As a means for providing an overall picture of the year, what are some ways we can think of the guiding questions and themes for the 3 units? Here are some ideas we have thrown around:
Sept-Dec: "The Human Body's Basic Needs" or at Co-Seed we said "Knowing what your body needs and does to survive"
Jan-Feb: "The Human Condition," "The Human Spirit," or "What happens when some human needs are not met?"
March-June: "When Humans and Nature Come Together", "Survive or Thrive? Understanding and Working With Nature"
Just some ideas. The titles are really sort of silly and not too important overall, but it is a nice set of titles to have for grants, for parents and to provide broad perspective. What do you think?
Friday, August 10, 2007
Updated Culminating Projects
After meeting with Catheryne, and talking with Alicia, here is the most recent version of the list of culminating projects: (Still under construction!)
Culminating Project Ideas (Revised)
1st Culminating project: Early October
Camping--students will camp on Grape Island, for at least one night. This will include major integration with beginning of the year team building and History Curriculum, and some survival/physical aspects from Human Body
Students will write a guide book (taking notes while camping) about camping for the 5th Graders. They will share their work with them when they finish.
2nd Culminating project: Late December (right before break)
Human Body Brochure--major integration with Human Body work/collaborations with local Doctors, Hospitals. Writing and brochure could be the humanities tie-in. The kids could make a brochure outlining what they have learned about the human body and how one must take care of it. We could create it and pass it out at Forest Hills Station as a public service. We
could also hold a "mini-health expo" although passing brochures out would be simpler.
Catheryne and I also discussed the idea of having a one page "digestion short story" on one side of a sheet and a "fact list" about nutrition on the other side of the sheet and handing that out as the "brochure."
3rd Culminating project: Mid February (right before break)
Math/Science: Students will create a human body/health related entry for "Reflection in Action"
Humanities: Children's Rights Brochure. Again, we could pass out the brochures at Forest Hills. Doing the brochure thing a second time could allow the kids to improve upon this type of public service. There is certainly a social justice piece here that could be used to build on for the MLK assembly. If we can, the handout/brochure could also relate more closely to the design/project that students will be working on in Math Science.
4th Culminating project: Late April
The museum. This will be set up in the school and the students will display through animatronics and other exhibits what they have learned about ancient civilizations through their work in History. They will also use their museum visits as a basis for designing a museum and thinking about museums in general. It might be interesting to have a photo gallery of photos/art that capture different aspects of weather/water that the students have either gathered or created. This connection is far-fetched for science, but they'll get lots of weather/water tie in during sailing.
Or, for another math/science tie-in students could create an "object" or perhaps poster or other display of some of the significant math/science/technology objects that were created by different ancient civilizations (Bisse might be able to help with this)
5th Culminating project: End of Year
Family presentation/showcase. Students could show their portfolios and work, and we could promote the sailing fundraiser. This would include both humanities, math and weather and water presentations or work, if the kids are working on a particular project.
Sailing Fundraiser/Exhibition
Students will sail their family and friends around Jamaica Pond and show off their skills. Upstairs at the boat house will be a weather/water exhibit that gives information and can also show how weather is an important aspect in sailing.
Wednesday, July 4, 2007
Email from Bo 7/4
Hi Heidi, sorry to be so slow in getting back to you. I took a few days away.
First, I heard back yesterday from the woman from the Harbor Islands. She said those dates look good. So we are a go for that. I only got a message, I will try to reach her in the next couple days to firm up reservations.
In terms of the outcomes/projects you laid out, it is great you are thinking this way and that seems like a great and logical progression of events. I especially like what moving the sailing to the end of the year does as the fundraiser seems like a nice capstone student activism type of event. My only caution is to not try to do too much. It seems manageable the way you have it laid out, but these types of things have a way of growing on their own into something unwieldy. Some specific thoughts.
1. We should play up the survival thing even more for the camping trip as it goes so nicely with the human body stuff. Maybe looking at some specifics between human body needs and the experience of being out there.
2. For the human body brochure, a connection to early hominids? Might make for an interesting twist.
3. Museum idea is really cool as we could gather lots of neat photos from different experiences (camping, medical visits, sailing if we have started) plus the exhibits the kids make. We should also talk with Bisse about doing a specific art project connected to this. She is game for anything as long as we give her notice. That would help you all out as well if she can do a substantial part of the art in art class. For the weather connection, "Weather Past and Present, how early civilizations were affected by weather in similar and different ways to how we live now." Or something like that.
Lots of ideas, Happy to keep thinking on it with you. -Bo
First, I heard back yesterday from the woman from the Harbor Islands. She said those dates look good. So we are a go for that. I only got a message, I will try to reach her in the next couple days to firm up reservations.
In terms of the outcomes/projects you laid out, it is great you are thinking this way and that seems like a great and logical progression of events. I especially like what moving the sailing to the end of the year does as the fundraiser seems like a nice capstone student activism type of event. My only caution is to not try to do too much. It seems manageable the way you have it laid out, but these types of things have a way of growing on their own into something unwieldy. Some specific thoughts.
1. We should play up the survival thing even more for the camping trip as it goes so nicely with the human body stuff. Maybe looking at some specifics between human body needs and the experience of being out there.
2. For the human body brochure, a connection to early hominids? Might make for an interesting twist.
3. Museum idea is really cool as we could gather lots of neat photos from different experiences (camping, medical visits, sailing if we have started) plus the exhibits the kids make. We should also talk with Bisse about doing a specific art project connected to this. She is game for anything as long as we give her notice. That would help you all out as well if she can do a substantial part of the art in art class. For the weather connection, "Weather Past and Present, how early civilizations were affected by weather in similar and different ways to how we live now." Or something like that.
Lots of ideas, Happy to keep thinking on it with you. -Bo
Monday, July 2, 2007
Culminating Project Ideas
Been thinking a lot (maybe too much) about culminating projects. Any thoughts on these ideas? I just sort of thought of the year as a whole:
1st Culminating project: Early October
Camping--major integration with beginning of the year team building and History Curriculum, and some survival/physical aspects from Human Body
2nd Culminating project: Late December (right before break)
Human Body Brochure--major integration with Human Body work/collaborations with local Doctors, Hospitals. Writing and brochure could be the humanities tie-in. The kids could make a brochure outlining what they have learned about the human body and how one must take care of it. We could create it and pass it out at Forest Hills Station as a public service. We could also hold a "mini-health expo" although passing brochures out would be simpler.
3rd Culminating project: Mid February (right before break)
Children's Rights Brochure--I believe this is already something that is part of the Children's Rights unit. Although the science tie-in wouldn't be as strong, we might be able to come up with something that we could add. Again, I think we could pass out the brochures at Forest Hills. I think doing the brochure thing a second time could allow the kids to improve upon this type of public service. There is certainly a social justice piece here that could be used to build on for the MLK assembly.
4th Culminating project: Late April
The museum. This will be set up in the school and the students will display through animatronics and other exhibits what they have learned about ancient civilizations through their work in History. They will also use their museum visits as a basis for designing a museum and thinking about museums in general. It might be interesting to have a photo gallery of photos/art that capture different aspects of weather/water that the students have either gathered or created. I know this connection is far-fetched for science, but they'll get lots of weather/water tie in during sailing.
5th Culminating project: End of Year
Sailing Fundraiser/Exhibition
Students will sail their family and friends around Jamaica Pond and show off their skills. Upstairs at the boat house will be a weather/water exhibit that gives information and can also show how weather is an important aspect in sailing.
1st Culminating project: Early October
Camping--major integration with beginning of the year team building and History Curriculum, and some survival/physical aspects from Human Body
2nd Culminating project: Late December (right before break)
Human Body Brochure--major integration with Human Body work/collaborations with local Doctors, Hospitals. Writing and brochure could be the humanities tie-in. The kids could make a brochure outlining what they have learned about the human body and how one must take care of it. We could create it and pass it out at Forest Hills Station as a public service. We could also hold a "mini-health expo" although passing brochures out would be simpler.
3rd Culminating project: Mid February (right before break)
Children's Rights Brochure--I believe this is already something that is part of the Children's Rights unit. Although the science tie-in wouldn't be as strong, we might be able to come up with something that we could add. Again, I think we could pass out the brochures at Forest Hills. I think doing the brochure thing a second time could allow the kids to improve upon this type of public service. There is certainly a social justice piece here that could be used to build on for the MLK assembly.
4th Culminating project: Late April
The museum. This will be set up in the school and the students will display through animatronics and other exhibits what they have learned about ancient civilizations through their work in History. They will also use their museum visits as a basis for designing a museum and thinking about museums in general. It might be interesting to have a photo gallery of photos/art that capture different aspects of weather/water that the students have either gathered or created. I know this connection is far-fetched for science, but they'll get lots of weather/water tie in during sailing.
5th Culminating project: End of Year
Sailing Fundraiser/Exhibition
Students will sail their family and friends around Jamaica Pond and show off their skills. Upstairs at the boat house will be a weather/water exhibit that gives information and can also show how weather is an important aspect in sailing.
Co-Seed
Co-Seed, as always, was a successful 4 days of work. Alicia and Catheryne, my two new teaching team members, were fantastic and easy to work with.
I'm hoping this blog becomes a space for us to communicate what we've been up to.
Major accomplishments from Co-Seed:
1) Beginning to fill out map (I still need to email this to Alicia and Catheryne with the new stuff in it)
2) Making major phone calls and emails to field trip connections
I'm hoping this blog becomes a space for us to communicate what we've been up to.
Major accomplishments from Co-Seed:
1) Beginning to fill out map (I still need to email this to Alicia and Catheryne with the new stuff in it)
2) Making major phone calls and emails to field trip connections
- Bo called the Parks Service to set up the camping trip, set for Oct. 3-5
- I got confirmation from Courageous Sailing about sailing in the spring
- I emailed Thompson Island just in case they could squeeze us in for free (not likely and still haven't heard back from them)
- I need to call the Museum of Fine Arts and set up some solid dates for visits that tie in with our History units
- Alicia will be contacting local programs that could come in to work with the kids around human body
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