Another year over....look how they have grown!

It was a combination of the review of our unit on liquids, some chemistry

a little bit of vocabulary, and a whole lot of fun!  Today, our class explored

lemonade!

Every student had the chance to squeeze the lemon so that it could produce more juice,

and then, using a borrowed electric citrus juicer, each student got to squeeze half a lemon.

We watched as the empty measuring cup went to nearly full!

We looked up how to make old fashioned lemonade using a simple syrup.

This is where the chemistry came in.  We received the words dissolved

and evaporated,

We had a great conversation about how a stove works, watched the bubbles to understand the word boiling, and then let the simple syrup cool in the fridge.  To make a simple syrup, use equal parts sugar and water.

We knew we wanted to compare two different flavours, so strawberries were mashed and then added to one of the batches (new word to most of the students).

Each student got to taste each of the lemonades that we made together.

They had to remember which one they liked best because....

we collected data (using tally marks) to see which of the two flavours was most liked.

The data was first turned into a pictograph and then a regular graph.

Here are the results on our white board.

I just want again, to thank each and every parent for trusting your precious child to me.  I know that I didn't do everything right, but I sure did try my best to help your child on their education journey, with a great emphasis on Our Loving Father's guidance.  May they always know His love!

The children and I talked a lot over the last few weeks about being 'bored'.

Here's what we decided the students could do if they ever said that 'b' word during the summer:

a) visit the library and choose a book to read, cover to cover, a little bit every day

(That book should be a challenging one....not one that would be too easy....

they are great readers now!  Search for Big Nate, Junie B. Jones and Magic Tree House)

b)  practise using a keyboard....ask a parent about getting an app on their device, or being allowed to use the computer in the house, specifically to learn how to use all ten fingers to keyboard....it will be a skill that they will be happy to know how to do!

c)  Keep a journal for the summer.  Encourage at least 5 sentences everyday, keeping them using correct spelling, conventions and details along with interesting vocabulary.  Add some drawing.  Maybe they saw an interesting bird while you were camping....draw it and label its parts....or maybe you're made S'Mores....can your child write the steps on how it was done?

d) practise math facts....especially subtraction.  In Grade Two, the students are only required to 'know' the facts to 5+5 or the inverse operation so 25 - 5, etc.  The truth is that knowing all the facts addition to 20 and subtraction from 20 (that includes ones like 6 + 8 or 19 - 12) will make their math journey so much easier.  These are great to practise on road trips, on the way to hockey camps, playing various forms of card games, etc.  There are games on the computer for practising, but these are often too focused on the 'fun' of jumping or shooting after getting a few correct, rather than on the actual facts themselves.  How about a competition.....how many days before I know all the 8's or 5's.... or how to subtract any number from 12?

d) just be bored....let the child come up with something to do....it helps their imagination, it allows them to think outside of the box, encourages them to play with their siblings, or invite a neighbour from down the street to ride bikes or some other such summer memory creating moment.  Don't fall into the trap of being your child's entertainment or chauffeur.  Create a list together early in the summer of what you are willing to do as a family.  Do one thing on the list every few days....visit the zoo, have a picnic, walk to the spray park....but otherwise, encourage the child solve their problem on their own.  By the end of the summer, you will see a much more confident kiddo 

ready to take on the world!