5th Grade:
The fifth grade finished their unit on general geography (latitude, longitude, the continents, and the oceans). We started to practice taking skeleton notes. This is a transition stage to students taking their own notes in their copybooks. At the end of each chapter, I collect their notes to check them, so please, please, please do not throw them out! Throughout the unit, we listened to the "7 Continents Song" which became a huge hit. Additionally, we became familiar with how much there is to see in the world via maptangle, a map version of Twister! Finally, at the end our lesson on latitude and longitude we used a human size grid to locate things such as stuffed animals, DVDs, hats, and other objects. Moving forward, we will be diving into the different regions of the United States.
6th Grade:
The sixth grade completed their first chapter on general geography, landforms, and bodies of water. After reviewing general geography, the sixth grade was able to review latitude and longitude lines by playing Battleship! It was exciting to hear them call out coordinates and hear them yell, "I sunk a ship; I sunk a ship!" After Battleship, we discussed the different landforms and bodies of water. We started a project which had each student create their own map containing three countries, three cities, and a mixture of eight different bodies of water and landforms. It is amazing to see what they have created! From Sports Nation to Alien World they are creative and unique! Next we will be moving into Europe. The European Unit is a combination of ancient history and current European nations.
7th Grade:
The seventh grade is just about finished with Chapter 2. We explored Ancient Civilizations, Native Americans, the Silk Road, and change happening in Europe during 1300s. Throughout the chapter, the seventh grade was able to connect prior knowledge from sixth grade to Chapter 2. I was jumping up and down with excitement that they were able to do so! Additionally, they made their own Quipu, or string, that contained top secret messages used to communicate throughout an Ancient Civilization. To conclude this chapter, they were put into groups and were asked to create their own civilization. Each civilization had to include five rules, a village, marketplace, farmland, and government building. The rest was up to their imagination! It is awesome to hear chatter like, "We should have one of our rules be that everyone has to catch at least 10 fish," or "I want our civilization to have comfortable shirts, so we definitely need to grow cotton." It is great discussion that really makes the students think! Next, we will move to Chapter 3, Exploration and Colonization!
