Newsletter: Election, Animal Expert Projects, Memoir Share and Reflection

Dear Parents,

Voting season is drawing to a close and we're using it to our advantage here in the classroom. One of the topics the state of South Carolina wants to see us exploring in third grade is government. To do this, we're rooting much of our studies in real world events and topics - such as the elections taking place next week. We've focused our attention on the race for governor but when looking at the results next week we will widen our lenses to see the other offices that were up for grabs as well.

As you know, a few days ago the kids came home with the task of bringing back a belief or claim from one of the candidates. You did a wonderful job. The information they brought back was shared

out and glued to our poster. We used a list of issues we had pulled from Nikki Haley's website to sort these out since almost all the things the kids brought in were about her. Today in class we looked at Vincent Sheheen's website and everyone took one belief/goal they liked and posted it to the other side of the board. What we found is that both candidates want more jobs and good schools in South Carolina. Our primary goal was to learn that elections and candidates run on issues. Our role as citizens is to be informed and make decisions that will support our communities.

I hope you will be able to take your kids with you on Tuesday to vote. It's such an important experience. Many of the kids want to know who I will vote for. I didn't tell them, though I'm not sure it's important to be secretive about this. I'm generally in favor of being upfront with things of that nature because I doubt my own voting habits make any difference what-so-ever on the kids. They know better than to think we have a classroom where any of us are expected to parrot the choices of others. Rather, we learn each and every day to think for ourselves. Elections are yet another opportunity to have this discussion.

Our animal research has been going really well. There's a lot of energy around this work. In fact, most days when I say "Go get your research notes and your Chromebook" the class either cheers or gets excited. The kids love learning about animals, but they also love researching. I don't remember this being the case when I was young and in school. I think this is due, in large part, to both the inquisitive nature of CFI and the element of choice within classrooms. The kids are exploring so many cool animals - some of which I know little or nothing about. The fact we get to learn alongside one another makes it all the more exciting.

The kids began this work by carefully observing a photo of their animal. They sketched it and recorded all the observational data they could collect about their bodies. We then began searching for information on the internet. The kids collected any and all facts that caught their fancy. After a few days of this we began to sort these notes out. The class suggested possible categories in which to sort our information (habitats, food, bodies, etc) and then we looked at a few published animal non-fiction books from our library to see what categories those researchers/authors used. Once we had a list compiled the kids chose the ones they needed based on the types of information they had been collecting. Some,like those mentioned earlier, were considered "Must Haves."

Having sorted their notes into categories, they could see which subtopics they had really researched

heavily and which needed more attention. We also used our notes to consider the sorts of questions we were answering. For instance, if someone had a note that read "Wolves are carnivores. They eat small animals." we realized they were answering the question "What does your animal eat?" We used our notes to compile a master list of questions that might be answered when conducting this sort of research. The kids then used these questions to consider other bits of information they may want to collect for their projects.

Today we spent our final chunk of class time on this research. As shared in an earlier email, they are now bringing this work home to show you. This will be your opportunity to look it over, provide some feedback, and help them chase down any remaining information that seems to be missing. The goal is to have enough facts from which to write a non-fiction book about their animal. We all have different facts and many of us have at least one or two different categories/subtopics. So these projects are unique to each child (thus, the element of choice). But along the way they're learning to read non-fiction texts, skim for information, summarize big ideas, sort ideas/information, write informational text, and so much more. The vast majority of this is happening at school because the focus is on the process, not the product. We'll take pride in those final products but our real learning takes place "in the moment" when reading, note taking, sharing, writing, and revising. It's a big undertaking, to be sure, but well worth it!

Finally, the kids had the opportunity to share their published memoirs with both fifth grade classes yesterday. The fifth graders moved around the room reading a handful of the kids' pieces and providing them with feedback on their writing. Afterward our third grade writers looked at their own pieces and started the important process of self-reflection - identifying their strengths as well as their goals for future growth. I'll leave you with a few photos from this work.