A routine has settled with the class, but all is not perfect, which is as one would expect at this point. Still the signs are good. I feel like there is a good base to build on with this group. The class is both productive and both want to learn and please me (not a requirement on my part–but still pleasant). Here is what happened:

Position and power

We read an account of the first successful Everest expedition (they got to the top, and no one died). Yeah, I haven’t name the climbers yet, there’s a reason for that. One of the things that is really easy to discuss with kids,even elementary school kids is social justice issues. They understand positions and people who have power, and those who don’t. When that power is arbitrary, or unfair they usually get it. During our discussions of the story I brought up some background about how the climbers, a sherpa guide and New Zealand climber, agreed to share credit and vowed not to reveal who had gotten up “first”. I talked about the sherpas, and how they are critical to these climbs, but are often regarded as “servants”, and when I was younger, I only heard about Hillary, the climber, and not so much about Tenzing Norgay, the sherpa climber. I pointed out that in the story, Hillary’s name is listed first. A funny thing happened on the assessments I gave at the end of the week. The students who wrote about them ALL listed Tenzing Norgay, before Edmund Hillary in their writing. They had absorbed that lessoon and applied it in their writing without me directing them to do so. It was their own choice. It’s a small thing, but interesting nonetheless.

Other issues have been coming up as we work our way through our class novel, Hatchet. Most of the students love it, but some of them are annoyed by a couple of aspects of the novel. They don’t like the author’s use of repetition in the self-talk that the main character does (repeating the same word two, three, more times) before explaining himself. Also, some regard the way he describes the various injuries that the characters suffer as “overly dramatic” and annoying (if not nauseating). This is one of the FEW books that seem worthy of that Common Core standard (5) on structural choice of the author, and would lead to some meaningful discussions (certainly my kids are bringing those up all on their own). In this case, it doesn’t feel like navel-gazing, but a worthwhile discussion.

Ecosystems in real life

One of the great things about my school site is that we have a native plant habitat that a teacher helped create. That teacher, Kristi Phillips, died last spring but this was her baby. She worked tirelessly on getting it together, from permits from the state to planting things. I also have another resource this year. When the SDC (Special Day Class) visits, they come with their aide, who is a wonder of information about plants and nature (he was a geology major in college). This week, we did a lab from our text in the habitat with the students comparing sunny and shady spots. It’s so nice having another adult to share with, and not only do the kids love it, the aide is having a great time (which the kids can sense and feed off of).  This sort of hands on, experiential exploration is what I wanted more of this year, so I’m very pleased.

Early Man

While small groups of kids are out in the garden, I’ve been back in the class with the rest of them. This hasn’t been too bad, because I’ve shown them a really great video from National Geographic, Human Family Tree. It’s really well done, taking a group of New Yorkers in the present day, and looking at their genetic markers to see where they “came” from when our ancestors left Africa. It really hooked the kids in with the idea of the connection to the present day to what we had been learning about in our text, which cover David Johanson discovering Lucy. In addition, National Geographic, and many of the Discovery videos (like Planet Earth, although they do it in most of their titles, even Deadliest Catch) have the habit of repeating and circling back on concepts which works well for both re-enforcement, and if you have groups of kids coming and going, they can still get the jist of what has happened.

Podcasting

The kids did another podcast, which can be heard here. This is really one of the easiest ed tech projects to implement, and I can’t recommend it highly enough. It also buys a lot of goodwill with parents (and administrators). It’s much easier dealing with the editing in audio, than video, and there is less that can go wrong. I’m going to work the students into the editing process starting in Week 5.

Mathematics

I’m going to do a separate post around Wednesday on the Math Workshop projects I’ve been doing, so no news now.
Image credit: number 3 by jontintinjordan, on Flickr