How the world works!!!!

This week we began our 5th Unit of Inquiry under the theme - How the World Works. We are going to be investigating about - 'The design of buildings and structures is dependent upon environmental factors, human ingenuity, and available materials.'

We began the unit with a provocation:

We came to class and found a HUGE pile of different construction materials in the room- cardboard, newspaper, boxes, sticky tape, glue, plastic wrap, play dough, chopsticks, tooth picks, foam, toilet rolls, fabric, string, etc.- 

We went crazy with them and let our creative juices flow to make something out of the waste.

At each step we kept reflecting on the process we were going through while building.

Once we were done we sat back and looked at all our reflections and tried to put them in groups. 

We realized that these were things that architects did. We decided to brainstorm on what materials architects use and how.

We decided to put our structures to test. we tested to see if they could withstand ....air, weight and water. 

Take a look at what happened - 

Taking into consideration all that we had been doing over the past days we tried to guess what our new UOI is going to be about.

It was time to unfold the central idea. We looked at the central idea and looked up the dictionary for words we didn't know about. 

We went for a walk outside to see what were the materials available to build buildings and structures around us.

We came back and made a collage from magazines and newspapers and looked at the properties of these materials. 

We then put our thoughts and wondering on a See/Think/Wonder chart

"What I THINK I know/what I WANT to know/HOW I can find out/what I LEARNED"

In Language, we are looking at elements of a story.

This week we celebrated Dr Seuss's birthday. We read several of his books and researched a few facts about him. 

This week we also had a fun assembly by Grades 1 and 5 who made a few of the characters  from the world of Dr Seuss come alive.Thank you Ms. Ceclia and Ms. Jessica for helping them put together such an informative assembly.

In  Math, we are learning about measurement. We began by learning about non standardized units of measurement.

We also learnt about standardized units of measurements like centimeter, meter and kilometer.

What a colorful way to end the week.
Thank you Grade 1 and Ms. Jessica for arranging this celebration for all of us. We thoroughly enjoyed it.

 HAPPY HOLI TO EVERYONE!!!!