November 28, 2011

Santa Clara Shoeboxes and Kinette Christmas Hampers

Our first donation arrived today.  Thank you for your generousity!

Social Studies 7

Many students did not have the current events completed, so I extended it to tomorrow.  It will be marked for sure tomorrow.

We began unit 2 and looking at exploration.  Students discussed four questions regarding space exploration:

1. If you were to explore space, what might be your reasons?
2. What would worry you most about space exploration?
3. What would intrigue you most?
4. You might be gone for months or years.  As you plan for such an expedition, what would be your top priority preparations?

The answers the students provided were very similar to what motivated the European Explorers to travel to new lands.

Social Studies 8

We corrected the Daylight Savings Time current events.  This included two additional topics: Alberta Elects New Premier, and Canada Has World's Best Reputation.

We then looked at reasons for exploration.  One explorer, Marco Polo, had a different worldview than many other Europeans of the time.  We discussed the geographical influences and then assigned pages 44 and 46 in the textbook to further explore factors that led to the rise of trade.

Religion 8

Students participated in an Advent Celebration today for the beginning of class.  We are asked to remember to keep Christ in Christmas and what Jesus gave us at this time.

Health 8

Students worked through the beginning of the My Digital Identity project.  Students explored what an identity is, what a digital identity is and what they think their digital identity currently is.  We then came up with a list of questions students would like to know about their digital identities:

• Can you ever delete your digital identity?
• Would people want to hack me for personal information?
• Will my texts be seen on Google?
• What other supposedly private things end up on Google?
• Is it bad that I have a small digital identity and can find much about myself?
• What else is there out there about me that I don't know about?
• How many/who can see my information?
• Do the emails I send end up on Google or Bing?
• What happens when I go on chat sites? 
• How do you cover up a post or a picture that wasn't intended?

As we explore digital identity over the next few weeks, students will hopefully find answers to some of these questions as well as come to understand what digital identity they currently have created.  They will come away from the project with ideas on how to create the digital identity they want.