Investigative Journalism

In language arts, students are investigative journalists, working the news beat to find stories around them. We have learned several strategies of great writers already, which you can see in your child's writer's notebook. Their table of contents should look something like this:

One of the skills students worked on is transitioning from narrative, 1st person writing to journalistic, 3rd person observer writing. On the left in the photo below is an example text, comparing the same scene but told two different ways. One is as a fiction story, and one is as a news story. We discussed these differences and used the mentor text to improve our own writing.

Students should have pages where they brainstormed potential newscasts from inside the school (the gym) and from last year. What would an undercover journalist have written about? I wrote a mentor newscast from our field trip earlier this year. Journalists need to remember to have an angle in their writing, the "so what?" to engage their audience. My angle was about how the bus garage needed the bus back an hour early--would we be able to see everything at Fort Crown Point and complete our assignments in less time?? Turns out, GRIT rose to the challenge. 

One of the ways writers improve their writing is from experts. Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Roy Peter Clark's strategies are pasted into students' notebooks to help them improve their stories. First we looked at a mentor newscast, and tried to find evidence of Clark's strategies. We found vivid details in the descriptions of the fighting basketball players, a grace note in the word pandemonium, and a clever ending in the author's use of the phrase, "These stars had just imploded." The author used the star theme throughout the newscast.
Your child should have newscasts where they highlighted these strategies in their own work. If they didn't have them, they were to revise their work to include them, and improve their writing.

Finally, we chose one of our pieces to publish on Schoology. Students used the last minute editing checklist to review their work one last time, and then were responsible for reading 2 other writers' work and providing feedback. Could they find the 5Ws? Could they find the angle? 

For our longer news piece, students should have selected a topic and made sure to identify the angle. Next, they needed to find sources to interview, so students shared their topics on notecards so other students could add their name to their card if they had a source for their classmate. This is a great way for students to help each other! 

What is your student writing their newscast about? Do they have an angle? Do they have sources to interview? Check in with your journalist to see how they're doing!

Moonball Space Warp--team building

For Wednesday's SAM morning, we went outside to play Moonball Space Warp--which is a really a team building activity using groups and a small ball. The idea is to keep the ball in the air, and to count how many hits the group can get. The more hits, the longer the ball has stayed moving and the better the group has worked together. Players are not allowed to double tap the ball, let it touch the ground, or catch it. 

Below are the small groups attempting to strategize and get in some practice:

This group's best was 14 hits in the air, while others reached the 20s.

The next challenge was to combine groups and keep just 1 ball. Did the amount of students help the groups, or hinder the groups? Some groups rose to the challenge, and had even more hits than in the small groups. 

Another successful SAM day working together to accomplish goals!

Field Trip Photo Albums

After our Fort Crown Point trip, students put together group photo albums about what life was like as a soldier or settler. They needed to include information about daily life including food & drink, work, and dangers around the fort. They could create digital or hard copy versions.

Here are some examples of hard copy photo albums:

Here are pages from digital photo albums:

Great job, storytellers! Ask your child to share their photo album with you. They were collaborative efforts!

Field trip!

Last week we went on our first field trip of the year to the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum and Fort Crown Point. Students are preparing for our social studies unit on Colonial America and have learned about early settlers in the Lake Champlain basin. 

Our first stop was the Lake Champlain Maritime Museum. Students explored early boats of the area, like the dugout canoes below, top left:

They also explored some early diving equipment:

And talked to the staff about why there are so many wrecks in Lake Champlain:

There is a whole building about our involvement in the Revolutionary War, including the ship models below (the first of the Philadelphia):

And a video on the replica of the Philadelphia: Take notes!

Students could head down to the lake to learn about the ships: 

Our next stop was Fort Crown Point in New York. Students had already learned all about Fort St. Frederic and Fort Crown Point during class. Their task while at the fort was to create a photo album with their group of life at the fort. They needed to create characters, and include aspects of life during the time, such as food, work, and dangers or concerns of living in the area. 

The first stop at the fort is the presentation in the screening room. Here the students listened to a presentation with images and a map of the area, which highlights the conflict over the area between the French, British, and Native Americans. 

After the presentation, students exited through the museum. Here is a model of the French fort, Fort St. Frederic:

Later, the British built a much larger fort:

Here is a map of the British fort: Ask your student why the fort is built in a star shape--the design is intentional!

After a picnic lunch, students went off with their groups to start snapping photos for their photo album:

It was a beautiful day to explore the fort!

Students were able to explore the ruins and create their stories: Ask your student what happened to the fort!

Students created digital or hard copy photos albums, which they worked on until the end of the week. Ask your student to share their photo album with you if it's digital. They should have lots of details about life at the fort!