Week 7 Term 4

What is learning?

10 weeks have passed since we started really talking about what we think learning is, thinking about our learing and reflecting on our learning

When I started talking and thinking about my own learning, this is what I thought learning was.

Learning is when you are taught or teach yourself to do something. You can have a discussion about it or just talk to someone about it.
I think that I am now much better at knowing what to do to improve my work. I also think that we talk about learning more in our class and I have never really done this before. I like it when Mrs. M tells us what we are learning and when we decide on what we have to do to be as successful as we can be.
We have been using Solo Taxonomy. This has been very useful to us because we would never have been able to improve in our learning if we didn't know how to use the different symbols to show how we think or show what we know. Solo Taxonomy helps us to develop skills that are very useful in our learning like talking about what we have to do to show our level of thinking and also making rubrics together so that we know what to do.

When we work with Mrs. M we make a rubric. Then after we have completed our work we discuss this with her and she talks to us about WTN next step We then go and try again. We can have as many tries as we like to get the best result and until we are happy with our work.

I am glad that Mrs Mitchell has taught us about Solo Taxonomy because it helps us to develop good skills that will help us throughout our whole time at school, helps us to improve our level of thinking and self asses our work.

Solo Taxonomy

Using Solo Taxonomy has helped us learn how to develop our skills at an Extended Abstract level. It helps us to know where we are with our learning and where to go next. It also helps us develop skills such as assessing where we will be at. Solo Taxonomy is a good way to help you work independently because, say you are writing a poem and the teacher was working with someone else and you were ready to show the teacher, you could rate yourself using Solo Taxonomy and then look at where you were and then write yourself a where to next. Predicting is another skill that you develop using solo taxonomy. Predicting is when you predict where you will be at at the end of the lesson. It helps you to reach your goal.
In maths we also use prediciting.
We had an inquiry on predicting and collecting data.
Here is my front cover:





We then had to write what we were going to find out, what our key question was and what our choices were. Here are my predictions:




We made a tally chart and then used our data to make a graph. At the end we had to write what we had found out. Then, we had to write if our predictions were correct.

Camp to Virginia Park Cattle Station

On the 29th of October, Year 4 went on a camp to Virginia Park Cattle Station. It was an exciting journey. We did an obstacle course in the cattle yard. I had lots of fun doing that. Then we went swimming in the green pool! We did cow milking. Lots of people wanted some milk. Then we did cow branding. I thought that it was really cruel. I did not want to watch it. At night we had a campfire. I toasted my marshmallow and put two biscuits around it. It was delicious.
Today Mrs M showed me how to make a Quick Time movie from our photos in iphoto. It was very easy. You just have to Export your slideshow. Then she uploaded the movie onto the internet so that I could get the embed code to put the movie on my e-portfolio.

Using Solo Taxonomy in Poetry

This term we have been writing Free Verse Poems. I wrote a free verse on hate. When I first wrote it, I only wrote 3 lines. Well, more likely, sentences. I rated myself at Multistructural. We talked about my where to next. Mrs M said to use these ides to form them into a poem.
Here is my first draft:


I wrote my poem a second time. I rated myself at Relational. Mrs M said that I was not quite there yet because I had started my lines off using I too many times and had no language features. We talked about my Where to Next. Mrs M said that I did not have many language features, that my ideas were now connecting and that I needed to be careful with using the letter I.
Here is my work:


The last time that I wrote my poem, I changed my 'I's to ing words. I also added some language features. I rated myself at Extended Abstract and Mrs M said that I was there. I was very happy and very proud of myself.
My final draft:


Here is my poem using Imagechef:

ImageChef.com Poetry Blender

Tuesday Week 4

This term we have been doing poetry writing. We have written Cinquain poems. Haiku Poems and Triangular Triplets. I wrote a very good Cinquain poem, about blue. I was at Extended Abstract by the time I finished writing "blue". I wrote "blue" a first time, but I was only at Multistructural, so I wanted to do better. I wrote it a second time, changing my choice of adjectives. I was really overjoyed when I wrote it. Then we started learning about adjectives. We did a circle map about what we knew about similes. I rated myself at extended abstract. My Mrs M said that I was really at Relational because I needed to still show new thinking or knowledge. We had to write a reflective sentence and this is what I wrote: I think I am here because I gave a few examples and I had reflected on where I had used them. A week later we had to do another circle map. I again rated myself at extended abstract. For my reflective sentence this time I wrote: I think that I am here because I have said the general things about similes, given 4 examples, reflected on where I had used them in my own writing and said how they could be used in other ways to colour writing. I am proud of myself for getting to here. On Monday we started learning about metaphors.

My learning with Web 2.0 tools

Today I learnt how to use a web 2.0 tool Image Chef. I also learnt how to put an Image Chef presentation onto my blog.

Imagechef to publish my poems