Cultural Fair!

The girls took great pride in sharing their country projects with their visitors. Thank you for attending!

Chinese People and Culture

Post what you think are the most important facts from the reading today to our Culture Wall! http://wallwisher.com/wall/chinasculture

Country Project Time!

We have completed our note cards and outlines, and now it is time to write. The girls will write their rough drafts this week in class. They have each chosen a country in Asia, and will write a brief country report, and then delve deeper into a cultural aspect of the country.

Latin American Tagxedo

Students in Ms. Cheston’s class, researched a topic in Latin America and then wrote a brief essay before sharing what they learned with their classmates. To visual represent their essay, they loaded it in Tagxedo and chose an image that reflected their topic. They could put the words in the shape of their image or around the image leaving the shape plan and their words as the background. Tagxedo is similar to Wordle, in that the more often the words appeared in their essay, the more prominent they were in their Tagxedo! See if you can identify the shape and prevalent words about their topics! Enjoy!

• Scarlet Macaw
• Tango
• Salsa
• Panama Canal
• Carnival
• Mayan Temples
• Diego Rivera
• Bullfighting

First Geography Projects This week!

     Students were given a choice of alternative assessments for the unit, in an effort to move towards a more project based learning model.  Instead of paper and pencil tests and quizzes always being the way we assess, I wanted students to have an opportunity to share their interests and what they have learned in new and engaging ways!  The first 4-5 girls shared their projects today in geography, and they did a great job!  We had a diorama of the Dead Sea (complete with a tourist - aka Polly Pocket - floating in it!), a model of a kibbutz, a newspaper article, and tasted a homemade Middle Eastern recipe of pita bread! 

Palestinian & Israeli Conflict

    The girls have been learning about the Palestinian and Israeli conflict.  They have read 'accounts' from both sides of the conflict, then were divided into two camps - Palestines and Israelis.  We had two groups in each camp.  They were given 30 minutes yesterday to prepare an argument why they should have the land from the perspectives they were assigned.  The assignment was very open-ended.  I told them they could present it in any way they saw fit.   Three groups designed PowerPoints.  One group rewrote the lyrics to "Why Can't We Be Friends" and sang it to the class!  So clever and so creative!  I loved it!

Student Reaches New Heights

Our classmate returns from her trip to South America tomorrow, but not before reaching new heights.  She and her family climbed to the top and took this amazing shot!  We can't wait to see her tomorrow.

Classmate in Ecuador and Peru

   Well, it's back to school and everyone seems to be coping pretty well - especially our classmate who is in Peru and Ecuador!  She sent us a picture of her and her sister on the equator!  The girls were very excited to see them standing in different hemispheres.  We turned the picture into a quick geography review! 

Introduction to Islam

As we begin to explore the final religion in our World Religions unit, I want you to listent to the following two videos as homework. You may not understand everything, but listen and take brief notes to share in class on Wednesday. Feel free to write down any questions you have and bring them to class.


We'll use this website in class tomorrow.
http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/Homework/religion/Islam.htm

Judaism Glogs

The girls learned about the religion of Judaism as part of our World Religion unit. The girls had to research two websites to find various facts about Judaism, then working in pairs, had to create audio recordings using the web site - Vocaroo, and locate images that compliment their recordings. All of this was added to their 'team' glog and shared with the class. They did a great job! Check out these glogs. Click on the "play" buttons to hear student voices explain various facts about Judaism.

Intro to Judaism

PART 1

Judaism Religion


Religious Tolerance - Judaism

Ms. Cheston's class - Today, we'll begin learning about the second oldest world religion; Judaism.  Use the above resources to find information about Judaism for your worksheet.

                                                PART 2
                                                Vocaroo - Use this website to create your sound recordings.

                                                Glogster - Click here to create your glog about Judaism with your partner
                                                                 Username and password  is  214girls

Cultural Scavenger Hunt

The girls' classes went on a Cultural Scavenger Hunt over the last few days to learn about different countries and culture's customs, and to realize that culture involves more than just language and religion.  Everyone has culture - and belongs to different cultures - Calvert culture, Family culture, Baltimore culture, religious and/or language culture, etc...  Culture shapes how we see the world, ourselves, and others.  It has to do with values, beliefs, customs, and traditions, and is transmitted generation to generation.  The girls have created two "Wallwisher" walls where they have added electronic 'sticky notes' to share what they learned about various cultural traditions.  Take a look!

Ms. Cheston's Wall

Ms. Merrick's Wall

Map Projection

To help students understand projection and distortion, some students worked in groups to attempt to take an orange (their globe) and put it on a flat surface. They quickly understood how complicated and difficult it was to take a globe and make it into a map. They saw firsthand how distortion happens, and how some projections look "torn". They disagreed, just like many geographers have in the past, on how they could accomplish their task. In the end, we made a mess (geographers don't have juice squirting at them as they attempt to take Earth's 'skin' and place it on a map) :-), but they have a much better understanding of projection and distortion.