Perimeter and Area with Legos

Students of class 5, working in small groups, have drawn and built with the use of Legos some basic shapes, as squares and rectangles, and then they have begun to combine these basic shapes together to create more complex figures.

They have started measuring the perimeter. They  have isolated before the perimeter drawing the outline of the shapes on the paper and then they have counted the units around the space of the Lego polygons built. They have also multiplied the units of one side by 4 to calculate the perimeter of lego squares and the units of the 2 different sides by 2 to find the perimeter in the rectangles.

The students have constructed different shapes within a given outline using Legos to understand that a closed figure or a space covers area and they can find it using the square units.

Student have measured the area of the Lego shapes built in different ways: counting the circles on top of the lego blocks, adding up all the square units within the space of the Lego shapes, multiplying the lenght by the width of the outlines. To measure the complex Lego shapes pupils have broken the figure up into smaller other shapes (squares and rectangles) and they have calculate the total area adding up the single areas. They were able to write multiplication sentences about the measurements found.

In this activity students could better visualize the sense of perimeter and area, share the different strategies used, reinforcing perimeter and area skills.

They have also practised perimeter and area, having a lot of fun, in the Area Dice Game taken from http://reliefteachingideas.com/area-dice-game/ .

 

 

A Special Meeting: The Little Prince at school

Students of class 4A have read the Little Prince book. They have thought and discussed about many important subjects: the friendship and the emotional ties, the adventure and the travelling, the respect for the environment, meeting different characters: adults, children, animals, like the fox, and things, like the rose. Each one of them has had an important role to help children find a personal teaching of life.

The Little Prince is the most chosen and voted book by Italian Primary School children.

Our Little Prince book: "I have met the Little Prince"

St George and the Dragon Story

Class 4A has given a warm welcome to the job shadowing French teachers.

The lesson plan chosen for the job shadowing  is a comprehension activity about the traditional story of St George and the Dragon.

The aims pursued are the following: to encourage pupils to use English creatively, to practise simple present tense verb form at third person, to learn new words, to retell a story through images, to practise reading, to discover something about the British legendary tradition. In addition, to give an example of a superman who was fighting against the dangerous creatures and getting back peace, which could contribute to the explorations of children's own life and world in the future.

In this lesson, children have watched the story of St George and the Dragon and played  a wordsearch about the main characters and elements. They have represented the context and some scenes of the story by legos.

The teacher has given each pupil a copy of the story page and read it aloud by going round the classroom while pupils were listening, asking some of them to repeat the sentences for the rest of the class and checking their understanding by asking comprehension questions. She has divided students into seven different small groups and assigned each group one part of the story. Each student in the group has tried to read their part of the story and each group has drawed a picture to represent it. Using only their illustrations, one picture per each group, they have practised their speaking skills by retelling the story in the correct sequence of images.

At the end of the activity the students have stuck the pictures and the sentences in the correct order to make a poster and reread them aloud in a semicircle.

Let's make recycled paper

Students of class 4 have tried to make a piece of recycled paper after having studying the recycling in Science.

They could learn by an easy experience the scientific process to make paper using some old newspapers.

They have enjoied this experience very much!

The necessary equipment we have used: newspapers, water, two pails, a frame, a filtering mesh and a rectangular piece of wood.

At the first step we have torn the paper into small pieces and put them in a container.

Then we have covered the small pieces of paper with hot water and let them soak for two days.

We have mashed up the paper by hand a handful at a time aiming to get the pulp similar to the consistecy of watery oatmeal.

We have placed the pulp on the filtering mesh of the frame moving it lightly side to side until the pulp on top has become uniformly flat.

We have pressed down to squeeze out excess water using a rectangular piece of wood. We have periodically repeated this step to remove as much water as possible from the paper pulp.

The final step was to remove the rectangular piece of wood from the top of the frame and let the paper pulp dry near a heater for a few days.

Here the result of our experiment: a perfect sheet of paper!

Time to learn some new English words about recycling:

"Match the words to the pictures and to the appropriate rubbish bin".

"What's it made of?".

Happy New Year from Saronno

The pupils classes third and fourth share moments of songs and dances with parents to wish Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.

Christmas arts and crafts

In the fourth class we prepared an Advent calendar using plastic cups. Every day pupils open one glass and discover sweet surprises.

But the most important things is the little paper that there is inside it: a good purpose to be done in class.
For example:

• I apologize if I'm wrong;
• I give something of mine to those who need it;
• I play with all children;
• I do not stay with angry heart
• and many more ....

Then students realize cards, poems and Christmas objects for their families.