Boy, I've Been Busy!

Fourth through Sixth Grade Teachers-
If you are looking for a social studies/technology integrated project to do with your class, please look at the projects I have posted, ready to begin the first week of October. I just finished editing them, and they are ready for registration. Any teacher wanting to take part in any of these projects, leave me a message or email me.


There are various opportunities for sharing and collaborating with these projects. Here are the links to the projects and a brief summary:

1. Federal Holidays: This project is designed for upper elementary and middle school students studying the meaning of American culture, United States symbols and core values of the American democratic system. Federal Holidays proposes two main tasks: 1) students will teach their class about an existing federal holiday by creating a PowerPoint presentation; and 2) student teams will imagine a new holiday that represents the spirit of America and then write a persuasive argument which will be supported by a poster that visually represents their proposed holiday. Using VoiceThread, student teams will comment on and persuasively argue why their holiday best represents the spirit of America. The site includes links to all the required resources and rubrics. Originally created in 2002, Federal Holidays was a response to 9/11, to help students deal with the feelings generated by that horrible event. I am running the project again, with updates.
   
2. Explorations: This project is a 4th grade social studies project where students will study explorers from "The Age of Discovery." Students are asked to become "docents" - knowledgeable guides who will virtually guide "visitors" through our "Age of Discovery Museum" by creating photostories. Students will place a marker on our Google World Map, showing the area their explorer discovered. The marker will contain a link to the student/docent PhotoStory. The PhotoStory (vodcast/podcast) will inform "visitors" about the explorer they researched with narration and images. It would be fun if another teacher wanted to do this project as is, or modify it to have their class research other types of explorers...for example, 'explorers of the sky' or explorers of the arts, etc. etc.
3. On the Trail of the First People - I have posted about this one before, we do have some teachers who signed up for it! Would love to have more!