Camp Share-A-Story

Last week, on the day before Thanksgiving break, the 5th grade students went camping in their own classroom!  I transformed the room into Camp Share-A-Story.  

Ranger Bowman

The students never get a chance to read aloud their writing in class, and they get so disappointed when we don't have time to share.  I thought, since Thanksgiving week is short, we could use an hour to read aloud a couple of samples of our favorite writing pieces from our Writer's Notebook.

The students enjoyed eating S'mores dip/Graham crackers and drinking milk while listening to each other read aloud around a fake camp fire.  The sounds of a crackling fire played on the Promethean board and made the experience seem even more realistic.  As you can imagine, they had a blast at "camp."

Space Alphabet Books

To culminate our space unit, the students wrote their own informational books about space.  These were actually Space Alphabet Books and we modeled them after Sleeping Bear Press's state alphabet books (namely M is for Magnolia: A Mississippi Alphabet by Michael Shoulders).  If you've never read these books, the format is really neat.  The books have a two-tier format with simple poems prominently displayed on the page for young readers and expository text written to the side for older students.  The illustrations are bright and beautiful and can be enjoyed by all. 

Before my students began writing their books, they listed letters A-Z on a sheet of paper and decided what they wanted each letter to stand for.  Each child's book was different.  For the letter A, some chose "Asteroid" while others chose "Aldrin" or "Alan Bean" or "Andromeda Galaxy" or "Apollo 13" or "Astronaut."  The possibilities were endless!

The students worked on this project in class, using a variety of sources to aid in their research.  I edited their writing and made sure the information was correct and written in the students' own words.   

I've only done this project twice because it's time-consuming.  It takes a lot of time to work on and it takes a lot of time for me to grade. 

Finally, here are some sample pages from the students' books (not shown in ABC order):

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Tropicana Speech Contest

Each year, my students participate in a speech contest that is sponsored by Tropicana and Florida 4-H.  This is actually a state-wide contest for students in grades 4-6.  I love this program because I get to teach my students how to write and deliver a speech.  I, myself, enjoy public speaking and believe it is a valuable skill to teach children. 

 

Students come up with a topic that interests them, research information, and then write a 2-3 minute speech.  I encourage my students to talk over topics with their parents, but all the research and writing is done in class.  This isn't always the case in other schools, but at CCS, we like to see what our students are capable of on their own. 

 

Topics must be approved by the teacher and I have even asked students to change their topics before.  I usually won't allow them to write about siblings, pets, or vacations (those seem like 4th grade topics).  I want them to choose topics that require a little research.  Students may not use the same topic twice.  Here are a few topics from my students this year:

• The History of Basketball
• The Benefits of Laughter
• A Day in the Life of a Poison Dart Frog
• Big Ben
• Ballet IS a Sport
• Taylor Swift
• The Impact of Commercials
• Harry Houdini
• Music--The Magic Medicine
• Oscar Pistorius

I always learn something new when we work on the speeches.  For example, I didn't have a clue who Oscar Pistorius was until a student told me he wanted to write a speech about him!

 

Once the speeches are written, we hold a classroom contest.  The teachers do not get to judge and sometimes I'm surprised by the results.  Three students are chosen from each class to move on to the school-wide contest.  This year, my top three speeches were The History of Basketball, The Impact of Commercials, and Music--The Magic Medicine.  For the past three years, one of my students has won the school contest and advanced to the county level. 

This year, the student who wrote his speech on The Impact of Commercials won the school-wide contest!  Yesterday, I went to cheer him on at the county level and he actually won Most Humorous Speech!  I am one proud teacher!  Even though I've had several students advance to the county level, none of them have ever placed at this level.  We were so excited!

To learn more about this program and check out resources for teaching public speaking, CLICK HERE. 

Does your elementary/middle school teach public speaking?  Do you have any helpful resources that you could share?