Biography Project

We started a new project yesterday.  Each child chose a biography to read.  Today they started completing a graphic organizer.  The first part of the organizer stores facts about the person's early life such as where and when born, siblings, and any other interesting information.  The second part of the organizer stores information about why the person is famous or why a book would be written about the person.  This has been harder as the students just want to write 'famous baseball player' or 'had a son' or some other 'easy' comment.  We had a lot of discussions about this topic.  Tomorrow they will complete the opinion and question part of the graphic organizer.  They will tell whether or not they think the person should have a book written about his/her life and what would they ask the person if they could visit with him/her.  They cannot ask something that was answered in the book or that can be googled.

Students will take this information and write a short report about the person.  (We are using a second source...either History.com or Biography.com)  A title page will be created along with at least four pictures to illustrate important points in the report.  Each child will create a bibliography using easybib.com. 

The title page and pictures will be used along with the report to make a 'paper-slide video' with a flip camera.  Students will work together (we call it the production team) to video the papers as they are slid across the table as the report is read by the author.


A timeline is also being required.  Students will use a graphic organizer to log events in the person's life.  That information will be entered into the timeline feature on readwritethink.org and printed.  The timeline will be the last thing shown on the video mentioned above.

Students will be graded on the research paper, the video, and the timeline.  A rubric has been developed to grade the targeted areas.

http://mrscooksfantasticfourthgrade.blogspot.com/2011/12/flip-slide-videos.html

Using Glogster

I've wanted to try this all year.  We finally are getting a chance to do it.  I let the kids go out and create the background of their glog.  We played with some of the features....just enough to get them really into it, and then I had them get out of the program. There was lots of grumbling going on.  Now that they knew what they could do, I had them draw a "map" of their glog.   The topic was butterflies.  They know a lot about butterflies, we have lots of pictures and some videos.  They told me the glog is better than writing a paper because it's on the computer and the computer is fun.  (They wrote their paper on the computer...guess that doesn't count!)

Butterfly Final Projects

The students have completed their research and are compiling all their notes into a paper.  Students typed notes into Publisher as they read and researched.   The notes were written as a list of information.  Students printed the notes, cut them apart and sorted them into categories.  Then they glued them to notebook paper.  Each category was glued to a page.  Students know that each page will be a paragraph in their report.  In addition to the information the students have compiled, they will include a quote or two about butterflies from a classmate. 

They are excited to use the pictures we've taken as we watched the life cycle take place in our classroom.  We feel fortunate to have captured a butterfly emerging using a flip video camera.  We have some still pictures of butterflies emerging, too.   Not only will the students be able to enhance their reports with actual pictures from our experiences but they will also have diagrams they have drawn and scanned.  They have to have two labeled diagrams for their reports.  One diagram has to show the body parts of a butterfly and the other must show the life cycle.

I can't wait to see their final products!  Once the paper report is done, we'll start on glogs and add some of the video.

Butterfly Research

Since we have butterfly larva and are getting to witness the life cycle of a painted lady butterfly firsthand, we are researching butterflies.  We've already read one short book, currently reading Butterfly Battle, a Magic School Bus book, and have read a couple of web sites.  The students will compile all their notes into a paper complete with bibliography.  They will also create a glog about butterflies.  We were lucky enough to catch some larva turning into chrysalis today with the time elapse camera set at 30 seconds.  We have some fabulous pictures to use.  The bibliography is being compiled as we research and the bibliography is easy thanks to www.easybib.com.