Home projects will be guided by monthly themes, which are listed below. These home projects are meant to explore questions, find answers, share information with peers, increase academics, and ultimately instill a love of learning.
Home projects are a great way for your child to share information from what they read. Please help your child read if needed. They need to gather information from books, articles, internet, and such. Students will be required to create a final written document (based on ability), provide a visual aid, and present information to their peers. Make certain they are using words they know how to read and understand in their final written work and are not just copying information. If your child is not yet fully reading, please read with them and have them dictate to you what they want to write and then have them trace over your writing for good practice. Then, they may orally practice and present without notes. I would really like to encourage all students to practice their presentation. When students know their material and tell the class, rather than read, it really engages everyone and prepares the child for public speaking. Level 3’s will be encouraged to start typing their reports. They will be expected to type on the SAGE test this year and this is good practice.
Sometimes, students will come to class ready to present and simply have a page filled with words they are not able to read or understand. This is a process and should take several days to complete. Copying an article and printing a picture is not what we are looking for in a home project. This defeats the purpose of home projects. Help your child understand what they are learning, so they are able to teach their peers.
I am so excited to see the topics they choose. Projects are due by the end of the month, but please bring them as soon as they are ready. I like to have projects presented throughout the month. I feel the students gain better information from each other when they only have a few project presentations each day. Often times, when we have several at once, they become restless. Although we do not give formal grades for home projects, your child will receive a rubric to help guide their process.
Below are the topics, they are to guide the home project subject matter. For example, September is Zoology, Level 1 students are to choose a topic based on vertebrates. They could choose a broad topic like reptiles or types of snakes, their favorite dog breed, animals found in their favorite part of the world, etc. Level 2 students could choose anything related to the human body, like parts of the body, nutrition, how the body heart responds to elevated heart rate during exercise, and so on. Really, the sky is the limit. Have fun! If you have questions or concerns, please feel free to contact me.
September: Zoology
Level 1: Animals with backbones
Level 2: Human Body
Level 3: Invertebrate
October: History
Level 1: Personal time line of their own life.
Level 2: Planets, stars, galaxies, etc.
Level 3: Anything from the time line of life.
November: International Festival Preparation
Africa
Each child will chose a country in Africa and prepare a presentation for our International Festival which will take place mid-December. Every child will be required to have their presentation on a tri-fold board this month.
December: No Formal Project
January: New Year, New Learning
In celebration of the New Year, January’s home project will be personal interest based. This is a chance for your child to guide the topic of their choice. Our goal is to teach students to love to learn. The sky is the limit on this project.
February: “I wonder…”
This month our home project is a fun one! Students find an answer to a question they have, research more on the topic, and then come to class and present their findings. For example, a child may wonder, “What is the fastest animal on earth?” They will do some research to find the answer to that question. Once they find the answer, the fastest land animal is the cheetah, they will research more information about their finding, in this question it would be the cheetah. They will then prepare to come to class prepared to tell everyone what their question was and the information they found relating to that question. This home project is to help students develop curiosity and find answers to that curiosity. This is to help develop a love of life-long learning.
Some quick examples of questions:
“What is the oldest living tree on the earth?”
“How are legos made?”
“Who is the fastest runner in the world?
March: Europe
Your child may choose anything in relation to Europe. This could be a country, animals you find in Europe, etc.
April: Our Earth
Earth day is coming up on April 22nd. This is a great opportunity for students to do home projects in relation to our earth. Some ideas could be: ways we can conserve water, endangered species, recycling, botany, how to compost, etc. These projects are due April 28th, but I would really encourage students to avoid the last week of the month.
May: Book Report
We will be sharing one of our favorite books to the class in a fun creative way. Students can make a diorama, create a puppet play, make a time line, design a book jacket, etc. Be creative! This is a great way to keep students excited and engaged in reading over the summer.