As we are about to enter our final week of the school year, I have spent a lot of time thinking about how I should wrap up the year with my 6th grade U.S. History students. The last couple of months have been like no other. The last time I saw my students in person was March 13th. We didn't realize at the time, we would not see each other again for the rest of the school year. Fortunately, we sent all of our students home with their Chromebooks and two library books that afternoon. (I am also grateful that I stood in the hall, outside of my classroom that afternoon, and said goodbye to my students. That doesn't always happen. Sometimes the end of the day can get a little hectic and I don't make it to the hall to say goodbye to my students. I am SO glad I did that day.)
After we learned we were not coming back (at first we thought we'd be back in a few weeks), we were tasked with coming up with curriculum that could be delivered online. We had the benefit in my district of having an extra week to prepare due to Spring Break.
Most of our district's middle school students are working online. Some students are receiving paper copies and/or working from the textbook. Our district delivers materials to students daily (if needed).
A third of my students seem to be doing fine with distance learning, about a third are turning in work intermittently and about a third are checking in but doing very little if any work. I try to make my lessons engaging and meaningful and most importantly, I want my class to run as smoothly as possible. I tried to stick with platforms my kids already know. It was tempting to add a lot of extra bells and whistles with all the free subscriptions made available to educators due to Covid-19. The most challenging part of distance learning in my opinion has been maintaining personal connections with the students. Just as it seems like I'm starting to figure out what works and what doesn't work, the year is drawing to an end.
With all of this in mind, my goal for my sixth graders was to create a final project my students would find both meaningful and enjoyable. (One lesson I learned over the past couple months is students need time away from screens. They crave hands-on projects). As luck would have it, I stumbled across the Getty Museum challenge on Twitter and later on Instagram. I incorporated a project based on the Getty Museum challenge in my Geography and Word Cultures class and it was a hit. Over 90% of my students completed the project. I thought I'd give it a shot with my 6th graders.
The project I created for my 6th graders was two-fold. The first part required a little research of Emanual Gottlieb Leutze's painting, Washington Crossing the Delaware. Students were required to write about the historical inaccuracies of the painting. I provided links to three sources where they could find the information they would need to correctly answer the question. The second part of the project required students to recreate the painting using found objects (including people and/or pets). Within hours of posting the assignment, students were sharing their recreations, some using Legos, others using stuffed animals, others using pets!
Below is a picture of the slide I shared with my students in our Google Classroom:
After we learned we were not coming back (at first we thought we'd be back in a few weeks), we were tasked with coming up with curriculum that could be delivered online. We had the benefit in my district of having an extra week to prepare due to Spring Break.
Most of our district's middle school students are working online. Some students are receiving paper copies and/or working from the textbook. Our district delivers materials to students daily (if needed).
A third of my students seem to be doing fine with distance learning, about a third are turning in work intermittently and about a third are checking in but doing very little if any work. I try to make my lessons engaging and meaningful and most importantly, I want my class to run as smoothly as possible. I tried to stick with platforms my kids already know. It was tempting to add a lot of extra bells and whistles with all the free subscriptions made available to educators due to Covid-19. The most challenging part of distance learning in my opinion has been maintaining personal connections with the students. Just as it seems like I'm starting to figure out what works and what doesn't work, the year is drawing to an end.
With all of this in mind, my goal for my sixth graders was to create a final project my students would find both meaningful and enjoyable. (One lesson I learned over the past couple months is students need time away from screens. They crave hands-on projects). As luck would have it, I stumbled across the Getty Museum challenge on Twitter and later on Instagram. I incorporated a project based on the Getty Museum challenge in my Geography and Word Cultures class and it was a hit. Over 90% of my students completed the project. I thought I'd give it a shot with my 6th graders.
The project I created for my 6th graders was two-fold. The first part required a little research of Emanual Gottlieb Leutze's painting, Washington Crossing the Delaware. Students were required to write about the historical inaccuracies of the painting. I provided links to three sources where they could find the information they would need to correctly answer the question. The second part of the project required students to recreate the painting using found objects (including people and/or pets). Within hours of posting the assignment, students were sharing their recreations, some using Legos, others using stuffed animals, others using pets!
Below is a picture of the slide I shared with my students in our Google Classroom:
I made a short video explaining the instructions that I also shared with my students. You can watch it (HERE) if you are interested. (I always recorded myself reading the instructions and explaining each assignment and I posted my videos with my weekly agendas in my Google Classrooms. I did this because I quickly realized that I couldn't count on students joining my Google Meets to ask questions or email me with questions about assignments.)
If you would like to try this project with your students, (CLICK HERE) for a free copy!
As students shared their recreations with me, I added them to a shared Google Slide deck which all students could view!
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