I believe in inquiry driven project based learning that requires students to build on the funds of knowledge they bring to the classroom in order to take on new learning and create, collaborate, present, reflect, and develop. Some highlights are the following:
- Daily group work and collaboration
- Student led discussions through socratic seminars, fishbowl discussions, and science talks
- Neighborhood walking trips to photograph things they want to learn more about
- Creating maps of the neighborhood annotated with personal photos of student's favorite places.
- Artist study of artists inspired by plants
- Class created mural of what they love about our school and community
- "Cafe Conversa" Spanish conversation activity in which I turn classroom into cafe with conversation prompts
- Sobremesa(Spanish term meaning lingering after a meal for conversation) Spanish culture and language practice by introducing students to new dish that aligns with unit of study and engaging students in conversation after sampling dish.
- Student created pop up books of self designed libraries
- Model of indigenous civilizations
- Writing and performing Monologues of Harlem renaissance figures
- Building green city model out through upcycling materials
- Collaborating on a mural that represents our school community and creating self portraits
- Building Hispanic heritage gallery with folk art, modern day art, and oral histories from immigrant students
- Presentations on the history of their favorite food
- Group documentary about sports activism comparing Jackie Robinson and Roberto Clemente
- Day in the life of a dual language student documentary
- Creating children's books about kindness to read to kindergarten students
- Researching an explorer of their choosing and creating a fictionalized diary of their expeditions.