Wednesday 29 May 2013

ANTS!


We have a problem in our classroom and it's been a problem all year long!  We have ants!  Not just one or two ants.  And we don't see them all the time.  BUT we have noticed we have lots of ants in certain places in our classroom. A scrap of food on the floor under our snack table seems to be an invitation for ants to enter our classroom.  A bit of cracker kicked behind our door appears to be a dinner invitation for more ants. Even in winter we still had ants appearing to eat/collect scraps of food.

DG loudly asked the question one day "Why are there so many ants?" And so an inquiry began.  

MJ - D talk to us about what you are thinking.  You are the one who got this investigation going.

DG - That’s because I like ants because they’re small, tiny and only small ants are babies.  I like babies. 

RM - Hey I like babies too.

NB - Some aren't baby ants.  Some are grown up ants.

RM - Yeah some are big grown up and some are going to be this huge.  

NB - These are grown up ants (points to photo). 



MJ - DG how do you know if an ant is a baby or grown up?

DG - Because there’s God to take care of babies or grown ups and babies have to grow up so some ants will have to be babies and if they aren’t babies then they really are grown ups.

MJ - DG do you think these are grown ups or babies (referring to photo)?

DG - Well they do look big there.  But out here they’ll just look this big (uses his fingers to show length of ant on floor) and baby ants this big (and he reduces size between fingers). 

MJ - So are you suggesting these are magnified to look bigger.

RM - Yeah and some ants can look this small.



 


This video was captured in our classroom in the space between our garbage can and the snack table.  



L - I can’t believe something so small can move something so big!  The ant is so little and the popcorn is so big!


MJ - I’m wondering how long would that piece of popcorn feed his family?



Our OISE teacher candidate Ms. G took an interest in the investigation and continued to provoke thinking during her time in our classroom. 

C - When I was drawing my ant I noticed these things…(pointing to antennae)

Ms G. - Do you know what they are?


C - No


Ms G. - Should we find out?


C - Yes!


After doing research by watching a few short video clips:






RH - Those things are called antenna's.  I think they have them to smell and hear.

DG - They have to suck the juice out with them, out of the leaves.

RH - I thought ants chew their food.

NB - I know how they hear.  They have these....

RH - They're antennes.

NB - The hear with them and they smell with them. 

BG - They like eat what we eat.  They can eat other animals like insects. 

Ms G - How do you know that?

LF - I know the holes that you said.  When they make their home, that's what the girl said, they dig the holes in the ground. 


Ms G  supported students as they created plasticine ants using a similiar technique demonstrated by one of our favourite illustrators Barbara Reid. 








At our Ant Inquiry Centre Ms G and our research team of students continued to investigated ants by watching/listening to a video on the ipads.  

http://www.videolin.com/animals/amazing-ant-facts-fun-science-facts-for-children-at-amazing-science-with-ms-katie


N - Ants have holes.   
Ms. G - What else did we learn from the video?
N - Ants have two stomachs.
R - Ants don’t have ears.
Ms G. - How do they find food?
N - They have tiny eyes

Looking closely at the different ants they noticed there are red ants and black ants.
C - They may be friends.
C - They remind me of the red ants outside that crawled up my arm and bit me.  

Ms G. -  Why do you think they did that?


C - They think your skin is food.
R - Black ants don’t bite.

The team read from the book Ant Cities by Arthur Dorros
http://www.amazon.com/Ant-Cities-Lets-Read-Find-Out-Science/dp/0064450791
which pushed their thinking further.

RH - Ants go down below when it is cold.

R - I helped an ant make a home before.  I added sand. 

KL - I helped an ant make a home too. 


Our latest wondering:  What is an ant colony?

MJ - You started telling me something about the ant colony.  What do you know?

JC - The ant colony.  Oh yeah, um like the ant colony is a type of hill and it has a hole in it and that's where the ants go through it.  They have sticky on their legs to get down the ant hill, like inside when there's danger and they fight the mosquitos with squirters.

MJ - K what were you going to tell us about ants?

KL - They eat skitos.

JC - When they hear danger coming their eyes go big and they hear danger from their...(motions to head and antennae).

MJ - Their antennae like R told us?

JC - Yeah.

Thank you to Ms G for being part of our Team at Jersey.  We will miss you.  As we continue our investigations we hope you will visit our blog often with your wonderings and inspirational comments.   


Sunday 26 May 2013

Granny's egg problem continues!


Granny's egg problems continue!

Granny finally wrote us back after returning from her vacation in Florida.  She was still having problems with her eggs and asked us for help.  
(Setting the context)







(Working on it)
Our team was eager to help Granny.  Group 1 played with eggs and a carton that had been cut down to hold 10 as granny had instructed.  Once partners had considered different ways to make 10 with their coloured eggs they recorded their thinking.   Below are some examples of this.









(Math Meeting)
A few of these solutions were then brought back to the members of  Group 1 to share the thinking.  This group is quite comfortable subitizing numbers and are now being challenged to think about part part whole and in some cases hierarchical inclusion of numbers.  We began the challenge by having CB come to the SMARTboard and show us one way to make 10 with coloured dots on a ten frame.  She made the colours "in a pattern" (blue, pink, blue, pink) and then explained that there were 5 on the top and 5 on the bottom which makes 10, which everyone in this group easily recognized.

Here are some additional conversations, based on the work students did following the introduction of granny's letter and our initial conversation:  

First student work sample shared.


MJ - LK what are you thinking?
LK - The bottom is different because 5 blues are at the top and 2 blues are at the bottom and 3 reds are at the bottom.  
MJ - So is that 10? 
LK - Yes.
MJ - How do you know that?
LK - It just looks different.
MJ - Help us to understand how that's 10 
LK - 5 plus 4 plus 1 more equals 10.  
MJ - Does anybody see a different way to tell granny?
KB - 7 blues and 3 reds make 10.
MJ - How do you know there are 7 blues?
KB - Cause I counted in my brain when Liam was talking. 
MJ - How did you count?
KB - 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.
MJ - Anybody else...what did you see?
EA - 4 and 6 makes 10.  
MJ - Can you come and circle the 4 and the 6 you are talking about? (She circles 2 on top and 2 on bottom together as the group of 4, then 3 on top and 3 on bottom together as group of 6).

Second student work sample shared.


MJ - What would you tell granny about this one?
LF - 4 and 2. (He circles 2 on top and 2 on bottom together as group of 4 and then circles the next 2 yellow together as a group of 2 working left to right across the ten frame.) 
MJ - And what's 4 and 2 more?
LF - 6. Then 1 more .... (top green)
MJ - Is how many?
LF - 7 and 3 more (3 remaining green) is 10. 

MJ - Did anybody see it a different way?
CL - 2 and 2 makes 4 (green dots) then 6 more (yellow dots) makes 10 (working from right to left). 
LF - He almost like copied me!

Third student work sample shared.


MJ - EA come and share your thinking.
EA - 7 and 3.
MJ - Makes how many?
EA - 10.
MJ - How do you know that's 7 (blues dots).
EA - Because 5 and one more makes 6 and one more makes 7. 
MJ - So you actually went with the friendly 5 and then counted on. 

MJ - Are there any more ideas to share with granny?
BG adds a final thought to this last work sample discussion.  
BG - 3 and 2 more makes 5 (working across top row) and 3 more makes 7 and 2 more makes 10. (working across bottom row)
MJ - You said 3 and 2 makes 5 and 3 more makes 7 and 2 more makes 10. (I write an open number line as I re-voice what he said.)
(LK has thumb down as BG talks)
LK - 3 and 2 more makes 5 and then 6 , 7, 8, and then 9 and 10. 
MJ - What do you think BG. LK says 3 and 2 more makes 5 and.... 
LK - 3 more makes 8 and then 2 more makes 10
BG - I agree. 
MJ - What did LK say?
BG - 3 and 2 more makes 5 and 3 more makes 8 and 2 more makes 10.  
MJ - Can you show us here (on SMARTboard) what you are thinking. 

Some really great strategies were shared here.  We can't wait to hear what granny thinks.  

Groups 2 and 3 work to help granny too!





Group 2 had the same challenge working with the smaller carton of 10, using 2 colours of eggs.  The focus was on orally sharing their thinking. This group is developing strategies of thinking beyond 1 to 1 tagging and counting,  with a focus on explaining thinking by subitizing and cardinality.  


Group 3 worked with the same egg carton of 10 using 2 colours of eggs, but their challenge was to simply figure out how many eggs were in the carton. (This group is still working on 1 to 1 tagging and counting consistency, subitizing to 10, cardinality).  Each time the number of eggs was changed and partners worked together to figure out how many, how do you know, do you agree with what your partner said.  It is interesting with this group to listen to them help each other with strategies.  

AP - 3 on top and 4 on the bottom makes 7.
VP - AP can you...what you say?
AP - 3 on top and 4 on bottom makes 7. 
        1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.  Five and two more makes......
VP - 7
AP - no 4
VP - 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.  Seven AP!
AP - 5 on top, 1 on bottom makes 7 (she then touches next egg and adds 1 more) 8.
VP - AP go back.  AP you say first 7 now you say 8.  Count slowly AP!

Here is another conversation captured with a pair from group 3:
MJ - LW how many?
LW - 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8.  Eight.
MJ - How many?
LW - 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10.  Ten.
MJ - I'm confused.  First you said 8. Now you said 10. BP how many?
BP - 4 on top, 5 on bottom. That's 9 and one more makes 10.
MJ - So how many?
BP - 9
MJ - LW what do you think?
LW - 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. (She slows down her tagging and counting this time.) Nine.
MJ - Hey how many did you say BG?
BG - 9
MJ - How many LW?
LW - 9

An interesting reflection on my part with this exercise is some students noticed the colours and based their explanations on how many of each colour.  Others organized the eggs by colour but still relied on talking about what they see by subitizing number formations (similiar to dot plate formations) regardless of colour placement.  





Monday 20 May 2013

We Can See by JT

JT was very intrigued by some of the videos other students were making, often hovering around the IMac listening and watching.  He observed for a long time and then approached Mrs. Jelley asking when he too could make a video.  

We talked about what interests he has and with the help of his mom (who provided photos for this video) JT created this video.  

JT and Mrs. J explored all of the photos in the photo book he brought to school, adding sticky notes and text to each photo as JT gave important details.  Then it was up to him to decide which photos would be included in his video (he was to choose 10 photos to make it manageable to complete). Photos were scanned and then inserted into the movie.  We talked about keeping the text 'friendly' like the other videos so included the "We can see....." to each photo description.  

Justin was very proud to share his video with our team and now he would like to share it with you.

Enjoy!  






Zoo To You



Thanks to our parent council, Kindergarten students and staff were given a wonderful opportunity to have Zoo to You visit our school.  In the weeks leading up the visit members of Team Jelleybean engaged in numerous opportunities to research various animals and creatures that might be brought to the school for us to see. Studies included the Tarantula, Scorpian, Hedgehog, Sugar Glider, and Python. 



These are some of the facts discovered:
Scorpians
Scorpians are danger.  They could still bite and pinch. (LK)
The scorpians poop out slime.  (RL)
The scorpian's tail is like a stinger like a bee.  It stings people.  (SB)
Do scorpians eat spiders?  They can if they want. (LE)
Scorpians eat bugs.  (LT)
Baby scorpians go on mom's back. (NB)
Scorpians eat crickets for dinner and for dessert they eat mice and lizards. (RH)
If you touch a scorpian it will sting you.  (LK)
I’m wondering what are baby scorpians called when they are babies?  (BG)

Tarantula 
She makes the web on top of the grass and goes under the leaves and then got 'em.  (KL)
What did she get? (ML)
A mouse. (KL)
The lady said it's just ringing a dinner bell. (RM)
What's like ringing a dinner bell?  (ML)
When the spider gets the mouse it touches the web. (RM)
I’m wondering if something eats spider webs because sometimes there are spiders in my playground. (CC)

Hedgehog 
They eat snakes and worms.  Just like birds, ya they eat worms just like birds. (DG)
They eat snakes, they are so tough with the spiky things on their backs.  They just poke the snakes. (LT)
I discovered hedgehogs eat snakes.  (CL)
Hedgehogs have little spikes that really hurt. (BG)
He eats dead animal bodies?  He rolls up into a ball and then rolls over.  Look how fast he is!  He goes this way, this way, this way and this way!  (MB) 

One animal, the House Hippo (aka Skinny Pig), caused particular interest and as a class we observed a number of video clips, trying to decide which house hippo Zoo to You might bring. 
  
House Hippo commercial

A hippo in the house (Jessica)

Hippo Song



Hippy (Happy) the house hippo. 
www.youtube.com/watch?v=cxJgtrWhaOE

After watching each video students engaged in conversation, discussing which hippo they thought might possibly be brought to our school and why.  Once all 4 videos had been watched students used dots to show their choices.  We used our mathematicians brains to then figure out data gained from this visiual.  




(Which House Hippo do you think they brought? The answer will be at the end of this post!)


Finally the day arrived when Zoo To You came to visit Jersey P.S. 


 

   


















When our principal came to see what all the excitement was about she was encouraged to participate!





Did you guess which house hippo they would bring?  







Thank you to Ms. Bruno (DECE) for arranging this amazing experience for us.  

If you are interested in more information about Zoo To You contact:

705-432-3490