AIG Update (October Edition)
Hola!
Here’s some of what’s happening in our AIG groups:
ASG
Reading:
Fifth
grade students continue to work on the readers’ theater play Spark of Genius.
This play about Ben Franklin’s experiments with electricity is a great
opportunity for students to practice reading fluency and learn about history
and the scientific process. We completed recorded rehearsals and will move
forward to share a completed presentation in the coming weeks. These students
will also be working to present “Poems for 2 Voices” – specifically using a
collect from the Newberry Medal-winning poet, Paul Fleischman.
Fourth
grade has wrapped up introductory work with Junior Great Books. We have used a
‘do’s and don’ts’ list to help inform our discussions. We are moving to a more
formal literature study with resources from the Jones Media Center –thanks Ms.
Page!
ASG
Math:
Both
fourth and fifth grade students have been working with collaborative problem
solving. In this work, students each have a piece of a challenging math
problem. There’s a lot of discussion about how to work together – as you may
imagine! (They’re also looking at math analogies!) We have also taken to
playing a math fluency game called “24.” In this game students use randomly
generated numbers and four operations to get the answer 24.
Fifth
grade are moving into a webquest called The Gang of 15. In this work,
students have to locate a criminal organization around the world by researching
global sites they’ve visited AND discover/exchange the currency from each
place. The new Chrome book lab has been instrumental to this work!
Comprehensive
Study Groups:
You
may remember these students qualify based on an aptitude measure. To that end,
we’ve been talking about what that may look like. One way is for students to
exercise their gifts for visual puzzles. To this end, we’ve been playing a
visual attribute game (SET – you may know it) and discussing mathematical
analogies. Initially, both fourth and fifth graders were put-off by the
challenge of the analogy work, but they seem to be coming to the conclusion
that, with some perseverance, they can really show success!
I’ll
be rewarding student effort with photos on my blog (see address below).
Definitely check it out!
In the
coming weeks, these students will review multiple intelligences and begin work
on personal profiles.
Enrichment
Study Groups:
Fourth
graders prepare for a simulation by researching four sciences – meteorology,
astronomy, geology, and history – in preparation for a simulation in which they
will ‘be’ these scientists. Ms. Sorenson, our awesome instructional technology
facilitator, has been crucial to our connection to web research AS WELL AS a
great introduction to Google Docs. Students should complete their research and
vie for scientific assignments as we move into the simulation proper.
Fifth
grade had some initiative to redesign the AIG room (13, now shared with a math
specialist) to suit our needs. They are still working on scale models with
paper/pencils to not only show their design but also to pitch their ideas to
stakeholders. We’ll see where this one leads us! I sense more structure in the
near future, but who knows? I am looking forward to their pitches!
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