We have set our first learning target of the session. They are up on the wall for all to see and on our e-portfolios for us to update when we have achieved them.
Elastic Cars
The biggies went back to the maker space for a warm up of our engineering skills today.
Some Biggies reaction:
I learned that you don’t need a motor to make things go
Today I learned how to make changes in my work, I learned how to make rubber bands into a working motor and I learned how to improve the work I had already done!
I learned about how different weight can affect a moving thing and how different types of rubber bands can change how the speed works
I learned that you can do it you have to just believe in yourself
The Biggies are Back in Class
We have got to the end of our first week. The children are settling well and we are starting to think about our routines.
We have started reading Mr Johnston’s favourite book, Love That Dog. That means we read a lot of poems too. The first one we studied was The Red Wheelbarrow. The class all wrote poems based on this poem. They are great.
We a have also been working on a new class logo to represent out class, more of that later. And starting work on our Rights Respecting School class charter.
Today we had a visit from Steven from Future X, to show us what Future X entails and how to get involved. We had a great time:
The p7s have also been helping out with their buddies in p1, to make play dough and to get used to going for lunch.
Words to Learn by 2023-24
Last session The Biggies choose some word to describe what they would like to learn. These proved useful in reviewing what we had done at the end of the year. So we did it again this session.
Makerspace Robot Roundup
We have been working hard in our Makerspace on our Robots challenge.
The Challenge is to create a model Robot with elements of, Movement, Electricity & Coding.
The class has done an amazing job with lots of fun and failure. I’ve been especially impressed how the groups worked together and adapted their ideas as the went along.
Bobara
Duck
Robot Mike
ECCO Finished product
A.D.A.M
I gathered quite a lot of quotes from the class and have added some below in their unedited glory.
General Comments
- His back there is a skewer that you twist so that tightens the rope to make the flaps go up and loosen it to go down
- It is a micro bit that plays a song by another micro bit sending it messages to start and stop
- We had to change the song a few thousand times but we got there in the end.
- We argued about the wheels and some designs but we didn’t argue much. The wheels worked out well and the coding component is working well too.
- Yes when we were cutting our blocks of wood to hold up a big platform. The blocks where slanted so we had to make new ones and measure it correctly so it was in a straight line.
- We didn’t think of how the weight of the head was going to affect the motor. This was because the head was too large. Also we painted some of it and changed a lot of the outer design and make the packages more realistic by putting things in them.
- It’s moving part is the spinning brush on the front, a motor is hooked up to a battery pack and a switch using wires, when the switch is clicked the motor turns a piece of glue tack spins and the brush is attached to it.
- My robot is a large Aztec sort of style robot called A.D.A.M. A.D.A.M stands for Ancient Dispenser of Aztec Mummies. As the name suggests it dispenses drawings of mummies.
- It is called Adam it is like a box and it has wheels dispense mummies
Enjoyed
- I enjoyed working with others and learning how different things work.
- I really enjoyed be able to express my creativity
- Being partners with the people I was and painting and talking to them.
- I enjoyed creative work and doing fun things with saws and hot glue guns
- I enjoyed making a lot of the things we made and I think I work well in most of the groups I was put in.
- I enjoyed working with the micro bits and coding elements.
- I enjoyed using different equipment like hot glue guns.
Didn’t enjoy
- I didn’t enjoy the we had a problem with the electronics
- I didn’t enjoy all the arguing but then again it was mostly needed because of voting.
- I didn’t enjoy the problem with the wheels and trying to fix that because it took a while to find a solution.
- I enjoyed everything about the makerspace, and didn’t dislike anything.
Learned
- I learned that it’s sometimes people need to learn to try help each other more then we should.
- I learned how to put the movie into keynote and I learned how to do wiring.
- I learned how to work with others better and how to make different things, I feel like I’m better at arts and crafts as well.
- I learned that wires were very complicated and annoying and that you may not be friends with your partners but you can get along in some ways.
- I learned how to use glue guns, what materials are better and not just look better and how to find good solutions to problems but still keep close to the original design.
- I learned how to use micro bits to control motors.
- I learned how to use a saw correctly and I learned how to use a hot glue gun.
- How to have fun and work at the same time while being in my zone.
- How to make a iMovie video with voice over music and effects and to work in a team to create a machine with electronic components.
- I learned that you can make anything out of quite a lot of materials and I learned that using iMovie is quite easy.
Makerspace Robot Progress Report
The biggies are making some great progress on their Model Robot Makerspace challenge.
The Challenge is to create a model Robot with elements of
- Movement
- Electricity
- Coding
The class was split into groups and has taken some very imaginative ideas and is turning then into reality.
Makerspace 10 May 2023
makerspace 23 May 2023
makerspace 8 June
The Robots
Bobara
A.D.A.M.
Ecco
Mike
Duck
Final finishing touches are being added and some video reports started.
Outdoor Learning Day June 2023
We started the day by going to the woods to gather a bit of firewood and different things to test as tinder.
The woods have changed quite a lot since our last visit, the grass & bracken is a lot higher. Down by the Gladstone we saw a woodpecker and later on a frog.
Back in school we tried different items as tinder with our flies and steels. not much success. The only thing that really caught was some bog cotton we had picked on our previous visit.
Next we mixed up some dough to cook over the fire later on in the day.
We then explored a new App Seek by iNaturalist , which helped us identify plants and animals in the school grounds.
In the afternoon we rolled out out dough and wound it round some twigs, while the dough was rising we set up the fire pit.
Some marshmallows might have been toasted too.
Levers
Last week as a #MakerSpaceNL warm up the Biggies explored levers.
They made some simple examples of different combinations of leaver to show different types of movement. They then added a wee bit of creativity into the mix.
Cardboard Monsters
As a way to learn about levers we made some Cardboard Monsters this afternoon. We are working up to a #makerspaceNL project…
Earth Day 2023
The Biggies are studying John Muir this term, so that filtered right in with Earth Day 2023.
The day before we had visited Dow’s wood. There we collected natural sights and sounds with our iPads and pencils.
On Friday in class we made composite images of our photos writing & drawing, click on a thumbnail to expand and see all the details:
We also made photos with the text from our favourite John Muir Quotes:
And later on we made some art, could you guess which quote inspired which piece of art:
