So, the project I began describing the other day goes like this:
Each student has drawn one place in our community. It might be a restaurant, house, store, church, bank, park, or something else located along the stretch of college street that we will be exploring tomorrow.
Not only will students be completing a sort of community treasure hunt on our walk, but they will also let me know when they see their place, and they will take a picture of it.
When we return, we will use the picture we took to draw a store-front for our place. We will then figure out where it belongs on our big class map.
The other part of this project involves a bit of research. Each student will use what they've learned about persuasive writing to convince us that their place is very very important in the community. They already did a fantastic job today convincing me that Pizzaville is even more important than I would have thought, and what might happen if it did not exist.
Students will be encouraged to ask a parent for their opinion about why the location they selected is important and incorporate their findings into their paragraph. I will explain this research assignment clearly on Friday and ask the researchers to ask you about it over the weekend. It won't take much time, but it's good practice gathering information and considering different points of view.
Once we've all created our store-fronts and information sheets, we'll have a big co-created community map and information on how each place plays a role in the community. I'm beyond excited to see how this shapes up. Ask your student what place they drew from the bucket, and if they've started thinking about why it's important in the community.