It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

Well . . . not really but I was in a singing mood. We have a busy week ahead of us.

Friday is a half day with elementary dismissed at 12:15.

Wednesday is Ski Registration in the Church Foyer. I am looking for someone to help out with that. If you are interested, we will be going from 3:10 – 3:45. Any help would be appreciated.

We will be having a short Science quiz on Wednesday. The quiz will cover the following items:

1. How clouds are made – evaporated air rises up and is cooled as it goes higher into the atmosphere. The cooled air turns back into clouds and water vapour which then comes down as precipitation. We saw this when we took boiling water and placed it in a jar and put ice cubes on the top.

2. Types of clouds:

• Cumulus – fluffy clouds that can be seen on a nice day. However, when they get dark and turn into cumulonimbus, they bring rain and storms.
• Cirrus – thin wispy clouds high in the sky that appear on nice days.
• Stratus – low fog found close to the ground.

3. Properties of Air

• Air has weight
• Air has force
• Hot air rises, cold air sinks
• Air takes up space
• Air takes the shape of its container
• Air has volume – The students have trouble with this one. It basically mean how much air is inside something just like how much milk can fit in a carton. Some containers can hold more air than others.
• Air exerts pressure – Air doesn’t like to be trapped. When you pop a balloon, air comes out. When you let go of the balloon, if the hole is opened, all the air will come out. It won’t stay inside.
• Hot air expands, cold air contracts – When we put the balloon in the freezer, it shrunk because the air molecules came closer together. Once it was outside the freezer, it started to get bigger again because the air molecules spread further apart.

Here is the spelling for this week with the Spelling City links:

L-5

N-5

Here are the links to Spelling City:

Finally, here is a video that I introduced the students to today. It is a really neat video showing the brain of a mouse from the skull all the way down to the creation of new neurons. It is absolutely fascinating. We have talked alot this year about creating and strengthening our neurons by being creative and thinking outside the box. Speaking of which, Science challenges are due tomorrow!