World of Research

Second grade students at Beck elementary recently explored the world! This cross curricular unit allowed students to learn about other cultures, as well as expository writing and communicating their ideas. Mrs. Moses and Mrs. Jeffcoat opened student's eyes to global communication by contacting families around the world and having them post videos about their Christmas traditions on a padlet wall. The project consisted of four parts: Learning about other cultures, writing an expository essay over research, creating a poster of facts to present to the class, and making a video using Shadow puppets to highlighted a chosen country. 

When asked what they learned about other cultures, Morgan commented, "I learned that in Italy they

eat eel for Christmas and they call cake figgy pudding, it looks really good!" Colbie and Reed added, "I wish that we opened Christmas crackers like they do in England."  

One of Mrs. Moses' students (Ben) lived in Italy for three years. Ben and his family made a video about Italian Christmas traditions and put it in the padlet wall to share with the class. They used Shadow Puppets for this video. Ben comments, "I choose Shadow Puppets because my sister used Shadow Puppets for a 5th grade report and I liked it."

While this project was fun, it was also challenging at times. "The hardest part was presenting the information and working with our table," said Sam. "We had to try to spell everything correct and everyone wanted to draw at one time without talking about their idea first," expressed Reed. They added, "We did rock paper scissors to decide who got to write first." Colbie and Morgan pointed out, "It was kind of hard working in a team. We were both managers for our team, so we had to give everyone something important to do." The essay was also challenging. Reed commented, "The first draft was challenging because we had to have a hook and write about all of the things that we learned."

All of the students enjoyed using Shadow Puppets to make their video. "I like picking out the photos for the shadow puppet video and working with the special effects," said Sam. "We used smiley faces, snowflakes, stars, and other emojis to make the video more fun for others."

Morgan and Colbie summed it up well, "We loved this project because we got to learn facts about what other cultures do." They both agreed that next year's class should do this project. "I think they’ll have fun," said Morgan. "They will have to learn to be friends with others. I think every class should do it."

Come check these projects out at Techno Expo 2016. You can also view these student's videos in the padlet, or by clicking on the links below:

Created with Padlet

Morgan's Video Exploring Italy

Colbie's Video Exploring England

Sam's Video - Exploring Mexico

Reed's Video - Exploring 

Ben's famliy video about Italian traditions