Global Letter Project

I hope that everyone enjoyed their Family Day weekend. Luckily it cooled off so that the final days of Winterlude didn't have to be canceled. This is another short week ahead, but we have a lot on the go. We will continue to explore themes related to Black History Month in language, and we will be getting right into our creative writing unit on poetry. Angela, from Statistics Canada, will be returning to do the second session with our class in the computer lab using the class survey data we collected and input last week. There is a sharing planned for later this week, and, of course, we have School of Rock rehearsal Tuesday at second nutrition break.
This past weekend the students were asked to search for a topic they could use for our Global Letter Project. They were sent home with a brief outline of what they needed, and each was assigned a letter from the alphabet. This week we will be discussing what the next step in the project will be. Each student will be writing a one page (five paragraph maximum) piece of expository writing explaining what their chosen topic is all about. We have been reading a novel by the author Eric Walters (whom I brought in earlier this year to speak to the 5/6's) called Branded. The class has been quite interested in the story, and the themes that talk about global awareness and social justice. Expanding on the themes in the story, the goal of the Global Letter Project, is to find a different topic for each letter of the alphabet, and raise the awareness of our fellow classmates, and other members of the community by explaining the issue and its importance in a quick expository. We will be reviewing expositories this week, and looking at how to research and organize information for the project. There will also be an art component to go along with their topic that we will create in class. We will be reviewing topic choices Tuesday to make sure that everyone has something to pursue as we go forward (I have a lot of ideas from previous students for those who had a hard time finding topics).
On another note, this year the junior choir will be holding "Churchill School of Rock 6 - World Tour" on May 13th. We are looking for some parents to help out with the t-shirt and DVD ordering/distribution, etc. If you are interested in getting involved in this way, or any other, please let me know as soon as you can.
Regards, Ray