Rationale
In the past ten years of teaching I have seen a gamut of both educational settings and student understanding. I started teaching math in a high-achieving performing arts magnet middle school. I spent the last 5 years in neighborhood K-8 schools, first teaching middle school math and now just finishing my first year as a third grade self-contained classroom teacher. Next year, I will teach second grade. Within this wide range of ages and skill level I have found one important part of education missing. All of these students do not have a foundation in the process of research. They struggle with making sense of their research and knowing which are important facts and which are unnecessary. In too many of their minds, the idea of research is to copy the first paragraph of a book about their topic or cut and paste someone else's work. It is my opinion that the earlier a child is taught a process of research the better they will be at the skill in later years.
My school is located in one of the highest crime and poverty areas in Pittsburgh. There is a lot of instability in the neighborhood and most of the families are non-traditional. Many of the children come to school for stability, hot meals, and social interactions. Beginning in the fall of 2009 my school will be returning to a K-5 school with enrollment of under 200 students with 99.2% African American. Discipline within the building is very strict; each child is required to wear a uniform, walk the halls in quiet straight lines and obey strict school rules. Each grade level will have one self-contained classroom. Class size ranges from twenty to thirty-five children. There will be a possibility of having class reduction teachers come into the building if the class size is too large.
My classroom is based on positive self-image and mutual respect for anyone that steps through the door. Many of the children come into school with negativism and issues that affect not only their education but all of their peers' education as well. The school environment must be such that the children can focus these energies into their education. My classroom is a beehive of activities. I am the queen bee and the children are the worker bees. The worker bees know the expectations of the classroom and they know that if one bee does not do the work expected the whole hive suffers. Yes, my classroom theme is a beehive with bee name tags, Bee Rules, filling the honey jar and of course I have my crown to wear to signify that I am the queen.
This unit will be taught in the Science class during the National Brain Awareness week. For the school year 2009-2010 it is the week of March 15; all subsequent years can be identified through the website of the Dana Foundation at www.dana.org . Because of the length of the unit, it may need to be extended into the following week or started early. The lessons will be designed to build pride in the school community, as well as pride in themselves.
Young children need to develop and understand techniques to do a thorough research assignment. They need to be given a tool that they can use to research any topic. The tool that will be used in this unit is the journalist's approach to writing a complete story. This technique is to answer all of these six questions: Who, What, When, Where, Why and How. By asking these questions and finding the answers the children will be able to research a subject and get a complete understanding of it. The subject the children will be researching is the brain and the five senses.
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