Activities:
If you are a teacher and you have explored this web site, then you already know that I favor an interdisciplinary approach to education. I have seen this approach work very successfullly - I had the pleasure of working for a year at the Radnor Township School District, in Wayne, PA. Radnor Middle School is home to the Watershed classroom, where an entire seventh grade curriculum is based around the theme of the watershed. Two teachers and forty seventh graders spend a year exploring many of the topics you will find here. They have fun and learn a lot - perhaps you'll find some inspiration here to start something similar at your school.
The other item on my agenda is "reality" - as in what students learn should have some real meaning for them. Hands-on exploration and construction (physical and mental) seem to be among the best ways to keep things real and make them meaningful for students. Most of the possible activities listed here involve creating something. And most of the creating involves creating something that is useful. We all made those trivets and candy holders for Mother's Day, and we all took home our artwork to be hung on the refrigerator. Giving students the opportunity to create and show off their work is the best of what education is all about.
On to some possible activities:
- Activities based on this web site:
- Have students draft a set of open-ended questions which were raised in their
minds by visiting The Schuylkill River. Discuss those questions in class. How
would they add to or change this exhibit? Submit their proposals!
- Have students write down their thoughts about the quotation on the
Schuylkill River home page. How would they
analyze the quote? What does it mean? How would they have created a report
based on it?
- The quote and the themes that are explored here are all about the Schuylkill
River. Perhaps you also live near the Schuylkill. But perhaps you live far away.
You could do reports/skits/artwork about local "firsts", or "boundaries" or "life",
or you could create additional resources for this site - your contributions are
encouraged!
- For instance, you could research the
first map showing the Schuylkill, or
the first map of your own region.
- Make a map of the Schuylkill, or of your own region! The Watershed classroom
uses USGS topogrphic maps & cuts out corrugated cardboard shapes for each
elevation line on the map. Then they glue these together to create a
three-dimensional map. They look great!
- How about examining events in history and seeing if there were "win-win"
solutions to problems that were resolved by violence or with one side "losing".
Could the Native Americans and the Colonists have created successful
communities together, for instance?
- And speaking of the Native Americans - what happened to the Lenape? Can your
class trace them in their travels (travails)? There are lots of activities based
on native life that you could do - from staging native feasts to building
wickwams. You know all about them, right?
- Back to the Watershed - can your students create a working model of the Water
Cycle? Well, how about a mural for the classroom wall showing the ocean, the
mountains, and how the water interacts with them and with us. Could you design
a way to create an interactive version online?
- The section about our nation talks about the
symbols we associate with our nation. What are the symbols you associate with
you school or community or state? Can your class create a flag for your school /
community / state? (so what is they already have one - yours will be better - I
just saw a wonderful flag which is the tribal flag of the Naskapi Indians of
northern Quebec, and it was designed by an elementary school.)
- Exercise those problem-solving abilities - pick a topic or problem you found in
this exhibit (such as pollution of the river) and have the class brainstorm. Have
them answer a question such as "What do I know... about rivers and pollution",
then pool their information. They should be amazed at how much they already
know! Then they should be able to decide what they can conclude or theorize
about the question at hand. Maybe they will conclude that they need to do more
research. Or maybe they will conclude that they want to help cleanup a
river......
- Create your own web site:
- If you do not have an Internet connection that is fast and reliable then contact a
local university or college or telecommunications company. There is surely a
way to get online if you want to!
- Come up with a theme or topic. It could just be about your school or classroom,
but that has been done
before! It might be
more interesting to tackle something new!
- Research your topic - create a hot list of online resources, and create a
bibliography of text references. Do a good job, you're going to pulish this!
- Tie in to current events and the news media - students can bring in news
articles and weave them into your web.
- Okay, the hard part is over - now the fun begins - you'll need graphics and maybe
some sound and video clips, right? You get to learn how to be a multimedia
artist. If you are an elementary class, don't forget those older brothers and
sisters - a perfect opportunity to do some bridging between age groups. The
older students can assist the younger ones with the technical aspects of putting
your creation online. And of course there is also a lot of help available
online.
Of course, you know that it won't really be as easy as 1,2,3,4,5...but it will be
fun, and just think about creating something that anyone in the world can see
any time they want. Pretty cool, eh......
Don't forget to submit your own ideas!!
And if you need assistance or encouragement, all you need to do is ask.
Back to: Guide to Resources
Back to: The Schuylkill River