Mrs. Slaviero's Blog

Student Historians have been busy reflecting on their project and thinking about their work so far as they completed "The State of My Project" reflections. (The title is a take on the Presidential  "State of the Union" Address.)  Students were asked to let their classmates know what topic they've settled on, what the approximate start and end date of their project topic is, how they feel their research is going so far, showing us their 4 Ts graphic organizer work at this point (especially the "triumph" and "tragedy"), and to let us know about any Aha moments or tips they may have for their classmates. These quick presentations are really going well (we're doing a few each day). It's providing us the opportunity to celebrate the learning that's taken place, giving students the chance to publicly reflect on their work, and to learn from one another as they provide tips or share moments when things started to "click...

This week in NHD featured presearching and researching topics in order to finalize choices next week. Student Historians continued to wonder and find questions about the topics they learned about last week in the Media Center. The Speed Topic-ing lesson was a hit and left many students wanting to know more about at least some of the topics they examined that day. This week started with a mini-lesson from Mrs. Chatel as she asked this group if their topic questions could simply be answered with a "yes" or "no" or if their questions were "Big Mac" questions--ones that would take many weeks to complete. A Big Mac question is the perfect National History Day project endeavor. Presearching and researching went well. These students are going to decide their project topics, partners they will work with, and what type of project they will create this week. Language Arts teachers will support this work with helping students begin to formulate a thes...