6th graders embarked on a mini informational writing unit! I wanted to do a real life "How-To" and emphasis some important life skills such as taking your time, following directions, summarizing, collaborating, paying attention and having fun by not using technology!! ;)
Below are pictures of our "Kite Unit"!
FIRST, the class and I had a discussion on how important transitional words and phrases are to informational writing. AFTER practicing together student's completed some skill work and then we went to work with our directions on assembling the kite! As you can see from the photo, the directions that were included were not very effective! I modeled for my students how to take a phrase of directions and turn it into something more logical to be able to follow!
NEXT, we assembled our kites as a team to make sure our kites were put together correctly!
ALTHOUGH it was raining, my class knew we would be able to fly tomorrow. INSTEAD we decided to watch some instructional videos on YouTube to learn some techniques to ensure success! :) DURING the video, we jotted down important tips to help us fly!
The following day, we discussed our notes and demonstrated in the classroom what to do! :) AFTERWARDS, we got our kites and we were ready to test them out!
It's a lot harder than we thought it was! HOWEVER, after a few trials and errors we managed to have everyone successfully fly a kite!!
We even partnered up with Mrs. Boyle's class the following day and taught them how to fly! :) it was a great week! I was surprised at how many students had never flown a kite before. We had a blast!! :)
-Until Next Week,
Ritchie