Systems Kick-off!

     This week we continued to focus on building a growth mindset.  Students used an online quiz to determine their current perspective on learning and we spent some time discussing failure and how to approach it.  We want students to believe that perseverance and challenge can really grow their brain.
Students enjoyed some challenging activities to practice these habits by completing the Set Game and Quiddler daily puzzles.

     We took the pre-assessment for our data unit so students could show their prior knowledge and get a glimpse into what will be coming their way in math.  We also looked at critical thinking using the Foundation for Critical Thinking's Child's Guide to Critical Thinking videos.  We saw three types of thinkers and evaluated them.  Ask you child about Naive Nancy, Selfish Sam, and Fair-minded Fran. Students should recognize quality thinking as accurate, fair, clear, relevant, and logical.

Some lovely notes on critical thinking.

My favorite activity of the day was kicking off our year-long theme of Systems. Students interpreted the definition of a system and worked in teams to brainstorm examples. They came up with some great ones! We also named the different features of systems (boundary, input, output, elements, & interactions). Next week we will continue the lesson by drawing and labeling the parts of a system, creating a list of generalizations about systems, and competing in a friendly kahoot quiz to show off what we had learned.

Brainstorming types of systems.