Last Day of School

Have a great summer everyone!  Thanks for another fantastic year together.

Summer-Watering Volunteers Still Needed

Hello friends and family of Dr. E. W. Coffin School, We are still looking for volunteers to help us out over the summer months to water our plants that are in our gardens outside.  If you can help us out, please see our watering schedule to sign-up for a date that works for you.  We need watering of the Sun Circle garden and of our new(er) aspen trees.  Please use this link to register: https://www.signupgenius.com/go/60B0A45ADA92BA2FA7-summer We will send specific watering instructions after you have signed up. If you have any questions about watering, please contact Larysa and Miho at drcoffinenvironment@gmail.com Thank you! Larysa and Miho (parent volunteers)

Dr. E. W. Coffin School 5615 Barrett Drive NW, Calgary, AB  T2L 1W4    403.777.6190

Reminders

Reminders

Tomorrow at 2:00 is the grade six farewell assembly.  We will also have a brief year end assembly tomorrow morning.

Wednesday is the last school day and the students will be receiving their report cards. They will be dismissed at noon.

Students will be taking home their belongings and school work tomorrow. Please send a bag if it will not fit into their back pack.

Summer-Watering Volunteers Still Needed

Hello friends and family of Dr. E. W. Coffin School, We are still looking for volunteers to help us out over the summer months to water our plants that are in our gardens outside.  If you can help us out, please see our watering schedule to sign-up for a date that works for you.  We need watering of the Sun Circle garden and of our new(er) aspen trees.  Please use this link to register: https://www.signupgenius.com/go/60B0A45ADA92BA2FA7-summer We will send specific watering instructions after you have signed up. If you have any questions about watering, please contact Larysa and Miho at drcoffinenvironment@gmail.com Thank you! Larysa and Miho (parent volunteers)

Boat Challenge

Reminders:
Since the weather looks unpredictable for tomorrow we will not be going to Nose Hill.  You are still Welcome to join your child's class for the time that they will be spending with Saakokoto.  This will be 11:40 - 12:15 for the grade one and two students.  Thank you to those of you that had offered to volunteer.


Learning Highlights:
Today we made our boats for our boat challenge.  They had to carry cargo, move without being pushed and also float without sinking.  After we finished building our boats we tested them and then most of us had to redesign or fix things that didn't seem to work.   We will be revisiting our rubric targets tomorrow to see how we did with the boat challenge.  Here are some photos:

Transition Grade Switch Day

Reminders:
We will be selling treat again at recess tomorrow.
If you are available to help with sports day please let me know.
If you are able to come on Friday for our school wide trip up to Nose Hill, weather allowing, please let me know.
Learning Highlights:
Today was our transition day to see what the next grade was going to be like.  We only went to the other grade for one hour.
Here is what the grade twos did today when they went to the grade three class.

These were our ideas and impressions:
Grade twos did a survey question and made it into a graph.
We think grade three will be really fun.
The teacher uses a bell to remind us to stop and take two deep breaths.
We got to choose our buddy from the new grade fours that helped us while we were there.
We noticed that there were more grade twos than grade threes.

There grade ones stayed and helped to be big buddies to the kindergartners coming to our rooms next year. We did a measuring activity using cubes.  We had to measure different body parts and then record it on a sheet.  Then we colored the body and we each got to take home our half of the person.
We think we were really good big buddies

Here are some photos:

Reminders

Reminders

Our ice cream celebration will be Thursday morning.  Mrs. Kid will be buying Vanilla ice cream and toppings.  The toppings will be strawberry and chocolate and whipping cream.

Monday morning will be sports day! If you would like to help please let me know.

Wednesday is treat day from the Environment Team.  The money will go towards environmental pursuits at the school.

This Friday we are hoping to enjoy our last Fresh Air Friday up on Nose Hill. Saakokoto will be with us and will share stories of the land and Summer Solstice with each class. We require volunteers for the walk to Nose Hill. If you are able to volunteer, please let me know. We are also planning to have some fun activities up on the hill. We will head up to Nose Hill at 9 AM and return by 11:30.

Planting our Sun Circle Garden and a plant walk in the Whispering Woods and Natureground

A very big thank you to all the parents that helped us get our beds ready for planting.  It was a big job and we could not have done that on our own!

Today we planted potatoes, beets, carrots and squash.
Before we went outside we watched a video for how to plant a potato.  These are the things we had to remember for planting:
The seed potatoes had to be planted at least 5-7 inches apart.
The trench had to be about 6 inches deep.  We dug three long trenches in each of the two planters.
The eye of the potato had to be sticking upwards.
Once the potato was planted we had to cover it up gently with soil.

We also learned that potatoes are ready for picking when the plant is not longer growing or flowering and it begin s to yellow or brown a bit.

We went for a plant walk out in the woods and Nature ground and we saw lots of plants blooming.  Can you guess what these plants are called:
These names are in a random order, can you match them to the plant?
Old Man Whiskers
Golden Bean also known as Buffalo Beans
Alberta Rose
Purple Vetch
Daisy
Purple sticky Geranium
Wild Blue Flax












These names are in random order:

Making It Move, Ice Cream Party

We won the ice cream party!  Congratulations to us for getting all our books back! 

Learning Highlights

This afternoon we had to create some things for out boats that will make them move.

First we had to build a frame for a peddle boat.  We had three shapes to choose from.  Two had four sticks and one had five sticks.  One was shaped like a house, one like a square and the other was a diamond shape.  We had to make sure that the joints did not move after they were taped because that meant they were stronger than if they moved.  Tomorrow we will test it after we add the paddle and the elastic.  We watched a video that shows how they work.  The more you wind the elastic the faster the boat goes.  It works by having a wheel that turns and pushes the water back which then pushed the boat forward.

We had to design a sail for our second boat.  We had to think about making sure it could catch the wind enough to move the boat.  Everyone in the group had to choose a shape and then tomorrow we will test to see which shape will work the best.  Tomorrow we will have to attach the boat and the mast to the sail.

Which sail can make my boat move the most?

Working Hard to get Things Done...

Learning Highlights

We worked on our Nova Scotia projects during center time.  When we finish, we get to share it with the class.  Some of us are working with buddies and some of us are working on our own.  Some of us like using google slides because we can add in pictures instead of trying to draw pictures.

In story writing, some of us have finished our friends and feedback and have moved on to writing our stories.  When we finish writing we can also choose to type up our story.  We have to have a final edit with Mrs. Hamby once our story is finished and before we type it up.  When the story is written or typed we get to work on the illustrating.

This is our final week with our number operations math groups.  Today Mrs. Armour's group and Mrs. Hamby's group worked on using a number line to solve addition and subtraction equations.  Mrs. Yoon's group worked on expanding numbers.  Some of the numbers were really big ones.  A good challenge!

In science we worked on reflections for the stability testing that we did last week.  After our reflections are done, we will move on to testing various ways to make boats move.

Reminders:

Please remember to send all library books and all home reading books back to school.  We hope to win the ice cream party for being the first class to get all our library books back.

Library Books and Home Reading Books

It is that time of the year when all books need to be returned.  In library today, Mrs. Kidd gave out notices for those who still have to return books.  Please send in any home reading books that may still be at home as well.

A very big thank you to all the volunteers we had this year for our home reading program.  Also a big thank you to Angie for helping us with our volunteers and schedules over the last two years and her help in getting the Home Reading program volunteers organized and underway.  We truly appreciate all your time and support.

Outriggers

Today we added outriggers to our canoes. We learned that:
- the part that is added to the canoe allows the canoe to have more balance to carry cargo because it makes it wider and that makes it harder to tip over.
- You can have a double sided outrigger.
- The outrigger keeps the boat more steady.
- we learned that the outrigger helps to steady narrow boats when they have to carry cargo.
- You can carry more cargo when you add an outrigger.



After we experimented we had to answer three reflection questions:

Cargo Challenge

Sharing our ideas, what should we try?

Supplies for the challenge

Working as a team

Cargo makes it tip and roll

Readjusting

 


Here is what we discovered in the cargo challenge :
- Try to balance the cargo on both sides of the boat so that the weight is equal.
- It is hard to keep a bottle boat from rolling or tipping when cargo is added because of the long narrow shape and curved sides.
- The air in the bottle helped the bottle to float.
- Keep the water out of the bottle so that it stays afloat.
- If you want to make the boat more stable you could add a keel.
- The popsicle sticks attached with elastics on the bottom of the boat helped to stabilize the boat.
- One elastic on the top and one on the bottom helped to balance the weight and stabilize the boat because the weight was equal.
- If the weight is not equal it will tip the boat.
- Our bottle represented a canoe.
- When you are the cargo in a canoe the weight has to be balanced on both sides or in the middle so that the canoe doesn't tip.