Fur Trade Debates

In today's day and age, misinformation is everywhere! We need to think critically about where the truth most likely lies.

What's really more likely? Polar bears or more small furry creatures?

Students engaged in learning about the westward spread of the fur trade with the game two truths and a lie. Though it was mostly one truth and a lie, or which one is more true than the other.

How do we debate respectfully? How do we come to a consensus as a group? We explored these skills too.

Why is it important to learn how to debate (agreeing/disagreeing, consensus)?

It is important to learn about agreeing, disagreeing and a consensus because when you're in a job you need to do it and not get mad at your other coworkers.
if you learn the you early in your life you would need later in your life.Even when you learn it as a child you could have used at school. - LD

I think it is important to learn about debate because, if further in your life, the government of your country makes bad rules, you have to come up with great ideas to debate with the governments people and convince them to either stop or change that rule. - AK

Debating is an important life skill because you need to express your own opinion sometimes, and it is good to practice that in school when you are young so you can get better and better at when you are older. Some jobs like being a lawyer need this skill to be good at there job. - MM

Why might it be important to learn about the history of the fur trade in Canada (fur, travel, companies and indigenous people)?

I have enjoyed learning about the people who came before us and how they survived. Also I learned about how Europeans took over and what has happend to the indigenous peoples. - VN

What have you enjoyed about this learning so far?

I have enjoyed discussing the different possibilities. because it is interesting to hear what people think - AS

Confluence Field Trip

Our Field Trip to Confluence

We became archaeologists! What did the settlers, NWMP, railroad and Indigenous peoples leave behind?

We also solved some suitcase mysteries! Who packed these suitcases? What were their lives like?

Can you guess what this was used for?

What do these wooden posts represent? Ask me!

 

Creating Our Own Land Acknowledgement

 For the Earth Day Assembly, we took on the Indigenous Perspective.

We explored the following questions: What was Treaty 7? What is a land acknowledgement? Why do we do them? How can we create and acknowledgement that is meaningful?

Then, we created our own, filmed it and presented it at the Earth Day Assembly.

I learned that the treaties between the indigenous people and the settlers were not respected. - Atticus

Another thing is there was a very strong connection between the Indigenous people and the land. You can see this by looking at a place/landmark like mokinstis and how it is still a very nice area because they kept it that way for so many years. - MM

When you make your own land acknowledgement it will feel more special and show the person you worked hard to make it. It shows much more respect then using someone else's - Fox

What I liked about this project was how weren't just copying a land acknowledgement we were making our own - Milu

It was important to create our own land Acknowledgement to show that we really care about indigenous people. I learned that many of the promises given to indigenous people were broken. I enjoyed that I got to be in the video. - Davyd

I enjoyed doing the land acknowledgement videos to show to our school and learning about the indigenous people before us. Also doing the world map and just overall everything! - Viljo

Letter From the Prime Minister!

We got some mail!!!! Remember back in November when we wrote to the government about issues that were important to us? Click here to see the old blog entry to learn more. Well, we got our first response back! Here is the letter from Prime Minister Trudeau's office. We read it as a class and learned what all these tricky words mean. We are hoping to get responses from the Premier and Mayor soon, too.

Our History - The Beginning of Our Inquiry

First we made predictions.  

When historians discover something, they take what they already know and try to figure out how the new thing fits. If we discovered this photo in a box in someone's attic with no writing to tell us what it is, what might we guess the structure to be? When might we guess it was taken?

We guessed ...

"A warehouse (Felicia), Fort Calgary (Milu and Meredith), the Stampede (Viljo), horse racing (Finnley), a farm, the beginning of Calgary, a house."

What was it?

It is Fort Calgary in 1881 (Nollan). 

 

Then, we walked up to Scotsman's Hill to the same place the original photo was taken in 1881!! 

Wow! We sketched what changes have happened in that time. There were A LOT.

What was interesting about this activity? What did you like?

"It was interesting because we got to see the old picture and see the actual view now to see how much it improved." - Felicia

"It was interesting to see how much Fort Calgary and Calgary have changed." - Finnley

"It was fun to see that the building is now the Fort Calgary museum." - Nollan

"It was interesting to see the changes in the land." - LD

"I liked seeing the train and the airplane." - Vivaan

What did you enjoy about sketching in our sit spots?

"I liked the view and the way we were sketching the past and the future." - DA

"I liked how it was nice and quiet and focus on what has changed." - Finnley

"I liked how we got to thank the land and how she let us use her." - Felicia

"I like how we got to sketch." - Meredith

"I liked how we got to sketch and at the same time connect with the Earth." - Nollan

Moving forward in our history, what do you want to know?

"I wonder what happened to the original Fort Calgary?" - Finnley

"I wonder Fort Calgary was used for?" - Matin

"I wonder how much things of changed, like how many buildings there are now?" - Viljo

"I wonder why Indigenous changed their traditions?" - Felicia

"I wonder why the Europeans came here and why the province is so rich in oil?" - LD

Scanning and Skimming

Scanning and Skimming

Research Skills!

Scanning and skimming are two different things. Scanning is where there is a pile of words and you are looking for one specific word. - HS

Skimming is like scanning but more deep. You're looking for a bigger thing, like a sentence of a paragraph. - Milu

Why would we need these skills?

In university and at work you might need to do research and stuff.  - Meredith

Sometimes reading takes too long and when you have a time limit you might not be able to read a whole thing. - Aroosha and Felicia

You might know some of the information already, so it's not helpful to re-read it. - Atticus

If you're reading something very big, you need to go faster so that you get all that information in an amount of time. - Meredith

Sometimes there's information in the book that you don't need. - Milu