Our Cross-Curricular Unit Begins

Through trial and error, false starts, and big flops, we are continually trying to reach
the kids, to get them truly interested in the material. We’ve seen great success with
this in our World War II Unit. This cross-curricular unit is one that the students look
forward to each year. They ask questions about it a year in advance, and somehow
that excitement seems to eclipse the amount of work we ask from them.

A big part of the build-up for this is how we decorate the hallway and our classrooms.
During this unit, we transform our entire hallway into an interactive display. It contains
work from some previous years and morphs each year into something a little different.
The unit centers on our subject areas of English and US History. The students read
The Book Thief, by Markus Zusak, and study people, events, and locations from the
war itself.

Because of the importance of colors in the novel, we add different colored plastic
tablecloths to give the symbolism of the colors a tangible feeling in the hallway.

Death, who is surrounded by the books Liesel finds/steals in the novel looks
on as students walk into their English classroom, while the steam from the train
that decorates the door goes across the hallway to the social studies classroom,
which is blacked out to represent the devastation caused during the war and
serves as a solemn reminder of the lives lost during the Holocaust.

The hall is even more exciting with the addition of R/C model airplanes.

Check back over the next couple of weeks when we show you the display with
the student work from this year added.

A Walk on the Wild Side

Sometimes to take a journey all you need is a great book, but sometimes you have
to actually move your feet. Recently, inspired by a brief case study in the textbook,
you know the pages between the regular sections that student pretend do not exist,
I decided it was time to get my students moving. I love experiential learning, I love
hands on, but I also love the structure of a more traditional classroom setting. I
struggle with creating balance for my students and my sanity.

Inspired by the story of an American scientist who braved the African forest, I
decided I could brave the wilderness of our school neighborhood. Before we
left the classroom, I told the students we were going outside. Instantly the noise
increased and excitement began to build. In their mind outside at school meant
extra recess. For me it meant connecting to scientific skills, making them take on
the role of a cartographer, writer, and data collection specialist. To begin I shared
just briefly the story of mapping the African forests. We discussed what that might
have been like. The students were amazed that anyone would be willing to make
such a journey. None seemed to think they would follow this example and set off on
a similar path.

My school is in a residential setting. There are no forests to explore nearby, but we
do have a lovely little garden complete with chickens, vegetable and flower beds, a
few trees, and opportunity. Their instructions before leaving the classroom were simple. . .
observe everything you can. Listen, look, breath deeply, but don’t talk because you
might miss something. Our entire journey took about 20 minutes. When we made
our way back to the room the students learned of the real purpose and the task that
was before them. I got the collective groan, several questions, and a little pushback,
but as a class, we gained the opportunity to talk about the perspective and difficulty
of map making, the variation of data collected, and make connections to their English
class as we talked about descriptive writing. None of this would have been as meaningful
to the students if we had simply read the case study. Yes, it took an entire class
period for what could have been done quicker. Yes, I will have to read all the journal
entries and that will take more of my time. Yes, there were a million other ways to have
done this activity or I could have skipped it all together, but some lessons are worth
taking the first step.

The students submitted their maps and writing. Some were beautifully drawn and
detailed, others were less so, but every single student learned something, and that
after all is the point.