My students need copies of the student books and journals in the Junior Great Books Series, books about Rachel Carson and animals, and watercolor pencils.
“Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts. There is something infinitely healing in the repeated refrains of nature - the assurance that dawn comes after night, and spring after winter.” ― Rachel Carson, Silent Spring
I love teaching Fifth Grade English Language Arts and Social Studies in rural southwest Missouri.
I have 50 intelligent and creative students. These active children respond best to hands-on activities that allow them to think, move and create.
In our school more than 75% of our students receive free or reduced price lunch due to their economic status. In their lives outside school, children naturally move between music, art, movement, drama, mathematics, and language as ways to think about their world. They talk and write, but they also draw, sing, play, solve problems, and dance their way to new insights and understanding.
Unfortunately, sometimes it is only in school that students are restricted to using one system at a time to think.
My Project
I plan to use these Junior Great Books in small groups of students. This will allow me to teach my students at their instructional level. I want my students to actively construct understandings as they enter the world of literature to learn about life and to make sense of their experiences and feelings.
We will use these art materials and others to expand my students opportunities for response beyond talking and writing about stories that examine themes about nature, strength, integrity, perspective, trust, and resourcefulness. I want them to express their ideas in art, drama, and music, as well as by talking and writing. Each of these forms of expression have a different potential for meaning. My students will not always transfer the same meaning, but will create new ideas; their understandings of the stories will become more complex.
These materials will help me implement rigorous and responsive reading and writing lessons in my classroom.
I will be able to develop small group lessons to teach my students how to read with increasing sophistication and personal engagement.
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