you think about the words morphologically (remember that means about the base words) it’s EASY to work it out.

Let’s start with homograph: We know – from our prior learning in Science and Growth & Development – that homo means ‘the same’. That leaves us with graph. We can predict – based on our understanding of graphic novels, graphs and graffiti – that graph has something to do with drawing or writing. If we combine these two ideas we come up with a word that means ‘written or drawn the same way’. So for example: console (as in your PS3) and console (to comfort someone). These words are spelled exactly the same but have very different meanings.

Let’s break up homophone in the same way: We already know about homo, which just leaves phone. We can predict – based on our understanding of telephone, microphone, earphones – that phono has something to do with sound. If we combine these two ideas we come up with a word that means ‘sounds the same way’. So for example: no (the opposite of yes) and know (to be aware of something). These words sound exactly the same but have very different spelling and meaning.

This brings us to homonym. This one is a bit trickier because nym isn’t so obvious. If we think carefully though we can see it in words like anonymous and synonym which both have meanings related to names. So if we combine this idea with the meaning of homo we come up with a word that means ‘same name’. A homonym looks and sounds the same but has different meanings. So for example: bat (the nocturnal creature) and bat (the cricket equipment). These words are spelled and pronounced exactly the same but have very different meanings.

Recently in our writing activities I’ve that nearly everyone is mixing up the spelling of their homophones. More specifically I’ve noticed that people are using one spelling for both/all of the homophones. So, today we’re going to challenge ourselves to improve this area of our writing.

There will be 8 game stations. at which you will have 7 minutes. At each station you will find a paint chip (yay! I found another way to use them!) with some homophones. You will have to work quickly because you will need to discover the meaning of each word, write one or more sentences that demonstrate your understanding of the difference between them and finally share your sentences with the other people in your group to check your understanding. When the bell goes, you will need to move to the next station and quickly get on with the next set of words.

Can you find any homophones, homographs or homonyms in this post other than the obvious examples in my explanation?

Yep, I flipped this photo so the writing was the right way.

Remembrance Day

Posted on November 11, 2014 by mrsrp

Today is Remembrance Day. Today we take time out of our busy lives to remember…

We’re going to start our morning with an answer garden to share our connections to Remembrance Day. Click here to access it.

Here are some websites that will help inform your views…

Australian Army Remembrance Day Page

Department of Veterans’ Affairs Remembrance Day Page

Australian War Memorial Remembrance Day Page

Your task this morning is to create a poem, diary entry or exposition about the importance of Remembrance Day.

What does Remembrance Day mean to you?

Federal Government

Posted on November 2, 2014 by mrsrp

This week’s focus will be on Australia’s Federal Government. As in the previous two weeks, the focus in the VRP classroom will be on decision making. It will be really important for you to think carefully about how everything you learn in all four classrooms fits together to form the big picture.

Any questions that you have can be recorded on our padlet. Please make sure to check back in over the course of the week. You never know – you will probably be able to help other people with their learning and understanding. If the embedded padlet doesn’t work for you here’s the link or the url to cut and paste: http://padlet.com/Mrs_RP/5ltekpe30kmg

Created with Padlet

A good resource for you to check out this week can be found here. After you watch the video it would be a good idea to have a poke around the whole site: you may find answers to many of the questions on our three padlets.

As you know, I’ve had to do some research about this unit of learning about Australia’s levels of government because it’s been such a LONG time since I learnt about it at school. I’ve discovered more than a few things that I didn’t know, and learnt the real meaning of a few words that I’ve been using without really being sure about. I LOVE finding new words. (My favourite for this week is bicameral. Do you know what it means? You will by the end of this week I hope!)

What new words have you learnt during this unit of learning?

Tessellations

Posted on October 29, 2014 by mrsrp

Aren’t tessellations awesome? I love Escher’s tessellation art, he was a very creative man!

While I was away I asked you to start a tessellation overview. Here are the details:

Using whatever resource you like I would like you to create a presentation that demonstrates:

* Three existing images of tessellations with the repeated pattern highlighted.

* One tessellation (using at least two different shapes) of your own design with the repeated pattern highlighted and angles marked. (Don’t forget that you can use this website to help you create a tessellation.

* Your own definition of tessellation.

* Photos of 5 places you can find tessellation in our school environment.

This needs to be finished by the end of Thursday.

ILP Exhibition

Posted on October 26, 2014 by mrsrp

Last week the VRPs hosted an exhibition to share their ILPs from term 3. I have one word for it: WOW! The growth in research skills and engagement, over the three terms we’ve been doing this, is amazing. I’m quite proud of everyone.

The VRPs will each be be blogging about their own projects but I want to share some photos here too.

Australia Mini Project

Posted on October 24, 2014 by mrsrp

One thing I’ve noticed about our class is that none of us (myself included) is particularly great at Australian Geography. So… We’re going to do a mini project.

The class is going to break into 5 groups and with the use of this map:

Create a display that demonstrates your understanding of each state’s:

Capital and other important cities
Population (including the areas of the world from where any major migrations came)
Major physical features (with a Dreamtime explanation for at least one)
Major tourist attractions
Major industries

You will also need to make a twitter connection to another class in each state. Find out what they think is the best thing about their state and include it in your project.

Orange	Kyra, Kyle, Hayden, Chloe
Red	Zack, Sarah, Ty, Jess
Purple	Rhani, Tanisha, Jon, Connor
Yellow	Aiden, Kaleb, Tyrone, Avril
Green	Niki, Declan, Jordon, Keiandra

Carpe Diem

Posted on October 17, 2014 by mrsrp

Last term we were all very shocked and saddened to learn of Robin William’s death. We talked about him, and our favourite movies that featured him. Today we watched a short mash-up of parts of his movies. Everyone expected it to be funny, but it wasn’t. It was inspiring.

It also raised a big question for some students: what does carpe diem mean? Many are doing some research and will blog about what it means to them. For me the message is simple: live. Live now, and live big.

How do you live the message of carpe diem?

Sorting Out the Mix Up

Posted on October 16, 2014 by mrsrp

The experiment in my classroom during this science unit is all about separating solid mixtures. We will talk about why we would want to do that during our unpacking session but for now we need to ‘sort out the mix up’.

On the left of the photo you can see a tub of mixed up solid items. On the right are a number of small tubs. The items range from pompoms to glitter. Your task is to sort them into the small tubs. Sounds easy right? You all know me though – there has to be a sting in the tail… Your challenge is to complete the task within 20 minutes.

Make sure you take photos or video of your processes along the way because you’ll need to keep a learning journal and blog about your learning.

Term 4 Chemical Science

Posted on October 16, 2014 by mrsrp

This term Holly Unit is building on the amazing work we started together last term in science. We’re starting a new branch of science but carrying on with the team learning set up. Each week each class will learn with and from a different teacher: one hands one experimental lesson and another lesson unpacking the theory and ideas behind the experiment.

Here’s the roster of who will be where, and when.

As a teaching team we’re all excited to dig into this topic. Stay tuned for more updates.

It’s our Civic Duty!

Posted on October 13, 2014 by mrsrp

This term the whole Holly Unit will be learning about Australia’s three layers of government. Each week the classes will engage in a series of workshops, rotating through each room which will have a diffeent focus. The first week will be about local government.

After each topic focus we would like the students to add their questions (and ultimately answers) to a shared online forum on padlet. To access it, you can click on the link below.
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Created with Padlet

If that doesn’t work try copying and pasting this link: http://padlet.com/Mrs_RP/by2hcgxx0wib

Padlet is super easy to use: just click and add your question! As you find the answer you can go back and add to it. You can also add answers to other people’s questions.

It’s Electrifying Part II

Posted on September 23, 2014 by mrsrp

The learning menu last Tuesday allowed students to explore electrical circuits and collaboratively develop some ideas and understandings. Following this, the four teachers in our unit ran a series of four short workshops that focussed on explaining the concepts behind the learning menu activities. Each class visited all four teachers. The four workshops were:

Circuit basics (run by Mr Cronin)
Conductors & insulators (run by Mrs RP)
Circuits in the world around us (run by Mr Clements)
Technical drawings & circuit designs (run by Ms Lipczyk)

It was fantastic to see the engagement of all students. As a teaching team we were able to witness conceptual development in front of our eyes. There were so many great questions and connections. I wish we could teach like this ALL the time.

After our workshops we presented the whole unit with an invention challenge. In small groups they needed to design and build a device that met certain criteria.

We were initially working to a very tight time frame but decided to extended design/build time considerably.

Each class has since held a showcase of inventions. Every student was given $1000 to invest in their peers’ inventions as they saw fit. They were required to justify their investment along the same lines as the design brief. (E.g. I’m investing $750 in this device because it solves this particular problem really creatively rather than I’m investing $1000 in this device because my best friend made it.) We tallied the investment and it was a very close tie between our top two inventions. In the end Kyra, Niki and Jess’ invention won with their ‘Lighter Night’ device (hands free portable night light) by less than $300! I was VERY impressed by all of the VRPs’ creativity.

The most heavily invested invention from each class will be presented to the whole unit. The teachers will then have money to invest and we will determine an overall winner.

Each group’s invention will be assessed against the rubric you can find here: Inventors’ Forum Rubric

Good luck Kyra, Niki and Jess!

ILP

Posted on September 22, 2014 by mrsrp

Every term each VRP researches and presents (VERY creatively I might add) an inquiry project on a topic of their own choice. At the end of the first two terms we held exhibitions of the projects and invited the whole school. Parents and families have joinedus for the last hour of the day, and we’ve had a yummy range of treats to celebrate our learning.

Here’s a couple of examples.

Kyra’s inquiry project was on Forensic Science. She produced an iBook and gave people the opportunity to have their fingerprinted tested for whorls, arches and twirls.

Avril made the Colosseum from sweet biscuits and icing! Right down to Chico baby statues in the arches!!!

We’re due for another exhibition this week but unfortunately we need to postpone until next term. Stay tuned for a date and photos.

Our new pets!

Posted on September 16, 2014 by mrsrp

These are our new spiny leaf insect pets. Can you help us think of names for them?

It’s Electrifying!

Posted on September 15, 2014 by mrsrp

Welcome to Holly Unit’s very own Science Week! This week we will be learning about electrical circuits through a series of hands on activities and workshops.

Our first day will involve a ‘learning menu’ of activities designed to explore circuits, devices, conductors & insulators. The idea behind the ‘learning menu’ is that everyone will have the opportunity to choose the activities they want to use to explore these ideas. The instructions for this first session are:

Choose activities from the menu that meet YOUR learning needs. You need to do at least one activity from ALL three sections, so keep an eye on the time.
Take photos of each activity that you do.
At the end of the session choose one photo from each section (circuits, devices, conductors & insulators) and use it as evidence of your learning using one of the following reflection sentence starters:

In this photo I’m learning…
In this photo I realised that…
In this photo I couldn’t figure out how to…
In this photo I’m trying to work out…
This photo shows when I changed my thinking about…

You will have (at least) three photos in your reflection. PLEASE see your class teacher to find out which app to use for your reflection.

Circuits

Light Bulb Moment

Can you make the light turn on?

Diode and Dough

Build a circuit with playdough and diodes

Circuits websites

http://www.hyperstaffs.info/science/work/physics/child/main.html

http://www.learningcircuits.co.uk

http://www.andythelwell.com/blobz/guide.html

http://powerup.ukpowernetworks.co.uk/under-11/circuits.aspx

Devices

The Electrical Version of the Sandbox

How do circuits change when you include a device?

Everyday Devices

Try building a circuit with a switch using every day classroom items.

Devices websites

http://www.bbc.co.uk/education/clips/zxrb4wx

http://www.bbc.co.uk/schools/scienceclips/ages/10_11/changing_circuits_fs.shtml

http://www.playkidsgames.com/games/circuitGame/#

Conductors & Insulators

Does this Classroom Conduct?

Build a circuit with the conductivity tester.
Test everyday classroom items for conductivity.
Create a table of conductors / insulators.

Dough or D’oh?

Build a circuit that will test the conductivity
of these doughs?
What’s the difference between these doughs? Hint: check the ingredients list.

Insulators and Conductors websites

http://www.sciencekids.co.nz/gamesactivities/circuitsconductors.html

http://www.physicsclassroom.com/class/estatics/Lesson-1/Conductors-and-Insulators

http://www.slideshare.net/xnpsp5/electrical-conductors-and-insulators

Way Back Wednesday WWII

Posted on September 10, 2014 by mrsrp

Hi all!

Our WBW topic today was WWII. Most VRPs knew at least something about WWII but learnt a lot more today. We had a quick look at the wide range of reasons that WWII started and then looked at Hitler’s Final Solution.

The reflection questions tonight focus on the values behind actions rather than remembering facts.

Why might the German people have stood by while the Nazis killed millions of innocent people? OR
Link our school values to the behaviour of someone like Oskar Schindler.

Here’s a screenshot of the answergarden.ch word cloud that the VRPs created during our discussion.

Mrs RP.

Maths Timetable Challenge

Posted on September 9, 2014 by mrsrp

You should hear the buzz in the classroom! I’ve just set the VRPs a challenge:

They will be posting their plans on their blogs. Keep an eye out!

Moving forward

Posted on September 6, 2014 by mrsrp

Welcome back! It’s been a long time since we started this blog and, to be honest, we’ve been quite slack in moving forward with it. There’s no real reason other than we haven’t made it a priority. Other learning has been taking our attention!

Since we last (first) posted we’ve started and finished units of learning about ancient Greece, Rome and Egypt. Each student in the building chose one of those civilisations and undertook a series of inquiries into their history. We shared and celebrated this learning with an expo of everyone’s projects. It was inspiring to see the commitment to research and creativity in presentation.

We’ve also complete another round of Independent Learning Projects. Every term the VRPs each research a topic entirely of their own choice and present it in whatever way they think fits best. We set up the classroom as a museum and invite the rest of the school to come and learn from us. The last collection of topics ranged from the development of modern forensic science to a comparison of eastern and western pharmacology. (Can you tell that we had a science focus?) Inspiring stuff! Our next round of ILP is well underway: stay tuned for photos in a few weeks after the exhibition.

Our other project focus at the moment is about water. Every VRP is looking closely at the water situation of particular locations around the world. The whole class designed a rubric for their learning that involves the production of a multimodal text to share learning about the links between water and the economy, health and culture of the particular locations. I think we’re going to see Glogs on Glogster.com (although our school server seems to be challenging those attempts… grrr), iMovies, Keynote presentations, podcasts and installations that will hold iPads with iMovies. Hopefully there will be photos to share.

Following an inspiring conference with Dan Haesler about engagement and the power of technology I (Mrs RP) am making the commitment to blog much more regularly. Sometimes I’d have long posts, other times shorter. Feel free to prod me if you think I’m not keeping it up! Please also take the time to check out the VRPs’ blogs. Comments make our days!

Mrs RP.