Native American Webquest

Parents, Guardians, and Students,

Soon we will be embarking on a Webquest for Social Studies class. A Webquest is using online technology and resources in order to find information and complete a task.  Our Webquest will be used to find out information about the Powhaten, Sioux, and Pueblo Native American tribes. Each student will be assigned a partner and a tribe. The two will then work as "curators" to create a poster museum about their tribe (a curator is a person who takes care of a museum). The curators will print pictures of their tribe and write captions for each picture. These will be the "exhibits" on their poster museum. When the entire class is finished, the poster museums will be hung in the hallway and students will tour each others museum. As a class we will then compare and contrast the three tribes. These museums will remain in the Elementary hallway for two weeks so that all can come by and tour them.

If you are excited and can't wait to begin your on-line research as a curator, go to google.com and do a search on the three different tribes. Anyone who has a fact to share about these tribes at our morning meeting will earn a Gauger Dollar.

References

Highsmith, C. M. (n.d.). Milwaukee Art Museum — FactMonster.com. In Fact Monster: Online Almanac, Dictionary, Encyclopedia, and Homework Help — FactMonster.com. Retrieved October 20, 2012, from http://www.factmonster.com/us/history/milwaukee-art-museum.html

Educational Value of Animoto

 

Today I created an Animoto video for use in my second grade Social Studies, First Americans unit. I decided that a photo video with Native American Indian music would be a terrific front-loader to lesson one which covers the Powhatan, Sioux, and Pueblo Native Americans.  It will appeal to my assorted group of learners as it has many elements including music and pictures. The video is only 30 seconds long so it won't take up much instructional time and it will also serve as a great transition from one subject area to the next.  In addition to engaging my group of students, as a front loader it will serve to activate background knowledge on Native American people.  Following a short discussion on the content of the video we will read our textbook and follow up with another viewing of the video which will serve to reinforce the content that we covered. We will then create a Venn diagram on the white board comparing and contrasting the three groups. The day's lesson will conclude with learners writing a blog post about the things they have learned.