Revel Recap: June 14 - 18, 2021
Spark Studio
What another fun week with the Sparks! On Monday we enjoyed starting our call with a drama movement game. We acted out scenes where we were picking apples, opening a gift, eating our favourite food, taking a trip to the beach, driving a car, and being a superhero! We also began some of our calls this week with questions of the day. We discussed who we thought the funniest person we know is and if we could have any animal in the world as a pet, what would it be? It is always fun to hear everyone’s answers. We also continued our chair yoga practice and the learners were challenged to pick at least five of their favourite poses and teach their family members a yoga sequence.
Quest this week was all about being creative and turning ourselves into superheroes! Taking everything we’ve learned about superheroes there were some questions we needed to answer. What outfit will you wear? What special powers do you have? What is your superhero name? We started off by reading the book Superhero Instruction Manual which helped guide us through seven steps we could complete to become a superhero. We then set to work on designing our capes and masks. On Tuesday, we read What’s My Superpower? which got us brainstorming some of the superpowers we might want to have. We completed a craft where we designed our superheroes and then wrote on the cape what our powers were. Wednesday we read a book about a boy who is using his imagination to go on superhero adventures and we were invited to go on superhero missions at home! This was also the day to start preparing costumes to share the next day. We needed to design our costume, complete superhero exercise training, and our identity cards. On Thursday, we completed the superhero training together and then showed off all of our wonderful costumes! We shared our names and superpowers, and imagined how we could save the day! We ended our week of Quest learning that everyone can be a superhero, even a potato or a dad! We laughed together while reading about Supertato and the book My Superhero Dad, played Superhero Memory and danced to a superhero song. Thank you, Sparks for sharing all of your creativity and imagination!
On Monday, Spark Rebels asked each other “Bonjour, comment ça va?” and shared how they were feeling and what exciting things they did over the weekend! We learned that “nager” means to swim. There are many places you can swim: le lac, la rivière, l’océan, and la piscine. Then, we went looking for three yellow items around the house. We repeated their names and compared their sizes. On Tuesday, we read “Mon papa” by Anthony Browne and we talked about our dads. We answered the questions “Comment s’appelle ton papa?” and “De quelle couleur sont les yeux de ton papa?” We also watched an adorable video of forest animals and their babies. So cute! On Wednesday, we made Fathers’ Day cards. We wrote “Bonne Fête Papa” in the front, and Sparks reviewed the vocabulary of the parts of the face while drawing a portrait of their dad on the inside of the card. Last but not least, we celebrated a Spark birthday on Thursday! We sang happy birthday to them and they showed us some of the nice presents they received. Then, we read another book about dads and we ended the week with a dance party to a new song!
During our core skills time, we participated in two fun drawing activities. The first one was to draw a ‘100 monster’. We drew the monster’s body and then added 10 eyes, 10 teeth, 10 nostrils, 10 ears, 10 hairs, 10 arms, 10 hands, 10 belly buttons, 10 legs and 10 feet. We counted by 10’s and saw that our monster had 100 body parts! Everyone’s monsters looked pretty friendly though! The second drawing had us work together to complete a rhyming story. Every time we figured out the rhyming part, the word told us what to draw next. We ended up drawing a clown and shared our illustrations when we finished. During our maths lesson we read a book about the history of tangrams, what shapes the seven pieces are, the rules of the game, and examples of designs you could make. We also watched a video where we had to guess what picture was being made with the tans. We then made our own tangrams out of paper and challenged ourselves to see what we could make! In language, we continued working on sounding out and reading CVC words.
This week we also had two special Zoom calls. To celebrate one of the learner’s birthdays, we enjoyed a call with The Zoo Crew. We saw so many cute animals such as a sugar glider, rabbit, turtle, ferret, and duck. We loved seeing and learning about the animals and the Sparks asked some really great questions. We also had our last drama workshop. Our wonderful drama teacher commented on how much creativity and imagination each Spark brought to every workshop and their development in their ability to creatively self-express from the first class to the last class. This week we acted out our favourite summer activities, warmed up our voices by buzzing like bees and played Simon Says. We ended the call with show-and-tell performances. The Sparks each shared an object and what it is normally used for. Then they imagined the object as something different from what it normally does. We had such a great time! Thank you, Ottawa Children’s Theatre!
Discovery Studio
Mindfulness
Monday, Wednesday, and Friday’s yoga classes focused on hip opening positions and working on aligning our posture. Tuesday and Thursday Rebels had the option to work on their own mindfulness activities such as zen doodles, journaling, or creating mindful mantras.
Launch
After months of learning online we are really missing our studio mates, so for Monday’s Launch, we played the connection building game, Two Truths and a Lie. It was so fun learning some new things about our friends and attempting to guess which statement was a lie was often quite difficult! Tuesday’s launch was all about putting Rebels’ debate skills to work through responding to a series of Polarizing Questions. “Does a straw have one hole, or two?” “Is a hotdog a sandwich or a taco?” and “Are dreams the same as thoughts?” were just a few of the tricky questions that Rebels had a blast answering.
Wednesday’s French launch introduced French actor and comedian Omar Sy, currently starring in Netflix’s Lupin. Omar Sy’s career took a turn in 2011 when he played one of the main characters in The Intouchables. Since then, he has begun a career in Hollywood, appearing in movies such as X-Men and Jurassic World! The word of the week is “avertissement.” Rebels hunted for clues in the spelling of the word and the context it is used in to find out what it means. Thursday’s Current Events launch kicked off with a special animal of the week, Hamlet the Parrot, who went viral on Tik Tok this week for his silly antics! We continued our weekly Pride stories with a “History of Pride” video, that explained the origin of Pride and Rebels discussed “What does the word pride mean to them?” We also explored Japan’s KAI Industries making waves this week with the first paper razor that is 98% plastic-free. Friday’s launch was used to help finish up our list of Polarizing Questions from Tuesday, and Rebels had a check-in with their squad groups to see how everyone was feeling about their personal goals as we are now at the halfway point of our final session.
Rebel Readers & Warrior Writers
This week in Reader Writer, Aim and Release Rebels continued working through their chapters for The Unsung Hero of Birdsong USA. We discussed “The Reconstruction Era” (1865-1877) and how harmful and deep-rooted the resentment of the end of slavery was for some people and states, resulting in policies like “Black Codes” and the ongoing unfair treatment of black people in the United States. We linked this history to the chapters assigned in our novel from this week and discussed how this affects the dynamics between two of the novel’s main characters, Lucas Shaw and Meriweather Hunter. Draw and Anchor Rebels continued to work on their novel study “The Secret Lake” and we began writing about our own “Secret Lake” adventure involving all of the Draw and Anchor Rebels as characters in the remake of the story. Rebels began writing their own stories and participated in a virtual reading circle for chapters 7-10. On Friday, all Rebels participated in our wackiest Ten Minute Tale to date with features from Lamar Jackson, a creepy cheetah, Jules the Cat, a house shaped like a duck and Taya Currie! Rebels worked on Indigenous History Month presentations, completed spelling tests and wrapped up any unfinished work from the week. Excellent job, Rebels!
Math Lab
We took a sweet little detour in Math Lab this week! Draw and Anchor Rebels sorted and counted the number of each different colour in a pack of Skittles. They then completed a data table and tally chart before using their data to create a colourful bar graph. Aim and Release Rebels also “tasted the rainbow” while using Skittles to find the mean, median, mode, and range of their pack. Once the initial data analysis was complete, they used their information to write their Skittles as fractions, find equivalent fractions, convert their fractions into decimals and percentages, explore place value, graphing on a coordinate plane, solve various operations, and create a pie chart and pictograph! It was a fun way to review what we’ve covered this year all while getting a treat at the same time!
French
Welcome to “La Taverne du Chien Gris!” This week, Rebels practiced ordering and taking food orders at the restaurant in small groups. We prepared for this task by watching a short video and looking at example sentences. It was a great first start, and Rebels will be able to practice some more in the coming week. For Father’s Day, we crafted a crown-shaped card for our dads! Group 1 also read the book “Mon papa” by Anthony Browne and shared what they like most about their dad.
Quest
This week in Quest was all about developing our Food Truck menus. Rebels brainstormed several lists of food items and organized them into menu categories such as sides, mains, drinks, desserts, condiments/toppings, etc. Rebels worked together in their teams to establish fair prices for each item and worked hard as they designed a menu aesthetic that complimented their brands and images created in Week 2. On Thursday, Rebels partnered up with another Food Truck company and presented their menus to each other. They focused on giving warm-hearted and tough-minded feedback as they discussed elements of each other’s menus that were on brand, missed the mark, would be the most popular items, or what items could be changed or left off the menu moving forward. Rebels were really impressed with each other’s work and enjoyed having the time to see what each other have been working on over the past few weeks! Next week we will move into “The Flow of Money” and take a deep dive into budgeting and finances for our food trucks. Rebels will explore variable costs, sunk investment costs, and fixed period costs as they establish the final amount that they will be asking investors for during Exhibition week. Great job, everyone! We look forward to seeing your Food Trucks continue to come to life!
Exploration Studio
Launch
Monday’s French launch introduced Omar Sy, an actor and comedian who first became famous for his comedy show in the 2000s. After starring in The Intouchables in 2011 he has reached international fame and is now portraying Maurice Leblanc’s cunning thief Arsène Lupin on Netflix! This week’s word of the week is “avertissement.” Rebels observed the spelling of the word and the context it is used in to find out what it means. On Tuesday, we recognized the role that stress plays in our lives and as we took a minute to assess how stressed we currently are and think about how often we get a chance to fully relax. We learned that everyday activities such as reading before bed, laughing, and drinking tea can reduce levels of stress, as can kitten therapy! We activated our creativity centres on Wednesday with a drawing exercise. Each Rebel had to crumple a piece of paper, unfold it, and look for pictures within the wrinkles. It was impressive how many different images were discovered! A Ted-Ed riddle woke us up on Thursday morning and on Friday, we discussed the Grad Celebration which will be held on Wednesday, July 7th for families of a Grade 8 Rebel.
Math Lab
Skittles!!! Exploration Rebels also “tasted the rainbow” while using Skittles to find the mean, median, mode, and range of their pack. Once the initial data analysis was complete, they used their information to complete one of two problem sets. Rebels were challenged to convert their fractions into decimals and percentages, explore place value, graphing on a coordinate plane, create a pie chart, histogram, box and whisker plot, and find the interquartile range and mean absolute deviation. It was a fun way to review what we’ve covered this year, all while getting a treat at the same time!
French
This week, Rebels sat down at the Resto/Tron-9000 and practiced ordering food and taking food orders at the restaurant. After preparing individually, we role-played in small groups. On Wednesday, we prepared a “hologram” pop-up card for Fathers’ Day and completed an exercise on the future tense.
Big History
There have been two main components in Big History this session. In the first part, the learners are completing a presentation on a culture and its cuisine. Half of the learners have already given their presentations and we have learned about the similarities and differences of several different cultures. After the learners have completed their presentations, they will be moving on to write a fictional story utilizing their research.
Quest
This week’s Quest was all about food! Following the same learning model from previous weeks, learners are working on developing their time and project management skills. Each learner was busy tackling different challenges pertaining to dish creation including choosing recipes, making a shopping list, grocery shopping, and cooking or baking. Deagan encouraged the Rebels to experiment with their cooking and apply what we’ve been talking about in the Quest Launches to improve their recipes.
Next week is Food Truck model week! Learners will be using spare material from around the house to construct what they want the inside and surrounding area of their food truck to look like. Make sure to hold on to any recycling that may be useful in the next week!
Launchpad
This week, our Launchpad Rebel finished up the pricing module and began working on the branding for their subscription box company. After building an inspiration board with various pictures, our Rebel began thinking more about their brand mission, colours, fonts, keywords, values, and logo. Using their branding and products, they also began designing an Instagram feed.
In their Genre sessions, the Rebel worked on a rough draft of a poem they would like to have read at their funeral, about how they embraced life and how they would like to face death. They also researched estate planning and began writing their will based on various scenarios.
Potential Discussion Ideas or Questions to Ask your Rebel:
Spark: What is your superhero name and superpower? Would you like to be in a group of superheroes or work alone to save the world?!
Spark: Which animal was your favourite to see from the Zoo Crew? Would you like one of them as a pet?
Spark French: Can you read the words that you wrote on your card? What do they mean?
Discovery: What does the word “Pride” (for Pride month) mean to you?
Discovery: [Aim and Release] What do you think will happen between Meriweather and Lucas Shaw in the next half of the Unsung Hero of Birdsong USA?
Discovery: [Draw and Anchor] What do you think will happen to Tom and Stella in the next half of the Secret Lake?
Discovery French: What are some ways that you can deduce the meaning of a French word you haven’t learned before?
Exploration: What do you think the most important ingredient is in cooking?
Exploration French: What are some ways that you can deduce the meaning of a French word you haven’t learned before?
Launchpad: Will you leave most of your material possessions to your spouse? Divide it equally among your children, even if some have different skills, character and needs? Leave it to a charity and the less fortunate? Does taxation have any bearing on your decision-making?
