I’ve blogged about this
before, so excuse the repetition...but I love the Titanic. My mom took me to see
the movie when I was 7 (I don’t think she anticipated the graphic scenes) and I
fell in love with the movie, the history of the ship, and Leonardo DiCaprio.
I’ve always found the
whole story to be so interesting. It was a time when there was a major shift in
the industrial world and people truly thought that the advancements in their
modern technology basically made them invincible to the natural world. The
steel and iron built “unsinkable” Titanic would prove to the world that this is
in fact, very untrue.
To activate prior
knowledge, I asked the students if they have ever heard of or knew anything
about Titanic. I was shocked that a few of them could speak about the movie,
but hey-I guess I was only in Grade Two when I saw it for the first time. Who am I to judge?
To get them all pumped up,
I made them all boarding passes with a fun, made up biography of their
character. To protect their names, I’ll show you my boarding pass.
I was adventurous with the
biographies. Some of them were elderly women married to rich men, some of them
were third class men who helped build the Titanic, and some were
children travelling the world with their families. The funniest among the Grade
One audience was the girl who was engaged to be married! Oooooooo!
Our boarding passes served
as our shared reading for the week as we worked on comprehension skills.
"Do you
understand the information on your ticket?"
"If I ask you a question about your
character, will you be able to find the information and answer accurately?"
It
was tons of fun.
But don’t worry, there
were other curriculum connections as well. As you know, we are learning about
structures and materials in science, so we talked about the pros and cons of
different materials, specifically iron and steel.
I asked them if they
thought Titanic was a good structure. Thank goodness there was a unanimous “NO!”
I asked them how the
Titanic could have been built better, and I have a sneaking suspicion that I
have a few future shipbuilders/architects in my class. One kid suggested that
he would have used the same materials, but have multiple wall layers so that
even if it did crash into an iceberg, only the outer wall would be damaged.
That’s a genius idea! {At least I think so. Professionals may know a little
more about that…}
In our literacy program,
we have been learning about heroes, so we learned all about Margaret Brown. She’s
most commonly known as “The Unsinkable Molly Brown”. We learned how this first
class woman helped to provide food, water, clean clothes, blankets, and hot
beverages to the Titanic survivors.
Descriptive Feedback
I used this piece of
writing as my mid-point, formal descriptive feedback. When the kids were
finished, I put a sticky note on each of their pages with my feedback. In Grade
One, I keep it simple. I may just write, “Capitals”; or I may write, “word mat”.
Whatever it is they need to improve on, I let them know on a sticky note. They.
Love. It.
Then I sent a more formal
form of feedback to parents so they know exactly how their children are doing.
Let’s not forget, Easter
is in just a few days, so we had some Easter fun at the end of the week. We
made adorable magnetic picture frames to put on the fridge at home. I took
their pictures, had them developed, and stuck them in the frames before I sent
them home.
And of course I had to
spoil them rotten before I said goodbye for four days.
As I asked them about
their Easter weekend plans, one girl shared her agenda:
Girl: I’m going to Disney World and then we’re going to Miami.
Me: WHAT?! Can I come? Can
you squeeze me in your suitcase?
Girl: Sorry. I think I
just need some alone time with my mom and dad.
Fair enough…
Happy Easter!
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