National Park Project

We have had a great couple of weeks back to school!

Sorry that it has been so long since I made a formal blog post. That last month and half before break was a whirlwind! I'll include some pictures of our December adventures at the end of this post.

Some of the highlights of the first 2 weeks back to school:

Talking about taking on responsibility and being a leader in the classroom

Starting our new schedule and WIN Time

Finishing constructing and finding surface area of our statue in my math class

Starting new projects in reading, writing, social studies and science

In reading, we have started a project that the kids (and I!) are super excited about.

Our sixth graders are practicing and deepening their reading skills by planning their own dream trip to a National Park of their choice.

The purpose of this project is:

For the students to practice reading and analyzing a variety of texts (informational, narrative, and persuasive)

For the students to practice finding and using information from the texts in a real world context

For the students to stretch their planning skills. Planning a vacation takes a lot of forethought and organization!

This project ties into the work they are doing in science and social studies where they are exploring geological features and world issues.

Final Product

Their final product for this project will be a travel journal that will include their proposed itinerary for a trip, a travel log of an "imaginary trip," and room to create journal entries when they go to their National Park in real life!

I know some of the kids have started to ask you to take them on a road trip this summer so I wanted to clue you in ( and apologize, or say, "you're welcome,"... depending on how the trip goes).

America's National Parks are really special places to me so it's heartwarming to see how the kids are learning to love these amazing places that protect so much of our country's geology, history and ecology. Even if you're not going to be taking a road trip to the Grand Canyon anytime soon, I know you will all encourage their new-found interest in all of the awesome science, history and adventurous experiences that they have been researching in class.

Now, for some fun pictures from December!

Action Figure Project-- Representing characters from our book club books