Wrapping Up the First Half

It's so cliche to remark on how quickly time flies and how seasons jump up to surprise us, but it's also so true. Life moves quickly by. And so here we are...already half way through the 2012-13 school year. Thankfully, it's been a good first half. No matter how quickly the clock hands whirl, the crew has been able to optimize time, putting it to good use in learning and maturing both as students and as those approaching adolescence.

A couple of the things we've been up to in the final days before winter break are the concluding learning experiences of our case study on American colonial slavery and our second hike to Mesa Open Space. On the last day before break, we took a breather and celebrated in the afternoon with a fun party put on by several crew moms. It was great to relax, enjoy some delicious treats, and look forward to the well-deserved two weeks off! 

Enslaved Africans Spirit Read

One technique for getting the most out of a text is a "spirit read." Students carefully read a pertinent text several times to gain understanding, then as a group they read it aloud--not sequentially but by individual participants calling out words and phrases they feel capture important meaning from the document. People can speak up whenever there's an opening, and the same words and phrases can be brought up as often as needed for emphasis. Because it takes discernment to pick out relevant and impactful snippets from the text, and discipline to wait one's turn (there's no hand-raising or teacher direction), this can be a tough skill for fifth graders. However, our crew did a great job and got the essence of the article we reading (A first-hand account of a slave who had been able to gain his freedom and then moved to England.)  

Jig Saw and Color-Symbol-Image

Small groups of students read an article about a slavery-related topic and then shared their learning with the class. To maximize the learning, different groups had different articles. When small groups learn a portion of the whole picture we're looking at, they hold one piece to the puzzle. When they share with the rest of the class, they're putting their piece into the puzzle, so this type of learning experience is called a "jig saw."

In this particular jig saw, we used a thinking routine called color-symbol-image ("CSI").  In this routine, students think through a text's meaning by determining a specific color, symbol, and image they believe illuminates it. They then created posters with these, as well as an explanation of their thinking. They shared their posters with the crew and answered their questions.

Mesa Open Space Round 2 

In September, we hiked Chuck's Loop on the Mesa Open Space Trail a few miles from Renaissance. On Friday, we did the same short hike, making comparisons to our first jaunt in our note. We will do the same hike a third time in the spring, and then analyze the differences we observed each season as we construct a trial guide for the city of Castle Rock.