Debating

After spending a couple of weeks learning about expositions, we are now learning how to write debates.

Today students worked in small groups to write a debate.

The topic was, “It is better to read books than watch the movie.”

We had two teams arguing the affirmative and two teams arguing the negative.

Each team had to have an opening speaker who outlined the team’s position, a second speaker who presented the points and a third speaker to wrap up and conclude.  Students also wrote notes of rebuttal so they could argue against the points presented from the opposite team.

Here are some photos of the students working in their teams:

Living, Non-Living and Once Living…

As part of our investigation on the Great Barrier Reef for Science, students needed to classify objects into the following categories:

  • Living
  • Non-Living
  • Once Living

We did some brainstorming on criteria we could use to determine which category different objects and items belong.

We came up with a pretty good set of criteria.

  1. It should be able to breathe (take in oxygen)
  2. It should take in food or nutrients
  3. It should be able to respond to things around it (e.g. heat or light)
  4. It should be able to move by itself
  5. It should be able to recreate itself or reproduce
  6. It should be able to grow or change
  7. It should give off waste

We discussed how some things that appear alive can meet some of this criteria, but not all.  Therefore they are non-living.  Fire, for example, moves, grows and seems to ‘eat’ things when it burns them, but fire does not reproduce.

photo

Soccer Gala Day

On Wednesday  all the Year 1-4 classes went across the road to play 5-a-side soccer with St Mary’s and Whorouly.  The students had a great time playing some friendly games with the other students.

Here are some photos of the students in action.