Fractions, decimals and percentage

Over the next six weeks we will be forcusing on fractions, decimals and percentages. WE will go into such things as comparing like decimals, fractions and percentages; subtracting and adding decimals as well as fractions; appling decimals, fractions and percentages to real life situations. This unit ties in very well with our new Inquiry unit in How we express ourselves, where we are focusing on marketing and advertising.  Below is part of the scope and sequance from the IB's maths strand that we will be mostly focusing on.

Number

Our number system is a language for describing quantities and the relationships between quantities. For example, the value attributed to a digit depends on its place within a base system. Numbers are used to interpret information, make decisions and solve problems. For example, the operations of addition, subtraction, multiplication and division are related to one another and are used to process information in order to solve problems. The degree of precision needed in calculating depends on how the result will be used.

Phase 3

Learners will analyse patterns and identify rules for patterns, developing the understanding that functions describe the relationship or rules that uniquely associate members of one set with members of another set. They will understand the inverse relationship between multiplication and division, and the associative and commutative properties of multiplication. They will be able to use their understanding of pattern and function to represent and make sense of real-life situations and, where appropriate, to solve problems involving the four operations.

Phase 4

Learners will understand that the base 10 place value system extends infinitely in two directions and will be able to model, compare, read, write and order numbers to millions or beyond, as well as model integers. They will develop an understanding of ratios. They will understand that fractions, decimals and percentages are ways of representing whole-part relationships and will work towards modelling, comparing, reading, writing, ordering and converting fractions, decimals and percentages. They will use mental and written strategies to solve problems involving whole numbers, fractions and decimals in real-life situations, using a range of strategies to evaluate reasonableness of answers.

When constructing meaning learners:

• model numbers to thousands or

beyond using the base 10 place value

system

• model equivalent fractions

• use the language of fractions, for

example, numerator, denominator

• model decimal fractions to

hundredths or beyond

When constructing meaning learners:

• model decimal fractions to

hundredths or beyond

• model addition and subtraction

of fractions with related

denominators

• model addition and subtraction of

decimals.

When transferring meaning into

symbols learners:

• model decimal fractions to

hundredths or beyond

• read, write, compare and order

fractions

• read and write equivalent fractions

When applying with understanding

learners:

• use decimal fractions in real-life

situations

• add and subtract fractions with

related denominators in real-life

situations

• add and subtract decimals in real-life

situations, including money

• simplify fractions in computation

answers

BAMBA

 School Menu  

Week 4                           21-25 January

Monday                  Kebab stew with bulgur             

                               Veg: Bean stew with bulgur

Tuesday                 Meat balls with potatoes and brown sauce

                               Veg: Falafel with potatoes and brown sauce

Wednesday            Pasta with a creamy spinach sauce

                               Veg: Same as above

Thursday                Fish pudding with melted butter and potatoes

                               Veg: Cauliflower gratin with potatoes

Friday                     Fried sausage and mashed potatoes

                               Veg: Fried soya sausage and mashed potatoes 

                                                  

Every day we serve milk, water, salad, hard bread and margarine

homework week 4

here is the homework for week 4

Due Thursday:

• Maths Practice Book page 138.  Relating fractions and decimals. Don't panic if you don't know how to do this, we will cover it in depth this week.

Due Friday

• Spelling sheet
• Reading Diary

Make sure you also log into Raz Kids at least once a week. I will go in and check on Friday to see who has logged in this week. 

Week 4 and week 3 in review

Dear Parents and students,
welcome to a new week of school! But first, lets look at the week that was...

Last week ended with the handing in of our Inquiry projects which brought the unit to a close. At the start of the unit I asked all the students to write down a question connected to the unit that they wanted answered. Almost all of the students said that what they learnt over the six weeks helped them answer their question. One student who felt that she hadn't found the answer to her question. She was given time to go and research the answer using the knowledge of how cities and infrastructures work.

We also sat our end of unit maths review on Friday as well. We had spend the last week and a half practicing and reviewing so we could be ready for this test. For most, this part was where they demonstrated how much they knew and how well they used their skills of maths to build understanding of things in division that they did not fully know.

We also ended the week with a back wall full of book reviews.

This week we start our new unit in How we express ourselves.

Central Idea: Advertising can influence and affect the success of a product
Lines of Inquiry:

• Advertising is a way of promoting and informing people about products and ideas
• The attractiveness of a promotion will affect how well the product sells
• It is important to know and understand your market

Concepts: Form and Connection
Related Concepts: Advertising, product and consumerism

We will learn about affectingly marketing and promoting a product, as well as branding and having a target audience. We will also be helping Year 5 in the second half of the unit in promoting and advertising the Exhibition.

We have also started a new unit in Maths and in Literacy which tie in very well with this new Inquiry unit. I will write more about them tomorrow.

Week 3 menu

                               School Menu  

Week 3                        14-18 January

Monday                  Fish with cold sauce and potatoes             

                               Veg: Celery sticks, cold sauce and potatoes

Tuesday                 Taco spiced Bolognese with pitta bread/ bulgur

                               Veg: Taco spiced soya Bolognese

Wednesday            Lasagnette (Italian), cheese and tomato sauce

                               Veg Same as above

Thursday                Sausage stroganoff with pasta

                               Veg: Soya sausage stroganoff with pasta

Friday                     Goulash soup with bread and cheese

                               Veg: Bulgarian lentil soup, bread and cheese 

                                

Every day we serve milk, water, salad, hard bread and margarine

week 3 Homework

Homework this week is:

•  to study for the maths test
• continue with Inquiry project
• Book reviews
• go onto Raz kids at least once

Raz Kids help with login

Some people have been having trouble logging into Raz kids since we started with it last week. So to stop any confusion and stress as well as to help anyone who might forget later on how to log in I'll give you step-by-step instructions on how to log in.

1. First go to raz-kids.com where you will find the front page of their website. In the top right hand corner you will find a sign that says 'student login' with a parrot next to it. Click on this.

2. This will take you to a page that will ask for your teachers user name. This is so it can find the right class list for you to choose from. Type in cdayment, then click on the arrow that says 'GO'

3. The class list will come up now. Click on your name.

4. Finally click on the icon(s) in the shape of pictures that is your password. You are now logged in and you can start reading your books.

Note: In future, if you want to find this again quickly click on 'Literacy' on the right hand side column    

Maths test goals and help

Edit: photocopies have been given out as well as the page renascences from the test book and maths practice book;
Text book

• You will find work on division from page 314 on wards
•  You can find a definition of what a composite and prime number is (pages 342 & 343)

Maths Practice Book

• Pages 66 - 86
• Prime and composite numbers p.85 (you will need to know what they are before you start on this page - see text book 342 & 343)
• Division patterns to estimate p.77

Here is a great pdf that you can download and print out or just read, it gives a more in-depth definition of what I just went through above with worksheets. It doesn't cover everything and you don't have to worry about the section on percentage.  

Maths test goals and help

As mentioned earlier this week we will be having our end of unit division test next Friday (18th Jan). Today I am going through what we are going to focus on in the test. I posted on the blog when we started our unit on division our learning goals from the IB. Our test on Friday will have all these elements in it, you can find that post here. Over the whole unit we have focused on these goals and nothing that the students will find in the test will be new or something they haven't done. Below is a more 'user friendly' wording of what students will be asked to express their knowledge of.

• Patterns and rules in division can be found and used to help to solve problems and to be able to describe them using words, symbols and tables. Here is an example of one pattern in division:

• Link division to repeated subtraction. Here is a video that explains what it is:

• The inverse relationship between Division and Multiplication. Fact families are a good and easy way to demonstrate this relationship (/ symbol is used here as a division sign)

15 / 3 = 5

15 / 5 = 3

5 x 3 = 15

3 x 5 =15

• Understand and use a sequence of operations; are you able to do long division? if you are, then you know the sequence of operations for long division.
•  You are able to use and understand the language of division. The big ones are; factor, multiple, product, quotient, divisor, dividend, prime number, composite number, inverse (practice here). 

• To be able to use the language of fractions
• Divide whole numbers
• Know multiplication and division facts. mentally you know; 6 x 7 = 42 or 21 / 3 = 7
• You will be able to use your division skills in real life situations (think of the word problems that we have been doing)
• To be able to pick a method to use to find the answer (product). "Can I solve this mentally or is estimating better or should I work it out on paper?"

This is everything you need to know for the test. I will give you book references and photocopies to help you  review and refresh your knowledge. Here are some links to some online games that can help as well 

POI project-rubric and self-assessment

Here is are extra copies of the assignments if you need extra copies.

Cities and How They Function Individual Project by crdayment

Cities Self Assessment by crdayment

Welcome back, welcome back, welcome back...

Welcome back to school parents and students!
I hope you all had a great holiday and got out in the snow (and sun, Lyam).

A bit of information from last term first:
I haven't heard from anyone so I assume that you all received the term 1 reports via email on the last day of school. If you have any constructive feedback (positive or negative) in regards to the new reports I'm sure that Marilyn and Mike would like to hear it. From my perspective I found the reports much better the old ones as I was able to add more import information in a more concise manner. In saying that they did take triple the amount of time to write :/ (hence the lack of blog updates the last two weeks of school).

The next two weeks:
From today until next Friday (18th) we have a large block of learning and activities to focus on these include;

• Inquiry project
• Continuing division in maths with a review test on Friday 18th
• focus on writing book reviews and starting Raz Kids

In my next post I will put up the assignment outline for this units Inquiry unit, the scoring rubric and a student self-assessment.

This week we will continue to work on division after a few weeks break. We will focus on long division, dividing by three by one digit numbers, dividing with zeros, and mental division. Extending students in this unit will continue their good work that they were doing with Shannon. Unfortunately Shannon had to go back to Australia until Easter to teach kids how to surf and ride mountain bikes (poor guy), but we will be getting someone in to take his place. The students who still need help getting up to speed in this unit will also continue to get tailored work and support as well. Towards the end of the week I will make a batch of photocopies  plus other work that cover everything that we have learnt in division so everyone has a good chance to practice and review before the test next week. 

These two weeks will also be about reading, reading, reading. We have started our unit on book reviews so we need to read as many books as we can. When we have done that we can reflect on them by writing a book review. I have three types of book review for the students to choose from so everyone is able to write one (or two, or three,...) even the EAL students.

Homework this week:

• Read
• book reviews (at least one book review due by Friday)
• research Inquiry project (this will be done in school as well)
• Read some books and look around Raz kids http://www.raz-kids.com/

I will add some more information tomorrow about what we did the last few weeks as well as information about the Inquiry project.