The Mysteries of Harris Burdick

The story of Harris Burdick has always intrigued me and I thought it would be a great way to introduce mystery writing to the grade 4's.

In 1953, a man named Harris Burdick visited a well-known publisher in Chicago, Illinois named Peter Wenders. Mr. Burdick show him 14 fascinating drawings with equally fascinating captions, promising to return the next day with more illustrations and the stories to match. Mr. Wenders never heard from him again. Over the years, Mr. Wenders tried to find out who Harris Burdick was, but he never found out. All that remain are the samples of his supposed books. Readers are challenged to imagine their own stories based on the images for the books.

Media Literacy

In this activity, students learned how the media constructs reality by studying television families and comparing them to real-life families. The lesson began with a survey of student's favourite TV shows about families and what they enjoy about them. In groups, students chose a family-based television show to watch and report on using Google Slides. 

Promoting Critical Thinking

This is a great strategy for increasing engagement, understanding and independence for all students whether you teach kindergarten or grade twelve. I've been reading "Making Thinking Visible" which is a research based approach to teaching thinking. The strategy helps develop students' thinking dispositions while deepening their understanding of the topics they study. Students' thinking becomes visible as the students' viewpoints are expressed, documented, discussed and reflected upon. 


To test this strategy, I started with a "Tug of War" to introduce persuasive writing. The students were given two post it notes, on one they were asked to write a reason schools should allow cell phones and on the other they were asked to write a reason schools should NOT allow cell phones. The discussion they had was insightful and engaging. Next, we are going to explore this topic further with "what if" questions. 

Questioning

We ask questions before, during and after our reading. We ask questions to clarify meaning and further our understanding of the text. This week we are reading "The Bracelet" by Yoshiko Uchida. It is a book about a young girl who is sent to an internment camp with her family and the bracelet from her best friend is the only reminder of their friendship.

Explanatory Writing

Explanatory writing helps students increase their knowledge and comprehension of a specific topic. Explanatory writing needs an introduction, 3 facts with supporting details and a conclusion. To introduce this unit, we watched several videos on Iqaluit, Nunavut and completed a shared writing piece about the city. Now, the students are researching a city of their choice to write about. 

Holy Week

Welcome back! I hope you had a relaxing March Break with your families. 

This week is Holy Week - a very important time in the Catholic church. Holy Week starts on Palm Sunday and ends on Holy Saturday. During this time, we commemorate Jesus' crucifixion and his resurrection. We remember how He died on the cross to give new life to all who believe. 

Procedural Writing - Minute to Win It

To close out our procedural writing unit, the students were asked to create a "Minute to Win It" game based on the popular TV show. Their game had to include a title, a goal, materials found around the house, and directions which used transition / sequence words (first, then, after, next, finally). 

What the students came up with was truly remarkable! There was a game where you had to blow 5 cotton balls around the paper into a paper bag using a straw. Another game had the contestant trying to get a cookie from their forehead to their mouth by only using their facial muscles. The most popular Minute to Win It had to be the game where you had to get 10 tennis balls in a milk crate by once bouncing them only once. Great work Grade 4's!