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September 9, 2015

Social Studies and Novel Projects

This blog has been silent lately... just the beginning of the year with too much to do and not enough hours in the day.  I'm uploading photos today to show you what projects we have been up to.  :) 


We finished Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing, so our end project was to create character letters.  This year since we are focusing on novel studies, I am using these Book Reports from Rachel Lynette to make each novel shine.  These are in class projects and she has even included directions and rubrics that made it super easy to grade.  The students wrote letters to the main characters, and the main characters had to write back to them.  They thought this was hilarious!  I thought it was so creative how the students made their writing sound exactly like Peter, Fudge, Mom, and even Sheila!


We have also been researching our California Regions and creating Informational Booklets.  I chose sticks to separate out my 32 kids into regions groups - 8 per region.  We spent 2 weeks researching the different topics (Landforms, Wildlife, Vegetation, Industries, Major Cities, Climate, Natural Resources, and Interesting Facts).  The kids researched using the internet, their texts, my Regions Reading Passages, and a couple region DVD's in both small group, whole class, and individuals.  They took their information and had to write one paragraph on each area and draw a detailed picture per page.  These booklets have taken 2 weeks to complete.  :)  Labor of love...


We finished up our first chapter in Social Studies (which included map skills, directions, and regions).  On the back of these worlds the kids took part of their test.  Fun times!  They were given a circle and ruler, and had to draw examples of the Equator, Lines of Latitude and Longitude, Tropic of Cancer and Capricorn, Prime Meridian, North and South Poles.  When completed, they cut out their worlds and could decorate the back of it.


Oh, and we accomplished Salt Dough Maps!  1 cup of flour, 1/2 cup of salt, and 1/2 cup of water is the perfect amount of dough.  My grade level always completes these the Friday before Labor Day so we have all weekend to let them dry before painting on Tuesday.  The kids had to identify the different regions and landforms, show neighboring states, and include a map key.  We added a little glitter today to finish it up since we are the Golden State.  Happy Birthday California!  

California Regions Reading Passages
Just in case you are interested.  Here's the link. :) 

Hope you had a great day!

1 comment:

  1. What a super amount of work for the beginning of the year! I feel envious, but we just got our new classes yesterday, so I guess there's still time to get around to the projects I'm looking forward to this year!
    Always Primary

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