Psychology - today we looked at Erikson and Marcia's theories of identity crisis in adolescence. You took  a self-survey and found out what state best describes your identity.

New term starts on Monday! We are now finished General Psychology. Please have your projects handed in on Monday at the beginning of the period if you want that optional mark!

ELL 4 - We watched/listened to "The Tell-Tale Heart" and did reading comprehension/grammar on it. No homework this weekend, but book report #2 is due on Nov 19 so always a good idea to keep working on that.

ELL 2 - Your pumpkin carving expository paragraph was due today at the end of class.

ELL 3 - Your Stephen King booklet was due today at the end of class.

Have a great Halloween weekend everyone! Remember, parent-teacher interviews are tonight from 5-8 and tomorrow from 9-12.

Psych 20 - Please check your marks on Homelogic. I have finished re-entering (phew) everything that was handed back on Monday. If you handed work into me and got it back this week, please see me as I may not have been able to input your mark.

Today we talked about cliques, conformity, bullying, and the bystander effect. Andrew suggested we watch "On This Day" by Shane Koyczan and I am so glad we did!

We played the culture game and it was really funny to watch you interact with each other :)

ELL - great pumpkins! They look amazing. Tomorrow ELL 3 is finishing up Stephen King, and ELL 2 and 4 will be working on an expository written work.

Wear your costumes tomorrow!

See you then :)

Psych 20 - Today I introduced a new project for you.....it is OPTIONAL! So, if you are looking to boost your grade, you can choose to do it.
It's a mixed media art project about the teenage brain, and more specifically, the misconceptions vs reality of what it is like to be a teenager. I have a handout in class if you missed today - it is self-assessed and due Monday, no extensions.

We also went down to the first term art show to get some inspiration!

We watched The Nature of Things "Surviving :) The Teenage Brain"
You can watch that here:
http://www.cbc.ca/natureofthings/episodes/surviving-the-teenage-brain

ELL 2/3/4 - Your book report due date is November 19.

ELL 3 - Your Stephen King booklet will be due on Thursday at the end of class.
ELL 2 - Your Halloween reading is due tomorrow.
ELL 4 - You were lucky and didn't have homework tonight :)

See you all at the pumpkin carving tomorrow!

Psych 20 - Today we talked about cognitive dissonance and watched a short clip from a Leon Festinger experiment that was narrated by Philip Zimbardo. We did a little thought experiment where you imagined that you found out that your father was committing credit card fraud in order to buy jewellery for your mom, but that she was so happy when she got the jewellery. We looked at the four ways in which we try to alleviate cognitive dissonance and tried to apply those techniques to new scenarios.

We also talked about stress reducing methods and watched a video called XS Stress: Teens Take Control while you coloured in on your stress-relieving colouring page.

Psych 20 - You have homework for the weekend - the defense mechanisms handout. Please have it done by Monday. Today we did skits/scripts in class where you had to guess which defence mechanism was at play.

There will be NO learning log due for next week. That would be cruel and unusual punishment to do that to you on Halloween Havoc day.

ELL 4 - Please do a rough outline of your persuasive letter using all the techniques we discussed in class - emotional appeal, appeal to authority, strong transition words.

ELL 2/3 - One more group to present on Monday.

Both ELL classes - we will begin our Halloween mini-unit on Monday.

Have a great weekend!

Psychology - we did a powerpoint on "What is Stress?" then did a worksheet in groups of types of conflict (approach-approach, approach-avoidance, approach-avoidance, and double approach-avoidance)

Then we watched this amazing video! Powerful stuff. I challenge you to make a change in your life regarding stress.

ELL 2/3 - Presentations today and we will finish them tomorrow. Please be ready! And don't read off the slides!

ELL 4 - No quiz tomorrow - we are moving along with our persuasive writing, and hopefully getting into the Most Dangerous Game writing assignment.

All my classes - I have a bad migraine today and called in a substitute teacher. I'm super sorry to those students who were coming in after class today to write their quizzes - we will have to postpone.

It'll be a bit more of a work period than usual, so enjoy the time, and be nice for your teacher!

We'll pick up with everything tomorrow. Psych students - please read your stress booklet and be ready to move on tomorrow onto defence mechanisms.

ELL 2/3 - your presentations are tomorrow! Please be prepared.

ELL 4 - last day of Most Dangerous Game writing tomorrow - please be prepared with some ideas about how Rainsford can convince Zaroff not to hunt him! You will be writing a persuasive letter.

Psych 20 - I think you really got into the activity today! We played a game called "On the Run" where you had to communicate in a larger group with key pieces of disjointed information to put some details in order.
Questions to answer over the night:
1. Did you experience any conflict during the game? Why or why not?
2. What did your team do well?
3. What could you have done differently?
4. What made listening easier?
And for those teams who won:
5. What did the success feel like when you finally got the answer?

Ms. Chapman-Brown came into our class today after I gave her the feedback you gave me on quiet spaces in the school. You were a bit quiet today! Please don't be shy. This feedback is SO important to make improvements in the school. You can slip me a piece of paper with your suggestions and I can get it to her, or you can email her directly.
Thing change and improve because of YOU. Please embrace this :)

Nice end to a short week!

Today in Psychology we looked at Anorexia, Bulimia, and Binge Eating Disorder, touching a bit on Body Dysmorphia Disorder. We looked at social pressures to achieve a certain body image, and how those are reinforced by the media. We made a great class poster using magazine collage to convey mixed messages in the media in terms of diet, exercise, gender roles, and body image.

Your quiz will be on Monday. Things to study:
*All disorders outlined in the booklet that you researched
*Your booklets on disorders
*Disorders discussed in class
Nothing surprising. Just a general overview of the disorders we focused on.

ELL 2/3 - Your research (one document) on your Canadian city and NHL team is due on Monday at the beginning of class. We discussed communication methods today for how to contact each other. You may need to work on it over the weekend if you didn't complete it in the lab this week.

ELL 4 - We had a quiz on The Most Dangerous Game today. On Monday we will begin our persuasive letter writing assignment for the story and then we are moving on!

Have an excellent weekend!

Psych - We had a guest speaker today, Jennifer Raymond from Purple Couch Psychology. She was awesome! If you needed to contact her, please visit purplecouchpsychology.com. She helped give us a great understanding about anxiety and obsessive-compulsive disorder. If you have any questions about her presentation, please forward them to me via email or in person and I can get you the answers you need :)
Your quiz is moved till Monday because I am so awesome.

ELL - Level 2/3 started working on a research project on Canadian cities, in particular the ones that have NHL teams! You are acting as tourism ambassadors for the NHL and will be preparing a presentation to encourage travellers to visit your city.

Level 4 - we worked on subject-verb agreement, The Most Dangerous Game, and talked about the book reports. Plagiarism is NEVER acceptable. I will be talking with students individually to discuss why their book reports got the marks they did.

Hope you had a great Thanksgiving weekend!

Hope your weekend was restful and full of delicious food! Mine sure was.

Psychology - we watched "A Beautiful Mind" today and we will continue on this week. Tomorrow we have  a guest speaker who brings to us experience in treating people with Obsessive Compulsive disorder.
You will be having a quiz on mental illness on Friday.
You will NOT have a learning log due this week. Because I am so nice ;)

ELL - book reports due today! Also, we went to the library to get new books. Ms. Koch and Ms. Nevison showed you the best places to get books for ELL reading.

I think it's time to take a step back from literature for a brief bit and do some grammar practice. Your writing shows me we need to go over verb tenses. We will work on that this week and finish up our short stories in each class.

All my classes had a substitute today as I helped mark our schoolwide ELL tests.
I hope you  had a productive day of learning and research!

A couple of announcements (that I will go over with you in class tomorrow)

Psych 20 - your mental illnesses chart is due on Tuesday.
Your projects are due next Friday.

ELLs- All levels have book reports due on Tuesday. I hope you have used your time well and aren't scrambling over the holiday weekend! We will get to meet with Ms. Koch next week and learn about where to find new reading in the library - we have a whole ELL section that I can't wait to show you!

I will see you tomorrow for our shortened classes.

Mrs. S

Psych 20 - we watched the video "The Secret Life of the Manic Depressive" part 1 today. Keep in mind that although the terminology "manic depressive" is outdated, the symptoms and impact are still consistent with what we call Bipolar Disorder today.

Tomorrow we will be meeting in class, and then you will have computer lab time tomorrow and iPads on Thursday to work on the illnesses chart and your project, to be discussed tomorrow in class.

ELL 4 - You read "The Most Dangerous Game" today. We will continue with it tomorrow.

ELL 2/3 - you read "The Hockey Sweater" today. We will continue with it tomorrow, and your vocabulary is due tomorrow.

Psychology 20 - We listened to "The Secret History of Thoughts" on the Invisibilia podcast. Those who were in class today answered questions about it. http://www.npr.org/podcasts/510307/invisibilia

We begin behaviour disorders next week!

The man in the second part of the podcast is Martin Pistorius and his story is quite remarkable. You can find out more information about him at http://martinpistorius.com/

ELL 4 - Your "To Build A Fire" written assignments are due on Monday.

Many of you have been asking me about the experience I shared with you in class about the escape room. We did the pirate themed room and it was awesome! Our group escaped in 50 minutes with 8 people. Can you beat that?

Check it out at https://www.thelockedroom.ca/

Psych 20- today we finished Bloom's Taxonomy work, and I loved your creative ideas! Tomorrow we are listening to a fascinating podcast about violent thoughts. It's a great lead in to our new unit on mental disorders next week.

ELL- All levels have a vocab zquiz tomorrow. Study up!