#And That's Who I Am
Our first IB Unit this year is all about who we are and how we express ourselves. We will be taking surveys, creating art and writing stories about ourselves. We are working with Methow Arts and will produce beautiful collage posters about ourselves. You will be able to see the boards in progress in the hallway soon. It is a very interesting unit and we all learn a lot!
Our second IB Unit is an inquiry into Sharing the Planet. The central idea is that the Earth and its atmosphere are surrounded by space and are a part of a complex universe.
It covers many of our Washington State science standards. www.nextgenscience.org/pe/5-ess1-1-earths-place-universe is the link to the standards.
We will be creating "textbooks" around all of our topics, which range from the earth's layers to shadows to engineering tops. We started with a wonderful art project where the students created imaginary planets and we will be writing science fiction as well.
Our third IB Unit is under the transdisciplinary theme of "Where We Are in Space and Time" and the central idea is Exploration Widens Perspectives. It's called Galleons and it's all about the European expansion into the Americas. We explore the ideas of Native American/European interactions and think about ideas like, "Was Columbus a hero or a villain?" The students play a big game of racing to the Caribbean and back and get points for their Galleon team by writing log entries and taking quizzes about a variety of topics related to the theme. We use The Zinn Education Project for some of our assignments and an online textbook for others. They do a lot of hard reading and writing and thinking, but always enjoy it. If they talk about burning something, rest assured it's with an adult and it's just the edges of their log entries. You are welcome to come in any time to check it out!