Like my students, after reading the title you probably said I have no idea where Wissinoming is!
I teach second grade in the Philadelphia School District. Our population is ever changing and we have become a free lunch school in the four years since I started here. This is a public school with a very diverse group of students. We have a WONDERFUL class this year.
Part of our curriculum for second grade is to teach the students about their community, city, state and country. These are all very difficult concepts for a second grader to grasp. We have done the "book" work part of learning but the students still do not know that they LIVE in Wissinoming and that this is their community. I am working on my second Master's of Science in learning technology and learned about digital storytelling last quarter. I talked to my students about doing a project in which we walked around Wissinoming and could take pictures of their community then make a story about it on the computer. They were VERY excited. I was going to borrow a camera in order to complete this project but having a camera for the class would allow me to do this lesson with the children in each class in the years to come.
The project will allow us to SEE the neighborhood and document what the community looks like now vs. the early 1900's. They will be able to compare pictures of Wissinoming that were taken in 1907 to the pictures that they take on our field trip. We would need a digital camera to take the pictures and the photo printer would allow us to print the pictures easily and quickly to compare them to photos taken in 1907.
Your help in donating to this project will allow my students to learn about their community. Hands on learning will allow them to better grasp the concept of what and where their community is and my hope is that they will become more involved within their own community. I think knowing about their community will foster pride in where they live and will hopefully make them want to keep it clean and help others in the community.
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As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Ms. Peragallo and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.
