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This is my first year at Langley, but at my previous school as we managed the unexpected shutdown this spring, one of my biggest challenges was continuing the preschool exploration and experimentation at home.  One of my favorite activities during the Spring (Easter) is challenging the children in my class to take a raw egg and create a safe space for it with any kind of reusable materials and then bring into school for the "Great Egg Launch" .  Replicating this at home was harder not because of the task or creativity of the kids, but because often when we launch it at school, the egg doesn't survive the launch.  At home his was harder for parents to manage the messiness of it!  But, the kids (as usual) loved it all - creation, imagination, science and even the success/failure of smashed eggs.

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During our Friday morning meetings I would share a read aloud with the students and they really enjoyed it. When we were together in the classroom we frequently had students reading books to me and/or their friends. I invited the class to post videos of themselves reading books and I shared it on our class blog on Seesaw. Students were able to watch their friends reading stories and leave comments, compliments and book recommendations. It was such a cool way for us to stay connected and practice reading!

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Fifth Grade - Ancient Greece Agora Project

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Fifth Grade - Ancient Greece Agora Project

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During the spring Distance Learning the students were asked to research the various occupations of Ancient Greeks, write about what they learned, build or find something that represented that profession, dress up in a toga, then join together in a culminating project whereby they would take on the role of their person in a mock agora (Ancent Greek gathering market place). This particular inquiry project gave the students choice in what occupation to choose so that they were intrinsically motivated when asked to do the research. Asking them to take on the role of actually being an Ancient Greek provided the opportunity to think beyond their own experience. The students were so creative, some collaborating as playwrights and actors performing their works together, some becoming Platonic philosophers debating the issues of those times. It was such a joy to behold.

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4th Grade- African Artifact Inquiry Project

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4th Grade- African Artifact Inquiry Project

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During the last few weeks of distance learning, and after expanding their background knowledge on the continent of Africa, students participated in a virtual African Artifact Museum. Students took a virtual tour of the Smithsonian museum and investigated various artifacts and exhibits. They watched videos, explored interactive exhibits provided by the museum, heard from docents, and discovered more on the various tribes, ethnic groups, and people who created and used the artifacts. Students used maps to investigate what natural resources might have been available in the area each artifact originated from. Afterwards, students created their own questions related to the various artifacts and were asked to choose one artifact to do a deep dive/inquiry into. Students kept a field journal with their notes and used various online sources for their reseach. Teachers provided feedback to the students in their field journals so that students could improve their work and understanding. Students also were given opportunities to collaborate with their peers who were investigating similar artifacts. Modeling was provided to the students through their close examination of actual museum artifacts and examining primary sources. At the end of their investigation, students created their own interpretations of the artifact they studied using whatever materials they had at home. Using google meet, students presented artifacts to their classmates and shared feedback, questions, and compliments with each other.

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When I was student teaching 5th grade my head teacher and I both noticed that a lot of our students were stressed when we had testing. We had the student’s role play situations that involve stress. Then we handed  two students each an index card that describes a conflict and what side of the conflict they are on. After roleplaying, we had the other students in the class comment on whether or not the conflict was successfully resolved. How did it affect their stress levels? If not, gather suggestions on ways to improve handling the conflict to avoid or lessen stress. This activity shows how self-control is a valuable tool in avoiding health risks. Stress is the body’s response of the body to an event, whether it is positive or negative stress that results from a negative experience can have negative effects on health. When stressed, students often have a much harder time controlling their actions. If angry or hurt, students can act out physically or by verbally attacking their friend. Both of these actions lead to more stress for everyone involved--whereas self controlled can lead to a resolution. Dealing with social interactions can be quite stressful for students. When they are not getting along with their friends, they may have a hard time focusing in the classroom. They may act out. Helping them make positive choices is crucial to their well-being in the classroom and out.

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Community Building: One of the greatest challenges that we faced as teachers was developing a plan for the children to maintain some social connection with their teachers, their classroom and their classmates in an online format. At first, it seemed impossible. Nonetheless, we gave it a try! In our first zoom meeting, the children were essentially staring at the screen confused with a "deer in headlights" gaze. As we continued to hold zoom meetings, the children began to sharing things with their teachers such as books from their shelves or beloved toys. By the end of the distance learning there was a sort of transformation. They began to recognize each other saying things like "there is my friend." And, sharing toys online that were the same as the toys that their friends had at their homes. On graduation day, the class was singing and dancing with each other. In the very beginning I was uncertain as to what would come out of these moments. In the end, I learned an incredible lesson from the children and was inspired by their resilience and ability to adjust to their new classroom.

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At the very end of distance learning, I did a quick couple lessons on capacity. First, students estimated the capacity of a mystery container. Then, I modeled how to accurately measure capacity using cups. Next, students estimated measurements and practiced measuring (using some Math in Focus materials). Then, students were asked to create 2 gallons of a magical potion, using any combination of the units we'd learned. Students had the option of submitting their planning sheets for feedback from me before submitting their final potion. Students were given options for how to present their potion - some amazing videos were submitted, in addition to photographs, drawings and written descriptions - and recieved feedback from classmates and me. Community was built as they commented on and celebrated their creations together. It was a lot of fun for everyone.

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The learning target in kindergarten STEAM was to understand that the sun warms the Earth's surface. Students investigated by measuring the temperatures of various surfaces outside and compared surfaces in the sun and shade, and concluded that areas in direct sun were hotter. Next, students were tasked with building a model of a playground that would stay cool in the sun. I showed them pictures of different playgrounds and we discussed which areas would get hottest. Finally, students practiced by building their own models, many which included a shade structure,
and got feedback by testing them under heat lamps to see if they stayed cooler than areas of direct heat.

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In music 6 class, students often have choices for a project, either researching composers or genres, or collecting a list of instruments, etc. One particular task was to choose either a composition that mirrors J.S. Bach's technique or research a composer and create a survey. It was refreshingly striking how students can create a brilliant result when they choose to work on something they are interested. The level of investigation that students put in and their individualism and creativity were beyond my expectations. Thus made me realize the power of choices.

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For the home unit, the students worked together to write their own version of The Three Little Pigs play in Chinese, made props, and performed it. They were required to describe their houses and to explain what they were doing at home. They had fun practicing their parts and performing the whole play together.

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Get access to files anywhere through secure cloud storage and file backup for your photos, videos, files and more with Google Drive.

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In my role as a FLEX teacher, I support students as they work through the learning tasks you all give them. During distance learning, it was even more important to support students' well-being from a social/emotional standpoint. Along with meeting as a group to share strategies and tips for approaching assignments, I met with students individually. This gave us the opportunity to build trust in a way we hadn't been able to in the classroom. I spent much more time talking with my students about their homelife, what they were up to, what they missed about school, etc. The trust I built allowed me to support these students in a much more authentic manner than I had previously.

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In reading Lois Lowry's dystopian novel, The Giver, the students explore the dichotomy between utopian and dystopian societies.  The final project for this book is for them to create their own version of a perfect society.  The format was completely up to them with the stipulation that it had to be presented to the class.  Because it was due after we went to distance learning, students were asked to do a short video to present their societies.  What an amazing selection of formats, ideas, and creativity came out of this.  In order to be able to share it with the entire class, we opened a "showcase" document where students could download their projects to share.
This actually overlaps several of the practices: investigation, feedback, and even community building.  I am always proud of the depth of understanding the students get from the book and this project.  I was even more proud of their work this year because of the way they were able to adapt and still be so inclusive.

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At my old school, I had the pleasure of implementing the Word Study program into the 4th and 5th grade classes. Transitioning from the traditional “one size fits all” spelling approach to a differentiated approach that allowed students to explore spelling and understand the patterns that connect words was refreshing. Students became engaged in analyzing and recognizing spelling patterns instead of just memorizing how to spell a random list of words. I was proud that I was able to incorporate such a meaningful program into their instruction.

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I was hearing from a lot of students about how much they missed their friends and classmates. I knew that most students were experiencing a lot of emotions related to distance learning. For REACH, I focused all of distance learning around emotional acuity. One week, I assigned a project for lower school students to find a way to connect with a friend. They could create art, write a letter, make a video etc to send to his or her friend. As a result, I was sent so many cute pictures or email about how excited the students were to take time and find a meaningful way to connect with a friend! It was uplifting for all involved!

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How Does Geography of a Place Determine People's Lifestyles, as they adapt to the climate patterns?

Poetry was a great tool to engage them in cultural and language learning and reflected the Essential Practices to learn differently about landscapes.

In April 2020, 4th grade Spanish students learned about landscapes. As part of
“ National Poetry Month” and in an effort to expand students' cultural knowledge, we learned about Spanish poet, Gloria Fuentes. Fuentes’ poetry was a wonderful way for students to read about the landscapes of Spain. Herein, the students found Spanish poetry more interesting than they expected! As part of this unit, students worked creatively on their own interpretation of the words. For example, they made their own version of the poem and/or illustrated the poem using the expression “ Yo veo” ( I see…). They used both English and Spanish words as I am showing in the examples below.

Examples:
A student’s own version of the poem:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1mxP4LMaEUrLvc-1JFZ0-_jmOgSo8p6pvMA-veAR2s30/edit?usp=sharing

Illustration of the poem:

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During out poetry unit we took the opportunity to challenge the students to create primary sources related to the pandemic. The task was to think about their experiences, their life, and their thoughts. Students investigated their own memories and thoughts and told the story of their experience in the pandemic. After that, students listened to a TED Talk and a parent, who told their story through various lens. They learned that we can look at the same moment in a variety of ways. They learned about memories, the power of a stories, and how stories can be a window into our minds. They were challenged to OWN their story and use it as a source of strength. These lessons were designed to challenge students to confront and reflect on their feelings around what was happening in the world, the coronavirus, and distance learning. Students created primary sources and showcased their thoughts through poetry. The progression of the student's poems was powerful and they really owned their story!

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The task was to build different places in our community out of recycled materials.  Students first investigated the concepts of needs and wants, as well as goods and services.  After that, we took a tour of the McLean community, stopping at various places.  At each stop, the students were able to see those concepts modeled in real life; community members providing a service or creating a good in real time based on the needs and wants of a community.  We even got to see a real call to the fire department.  The firefighters stopped mid-speech to hop into their gear, turned on the sirens and raced out of the firehouse to an emergency!  Following our tour, it was time to put our inquiry into practice!  Students worked in teams (community) to plan then build a place in the community (bank, fire station, library, Target, etc.) with recycled materials.  They spent weeks digging through the mountain of materials (did you stop by LS25?! We had tin foil coming out of our ears!) to find just the right item for their building. I loved stopping a team to ask questions as a way to provide feedback, like "Remember when we went to Chain Bridge Bank and saw where people stored their valuable items? Does your bank have that?"  And then the team would realize they needed to build a vault. I think I'm most proud of how my students worked together in their teams; how they listened to each other, how they handled set backs, how they communicated with one another and finally how they offered help to other teams when needed.  They truly worked as a community to build a community!

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The task was counting on from different numbers. We practiced this skill for weeks before. We gave each student different number of cubes and then we gave them a number on a piece of paper that was higher. We asked them to use cubes and also be able to explain their findings. The students were able to use their background knowledge to find the answer. Some used grouping skills and skip counting.

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Seventh graders created their own superhero characters by answering a list of questions such as, "How does your character feel about his/her powers? If your character could go back to being normal, would they? Why or why not? Do other people trust your character?" I modeled examples of written and performed monologues and they wrote their own scripts. I gave them feedback on the written monologues, which they edited and practiced before recording a performance in costume. They watched each other's monologues and gave peer feedback through a Google Sheet. I am proud that the students had the freedom to imagine any character that inspired their creativity, then develop it with guidance from peers and teacher feedback. I also was pleasantly surprised by several pairs who built community by weaving their stories together, such as superhero best friends who fight crime together.

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This cross-curricular project allowed the seventh graders to research a specific topic related to energy policy in the U.S. Each student investigated their topic through extensive research. The 7th grade teachers modeled research skills and then the students practiced these skills in finding evidence to support their positions. The students each wrote Position Papers arguing their positions using evidence and logical reasoning to support their positions. Finally, the students presented their arguments in a mock congressional hearing to Senators. The students received much feedback on their work -- from the Senators and from the teachers. This was truly an inquiry based project.

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Percentages - "Game of Life" - 6th grade

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Percentages - "Game of Life" - 6th grade

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The students complete a 'Game of Life' project during the final term in sixth grade math. They are given a job with a salary and taxes and have to then figure out a budget. I enjoy hearing student's perspectives and letting them utilize the percentages to investigate how they are used in real life. It is also great to introduce financial literacy! The most challenging part about doing this virtually was the community part - but that is typically one of my favorite pieces of it - getting the students to have conversations that include solid 'math talk'. I was proud of figuring out ways to work in smaller groups virtually so that students could share what they learned and present their "experiences" with peers.

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The 8th grade team began planning for a spring, cross-curricular culminating project based upon service learning opportunities of sustainable living, affordable, "green" housing, and "life" in our community. This project was inquiry based and would have included important concepts and essential practices from Math, Science, Language Arts, Art, and Social Studies, as well as service learning opportunities. Our team felt this project was necessary to help students connect their learning to understand, participate, and solve real-world problems. From the math perspective, students from Geometry and Algebra classes utilized critical thinking skills gained from activities in "Three Act Tasks," "Would You Rather" and  "DESMOS," as well as the purposeful work they completed during in-class learning. They would have thought critically about their projects using spatial and algebraic thinking skills. I wanted to write about this as our students did the hard work to get to the "launch" point and were extremely excited to get started - as were their teachers. We are looking forward to putting this planning and implementation into place in 2021 - when our students can see the results of their learning in a rich, multi-disciplined way!

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During the second trimester we were doing a lot of cooperative learning activities in first grade . One of my favorite was for the students to come up with their own tag game. Students were divided into groups of 4 and given the task to create their own tag game we could play in class. They were all given 3-4 different objects (Building brick, jump rope, a noodle..etc) to use them in their games if they chose to. It was amazing to see how they worked together to come up with some incredible activities. I was pleased to see the communication and energy going on in each group.. Upon completion. we were all sharing the games they created, and students also explained the ideas and process it took them to create.

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Data Science is quickly emerging as one of the most important math concepts students will study in middle school and high school. As an introduction to our 7th grade data and statistics unit, I have students complete a series of tasks called "What's going on in this graph?",  published weekly by the New York Times. Students are presented with  an unusual data display and are tasked with answering three questions - What do you notice? What do you wonder? What do you think is going on in this graph? Students can then come up with a catchy title for the graph. I typically have students share their answers with a partner or in a small groups. This activity encourages students to think critically about the visual display presented to them, to be observant, curious, and start a mathematical discourse with their peers. I am always so proud of the observations and connections they make or the confidence they feel as they work to become data scientists, and especially when they can use the correct vocabulary to explain their thinking.

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Graphs, maps and charts from The Times — and an invitation to students to discuss them live.

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I was super excited to see how simple, clear, and purposeful lessons that included modeling, practice & ways to build relationships resulted in a lot of growth for my students language development. Spanish classes were not required and it was a pleasant surprise to received student's work and desire to keep learning.

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I was very proud to see how modeling in fun and engaging ways was the perfect way to build community during distance learning at the same time that students were reaching the class goals.

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During the third trimester, music students engaged in a songwriting unit using a software program called Soundtrap. Students analyzed popular songs as models of songwriting, practiced composing their own songs based on a poem, and then created their own original lyrics and music. Along the way, I was able to listen to their compositions and leave comments and suggestions for continued work. In the classroom, I usually give students the option to work with a partner to create their final project. With Soundtrap's share and chat features, students were able to do this virtually if they wished. It was great to listen to students' finished songs that expressed their individual personalities and creativity.

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Towards the end of what would have been 2nd grade's book club unit, students are asked to share the series they've been reading with other kids. Using SeeSaw, I modeled several ways students could share their books with others: leaving notes for the next reader throughout the book, creating quizzes for the next reader, writing a "love note" about the book, or acting out the best part. It was amazing to see the variety of ways second graders chose to share their books with others - including some ways I hadn't even thought of! One student created a Chatterpix with her main character telling others why they should read the book. The kids were able to demonstrate not only an understanding of their series books but also their own unique personalities.

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During our How-To writing unit, we started by showing students many examples of how to books from past years or published pieces. After we modeled many of our own teacher examples as well, students were inspired to think about their own expertise and teach others through writing. The students each produced many books. After some time in the unit, there are always a few students that run low on ideas. This year, we partnered students in small groups or partners to share ideas and give feedback on existing stories. It was a great way to build a writing community and keep students writing.

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My favorite classroom moment was when we discussed our Unit Study:  Community Helpers and why they are important.  Our class was eager to tell us about different community helpers in their neighborhood and their community. Our students were able to share with us their favorite community helper and why.  We were at a loss for words when we saw our students trying on different uniforms and instantly transforming into a Police Officer, Doctor, and Firefighter.  

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In my small group targeted intervention work we worked on building essential decoding skills. After my two students could comfortably build and read a variety of short a words using letter tiles, I wanted to see if they could transfer this knowledge to another short vowel. I had students build the word "pat," which they found to be quite easy. Then, I gave them a short i letter tile and asked them if they could take away one letter and build a new word. As they investigated various scenarios, they finally built the word "pit." Then, we worked together to build words changing one letter at a time from "pit" to "pig" or "pin." I modeled how you can take the sounds you know and use them to make new words. Then, students independently used this new knowledge to build words on their boards using the letters "t" and "i." I was able to give instant and immediate feedback as I challenged them to see how many words they could build using a variety of constants.

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In this assignment students explored different types of cells and created a Google slide project with pictures they took various cells while labeling different parts of the cells and describing the function of the organelles.
Community Building: Students share and microscopes and samples in-order to gather their pictures.
Modeling: I demonstrate how to use the microscopes, trouble shoot, and show them different organelles to find.
Investigation: They have to do it on their own and find and identify samples from tissue that I have not shown them before.
Practice: They need to use the microscope technology independently in order to complete the full project.
Feedback: I am constantly giving ideas on slide samples, checking work progression their Google Slides and viewing

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For their major project of the web design unit during the third trimester, each student created a professional portfolio using Google Sites. Students self-selected and shared various images, files, and content to archive, store, share and reflect on their learning.  At the beginning of the unit, students investigated and learned more about web design - the good and the bad. I had the students spend a lot of time on their content before they actually created the web pages.

If we would have been in-person, students in each class would be able to walk around and just look at each other's websites on everyone's Chromebooks in the classroom. It's also so much easier for me to provide feedback. Being virtual made this t very challenging.

Early on, I knew that I had to have the students see each other's websites. The intent of the portfolio is to tell someone about yourself. I didn't want my website to be the only model and I think there's so much power in peer feedback. So, they were partnered up and investigated a classmate's website and provided written feedback to one another.  The result was they were inspired by each other, shared ideas and enhanced their portfolios. It really helped build our design class community.

This is the third year I've had my seventh-grade students create digital portfolios. The websites this year far exceeded my expectations.  The students reflected how much they appreciated the opportunity to create these sites that showcase them as professional students. Many will be sharing the link to their sites on their high school applications.

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Trail of Tears / Andrew Jackson - 7th Grade Social Studies 

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Trail of Tears / Andrew Jackson - 7th Grade Social Studies 

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Westward expansion is often glossed over or glorified in social studies classrooms, so I wanted the 7th grade students to have a more authentic exposure to the topic. We began by investigating the themes of ownership and destiny through essential questions, and then I had students complete a self paced at home "simulation" where they were ordered to move within their homes to less and less ideal spaces. This began the investigation of how Native Americans were displaced while others were taking ownership of their lands. I modeled investigative practices for bias when reviewing historical accounts of Andrew Jackson, and modeled examining primary sources like maps and images. Students then practiced these skills to understand how Andrew's Jackson career and legacy impacted the nation, and how the Native Americans were directly impacted by his beliefs and choices. Students completed our study by creating their own account of Andrew Jackson called "What the World Needs to Know". They had choice on what they produced, and then these were shared in a classroom viewing.

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One of my favorite class moments was when we learned about Louis Armstrong. The students were first introduced to pictures of him and had the chance to predict who/what we were going to learn about. Next we explored Louis Armstrong’s life through his music and actual videos of his performances; students had the opportunity to talk about what they saw and heard. Then we took some action by pretending to play trumpets with straws and blew into them (with paint) to create a piece of artwork (as we continued to listen to his music!). It was so much fun to watch their eyes light up at the sound of his voice/instrument. It was a great lesson spent discovering, exploring and investigating.

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Fourth graders last year had the opportunity to investigate an Asian country of their choice. Students explored different books, magazines, and photos about various Asian countries that the teachers chose and each student chose the country they wanted to study further. They were put in research teams where they worked together to come up with inquiry questions, assign roles, research, share out at the end of each research session. At the conclusion of their research, students wrote paragraphs about their research and chose symbols to represent it.  They created mobiles with the symbols and information about their country. Teachers modeled the process of how to work as team, how to research effectively. They also showed an example of the product. Students and teacher gave each other feedback during many points in the process. The inquiry essential practices were used throughout the project.

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One of the best parts of JK is we are always asking questions and investigating. When studying the Polar Regions our kids had new questions and things they wanted to explore everyday and one question that we had a lot of fun answering was- "what makes animals able to live in such cold environments"? We discussed how we layer when we go outside in winter and the opposite in summer. But having a mild winter the kids really needed to feel the cold, so we introduced blubber. The kids had so much fun, wanting this to be a centers choice every morning and you could see their minds absorbing every bit of the experience.

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1st Grade Writing Workshop (All About Books)

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1st Grade Writing Workshop (All About Books)

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First graders learned to write nonfiction "teaching" books about a topic of their choice. They used mentor texts and their own nonfiction books in Reading Workshop to explore and investigate different kinds of nonfiction writing. Through minilessons and examples, students both viewed and coconstructed strong pieces of nonfiction writing. They experimented in their own writing with applying skills from minilessons and shared with their peers inviting and offering feedback to each other. Teachers conferred and met with small groups to provide targeted feedback as well. Finally, students published and celebrated all of their hard work! I love most that the students feel so proud of their work and the freedom that the workshop gives them to craft their writing at their own pace so they really feel like it is their creation!

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Word Detectives Celebration (Final "Mission")

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Word Detectives Celebration (Final "Mission")

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First graders applied word solving strategies and phoneme/grapheme knowledge to solve a final clue from the SSD (Super Secret Detective Agency). It was amazing to see kids approach inquiry through the lens of a mystery they had to solve. As the year progressed, students were able to come back to the strategies they learned in this unit independently or through teacher feedback.

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In the fall the 3rd grade students learned the importance of portraiture as an art form and investigated how to represent themselves visually.  In art, the students used their knowledge learned about their identities from their classrooms and our field trip to create Identity Portraits. Each artist chose what was most important to them about their identity and created a visual representation.
Portraits can sometimes be a challenge for students to draw, because the human figure is challenging and self-awareness  for a 8-9 year old is also hard to capture. It was wonderful to see their eyes light up when I said it doesn't have to be your face.  They could draw a hand or anything that represents themselves and what they are most proud of. The possibilities were endless!
Students also had the opportunity to practice and enhance their original artistic styles by choosing the medium they wanted to use for their portraits.
Students also reflected on their work while writing artist statements. It was quite magical to observe how students represented their identities both visually and through their writing.

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I wasn't at Langley last year, but I remember reading "Bear Counts" by Karma Wilson in one of my preschool storytimes.

In the book, we counted to ten in English, and afterward, we spontaneously started counting in the adults' native languages: Spanish, French, Creole, Tagalog, Hebrew, Thai, Mandarin, Japanese... and others I can't remember now. But it was wonderful to learn more about the adults I saw almost every day, hear about the countries from which they hailed, and see their little ones become curious about learning more words in their grownups' native languages. It's one of my favorite storytime memories.

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One of my favorite examples of inquiry was using the triangular shaped incline mat as a station when the students were learning about rolling and jumping skills. Rather than roll their own bodies, this station had them work to roll a ball down the mat. I placed out various sizes of balls as well as several targets and they were able to decide how to set up the activity. It was fun to see them choose either a pin to knock down or a basket to roll into, and to decide what size and weight ball allowed for the most success. I don't have a picture of this one. Another activity I really enjoyed was from last year during fire safety week. I put out 6 stations, all relating to either safety behaviors or being a fire fighter. One of the stations was to put out a "fire" by working together to hold the "hose". There's a cute image of some preschoolers working as fire fighters.

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Last year our third grade team worked with our students to create a newspaper. The students examined the various aspects of a newspaper, investigated different topics they wanted to write about and discussed ways to appeal to a wide audience age-range (kindergarteners through grandparents). Launching off of our non-fiction writing unit, articles were written covering global news, local news (happenings around the school), book reviews and interest articles (covering topics such as: peacocks, pigeons, FortNite, baby sisters and The Gold Rush). The third graders received feedback and guidance from older students who served as our "editors." They also asked older students to place advertisements in the paper and asked faculty and staff members to invest in their project to give them some startup capital. As a grade, the students discussed various organizations that could benefit from our profits.

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I like the way I "teach" scientific method using the Mystery Box. All science classes from K on up begin with a refresher lesson on scientific process. The kids tend to tune out if it's just regurgitating the steps. I've evolved into reviewing the process by doing the process - via kids working to figure out what is in the Mystery Box. In the end, they look back at their process, and lo and behold, it turns out they've done the scientific method! The beauty is that invariably the kids come up with about 7 different hypotheses of what is in the box, most of which would work, and sometimes none of which are what is in the box. It beautifully illustrates the scientific method from observation through peer review, and touches on all of the Inquiry Essential Practices. Here is a video that I taped for my GOA course at 5 this morning. Hope it whets your appetite!

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Think about your work last year and pick one example of our Inquiry Essential Practices you were most proud of to share with your colleagues.

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3rd Grade Social Studies (Western Expansion)

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3rd Grade Social Studies (Western Expansion)

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Students learned how Lewis, Clark, and the Corps of Discovery built winter quarters near the Mandan Indians to build a strong relationship with the Native people. To show knowledge of the different areas that the fort encapsulated, students build replicas of Fort Mandan. Once completed, the students recorded an explanation of the various sections' purposes. They recorded this on FlipGrid. Through investigation and practice, students were able to show an understanding of the lesson.
Additionally, students recorded feedback or asked questions to one another about their final product. This activity was successful because students could be creative (choice of building materials) and explain the reasoning behind their decisions. They also took great pride in their final projects. One student even sent her replica to Fort Mandan and got a response from the National Park!