Grade 7 & 8 Integration Week

Integration Week helps students make connections between different subjects in school. Our Grade 7 and 8 students incorporated what they learned across a variety of courses including English, Math, Science, Canadian Social Studies, Media Arts, Geography and more. 

 

Our Grade 7 and 8 Science classes designed their own community garden and analyzed it by making connections to their Ecosystems unit. They talked about the different components of a community garden ecosystem and researched information to support previous learnings from the Cells and Systems in Action units.

 

In English and CSS, students focused on finding the beauty amidst the chaos through a geographical lens. They explored geography-based good news stories from around the world and reported on them. The themes students considered were: Quality of Life, Sustainability, Global Development and Settlements. Topics ranged from baby leatherback sea turtles thriving due to COVID-19 beach restrictions to the peaks of the Himalayas being visible for the first time in almost 30 years! It was great to see their passion for this project and their final news reports looked great! 

 

In small groups, our Grade 7 and 8 English students created some fantastic news broadcasts in the same vein as John Krasinski's Some Good News series. He has passed the torch to his fans, who are spreading their silver linings to the world.  

 

The current news landscape is filled with data including graphs, charts and newly emerging studies. After examining 'math in the news', students looked at data that showed what we can do to invest in our health, wellness and happiness. What this data revealed was that the quality of one's relationships is often an incredible predictor of health, wellness and happiness. 

 

In GLE, Grade 7 and 8 students watched The Great Realization and reviewed the key points of the video. They were then tasked with answering the following question: 

 

Hindsight is 20/20 is a saying which means that “It's easy to know the right thing to do after something has happened, but it's hard to predict the future." How can you relate your own personal thoughts/feelings/experiences to this idea?    

 

Daniella Barmak ‘25 responded with a great poem:

 

The news has spread

I can’t believe it

I feel like time has passed,

I felt so far away from home,

No one to talk to 

No fun to happen

I’ve never felt so scared!

Questions popped up in my head, 

Like how long will this take?

I’ve never felt so lonely before,

Quarantine feels like a mess!

I’ve spent 2 days at max in Florida,

And then we had to go

We rushed and packed our stuff 

We barely got to say goodbye

The weeks have passed from day to day,

Everything is feeling grey,

When will we find a cure

When will my life feel pure

I can’t keep my emotions inside

When will this end was a question I said

When will this end I repeated while the words flew by

It is hard to know that you are looked inside

No one to see, there’s nothing to do!

I’m forced to stay inside

The stores are closed with dust surrounded

I can’t seem to focus

Did he have to eat that bat and not return to the hospital

It seems so crazy to look back and see,

that this all happened because of one person

But this all can change 

We can work together to stop the spread

And finally! 

Feel free

In the Arts, our Grade 8 Media Arts class used text, shapes, lines, colour, and texture to create a digital illustration communicating something or someone that they have been grateful for during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

The Grade 8 Vocal class students created a collaborative playlist with the underlying theme of "finding the beauty among the chaos”. Some songs included Lean On Me by Bill Withers, You Will Be Found from the musical Dear Evan Hansen, and Rise Up by Andra Day.

The Grade 8 Drama class was given a prompt and asked to write monologues as their response. Students were challenged to be creative and try to predict what the world will look like in the New Year. They were asked:

 

“It is December 31, 2020. As we close the chapter in 2020, we take time to reflect on the most memorable part of the year. What will you remember most as we move into a new year?”

 

Below is what Michael Baillie ‘24 wrote:

 

“Wow, who would have thought that the coronavirus cure would get rid of the virus so quickly? I can’t believe I am standing here in front of all of you. I never thought in a million years that I would get a grad ceremony.

 

When I was in quarantine the world stopped and gave me time to think. In fact, I think that corona was a blessing and a curse. The world moves so quickly that we forget to be grateful for the ones who have supported us the most and the opportunities that we’ve been given. We were all too busy preparing for grad that we didn’t stop and appreciate our last months together as a grade.

 

This graduating class will go down in history and will be a year we will never ever forget. Sometimes the simple things like hanging out with your friends or going to school can be taken for granted and you need to lose it all to realize how lucky you are. 2020 wasn’t the year of Corona but the year that we all realized we needed to take things slow and appreciate everyone along the way. Thank you, be nice to one another and stay safe.”

 

It was a very busy but fun week for our Grade 7 and 8 students. They made connections through a number of different subjects and talked about many positive things happening in the world today.