Sunday, February 10, 2008
Lesson Plan Thinking...again...
So after discussing my Language Arts literature piece I would be using for my lesson plan, my CT gave me a Literature-Based Map Skills book. This book contains various children's literature that relate to the Middle West of the United States. My CT selected three children's book found in the Literature-Based Map Skills book which were Wagon Wheels by Barbara Brenner, Dakota Dugout by Ann Turner, and Thunder Cake by Patricia Polacco. After reading through these three books I found that Thunder Cake would be the most fun, informational, educational, and practical to use in a forty minute literature based discussion. A majority of the initial literature-based map skills book it focuses on various questions concerning map skills and application. My question though is the thought of integration of subjects. I think it is a great book especially because it is about a girl living on her Grandma's farm in Michigan. The story also focuses on the little girl's fear of thunderstorms and her grandmother helps her realize just how brave she really is. But, I am questioning the thought of the focus of using such map skills in my lesson. My CT said she loves using literature and children's books for integration of subjects. I too agree that it is important for teachers to integrate such subjects for students but when i am teaching my lesson how do I stay focuses on a literature based discussion than a social studies lesson? I have a lot of thoughts and want to know from you what I should do with this book that my CT said I should use.
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2 comments:
I think that your CT and you seem to have great ideas about teaching lesson plans that include multiple skills and information that the students are learning. Like you were saying- I don't think there is a definite distinction between literacy and social studies. I think the great think about literacy is that it can be applied easily to different subjects. I also think that discussion is a great method of combining the two areas. While looking at the literacies project I have begun to realize that literacy involves many more skills than what I was originally aware of. I think that map reading skills is a form of literacy that students need to be aware of. I think that you could do a discussion where you have students use their skills at reading and understanding maps while also discussing some literary topics in the text.
The book I am using for my lesson plan is a Native American legend. My class is learning about Native Americans and my teacher is trying to cover some of the different genres. I have not completely figured out how I will conduct my discussion for my lesson but plan on having students include some of their prior knowledge of Native Americans in our conversation. Overall, I think that having the subject of the text be something that they have some experience with may help the discussion move past new facts about maps and onto more in depth analysis of the book.
Great conversation here!
Yes!! It's hard to study Social Studies and Geography if you can't read a map or research the cultural traditions of a distant people. Literacy is at the base of everything else you do in school.
These are natural cross-curricular connections at their best!
I love how you are making these wonderful connections!!
Think about how difficult life would be for someone who couldn't read or figure out a map.
Of course, reading a map and visualizing yourself following those directions are two different skills.
I'm looking forward to seeing how these wonderful explorations turn out!! :-)
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