We have finally done the full launch of our classroom economy! Think Monopoly... but lived out in real time...earning money, owning property, buying other people's property... So what are our properties? We each got to choose a recognizable place from around Pitt Meadows as our own and laid claim to that property on our cubby baskets. We call it our "house", even though we clearly will not be taking up residence in these places. In order to continue living in our "houses", we need to pay rent for them every week, just like grown-ups do! We all have assigned jobs (which rotate from week to week) and when we do our jobs well, we are rewarded with a nickel for our efforts. vWe can earn nickels in other ways, too - by having Madame catch us being helpful and by speaking in French. Madame keeps track of how often we make an effort to speak in French by moving our beads on the class rekenreks. At the end of the day, we are paid out in nickels for all of the beads we have moved. There have been so many more attempts at French-speaking going on this week!... it's been glorious! We collect our nickels in our personal money boxes and at the end of the week, we get to use our money to purchase something from the class store... to keep... like, forever! #mindsblown! We have been counting down the days until store day ("le magasin") ever since. But here's the catch... we can't make any purchases until we have done two things first: 1. paid rent on our home 2. donated a nickel to charity (because it is just as important to learn about giving as it is to learn about spending and saving) As a class, we decided that we really wanted to do something to help animals. So we will donate our nickels every week and in June, we will add up all of the coins that we have collected and Madame will match our donation and send a cheque to the SPCA! (Your children do not need to bring in any money from home for this venture. They are using the nickels provided in class. But if you would like to make an added donation, you're welcome to do so.) But circling back to our "homes", here's the thing... not everyone wants to rent their home for the rest of their life. Some of us would prefer to OWN our home and get rid of those pesky rent payments. So, if we save up 10X our rent ($0.50), we can PURCHASE our home and never have to pay a nickel to Madame again! We love this idea in theory, but it's much harder to fork over the $0.50 on store day when we would rather spend our hard-earned nickels on the frivolous items in front of us. We can even continue to save our nickels and buy up other properties so that other people have to pay rent to US!! Cha-ching! You will be amazed at how we begin to catch on to all of these adult concepts through play. In other news, we have begun learning about a special festival in Quebec called "Carnaval". We located Quebec on Google Earth and were super excited to find out that we would probably be going there for REAL when we're in Grade 7... an airplane field trip with the class! "Carnaval" is a huge winter party with dog sledding, ice sculptures, tubing, toboganning, ice buildings, and so much more. The mascot for Carnaval is a snowman called "Bonhomme Carnaval". We decided to try making our very own "Bonhommes Carnavals" with the fake snow from our classroom. The Bonhomme Carnaval wears a special belt called a "ceinture fléchée". These belts were often worn by French Canadians and the Métis and tell a story about the culture of the person who created it. The patterns and styles were passed down as part of a family's heritage and identity. So in class, we made our own paper versions of "les ceintures fléchées" by weaving colourful strips of paper, representing each of our family members' favourite colours. We also watched a video about the amazing ice sculptures that are made every year for Carnaval and we tried our hand at making our own sculptures out of sugar cubes. This was as much a cultural lesson as it was a learning experience on how to work together as a team to create a plan, communicate our intentions, and resolve conflict. We learned about the art of compromise and about how to adapt when things don't go as you planned. Other exciting news of the week... we got a trampoline! It has been very helpful for getting out some "wiggles" and for improving our French counting. (We need to count to 20 in French and then it's the next person's turn). But apparently it's not just good for bouncing... we've also enjoyed just hanging out on it. Extra pics... Thank you to Michelle for coming to the forest with us this week and for taking some of these pictures. :-)
Happy New Year!! Ok, we may be 2 weeks into January already, but this was our first "real" week back to school so it warranted a celebration. Throughout the day on Monday, we took turns popping a balloon for a special surprise activity - going for a run outside, playing a game, and our favourite: a flashlight dance party. We even figured out that holding the ball pit balls onto our flashlights made them glow like little luminescent orbs. ![]() Madame has told us that there's no more free-loading around here. It's time we start earning our keep. We've all been assigned daily jobs now that we'll keep for one week before rotating to another one. For the most part, we've adapted to working life quite well, though some have started wondering about vacation days and pensions. So far there has been no talk of unionizing so we'll call that a win. Next week we will begin earning real money for our jobs but Madame says we need a trial probation and training period. More to come on that... For now, we are learning to clean the guinea pigs' cage and give them water/food, water the plant, sharpen pencils, pick up garbage, and much more. As we prepare to earn money, we need to learn about different coins and how to skip-count. We will all start with nickels and work our way up to other coin combinations so Madame introduced us to a new counting song that she made with her kids. Even though we're in French Immersion, Madame has decided to teach us the English terminology for the coins since this is what we will be using in our day-to-day lives. So instead of saying the mouthful French phrase, "une pièce de 5 sous", we just say "un 'nickel'". ![]() When we worked on our counting collections this week, some of us began practicing our French skip-counting by organizing our collections into groups of 5. Others stretched their skills by attempting to count collections that went all the way to 80, 90, or even 100! And some of us preferred the coloured rows approach. The great thing about "counting collections" is that we can use whichever strategy suits us best! Afterward, we discuss what others have tried and are sometimes inspired to do that ourselves the next time. Madame really tested out the old theory this week that "there's no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing." Wednesday was pouring buckets so we had two indoor recesses and by the afternoon, we were getting very squirrelly. It was time to get outside. But since there's no rest for the weary, Madame fashioned a make-shift tent with a tarp and made the Grade 1s do their regular Math work before running off to play. The experience must not have been too torturous, though, because some of our Kindies were inspired to voluntarily try some Math, too. It really is amazing how refreshed we feel after a romp in the mud and rain... Thankfully the weather cleared up for us on Thursday for our forest walk. We've begun learning to tie knots! Some of us caught on right away, but for others it may take a few more weeks of practice, but we'll get it eventually! Sadly, we discovered 2 dead birds. We decided to give them a proper burial and made sure to treat them with respect since they were living creatures. We took turns digging the holes, fashioned make-shift "crosses", and Aaron led us all in some prayers. And today was "Black Excellence Day"!...a day to think about Black history and learn about Black stories and Black people, and to show them we care. Madame wasn't at school today, but the TTOC communicated that we were fascinated by the story of Viola Desmond, a black Canadian hero who is featured on our Canadian $10 bill. We also learned about Martin Luther King Jr. and his dream to see all people treated equally, regardless of the colour of their skin. We made special paper crowns that said, "I have a dream" (J'ai un rêve). Extra pics... Thank you to Lincoln's family for donating this marble run toy that has been wildly popular!
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