International Collaborative Projects All due dates are only guidlines, please adapt the projets to fit your classroom's needs and schedules. Any grade level may participate. If you have any questions or comments about the projects, please don't hesitate to contact me.
THE "Cost of Living" and "School Lunch" PROJECTS ARE NOW CLOSED. I have enough participants to complete the projects. Thank you for your interest. Please Contact Mrs. Smith if you have any questions. The "POWERPOINT FOR PEACE" is still open for participants!
The projects listed below are open to any school who wishes to participate. I need to know by 9-20-06 if you and your class plan on participating..
If you can not fit one of these projects into your schedule please let me know and maybe we can come up with another collaborative project at a later date. Please don't forget to sign our guestbook when visiting our web page!
Project One:Cost of Living Adapted idea presented to me by Mrs. Rawlings, a 3rd grade Teacher in Mississippi.
(My 5th Grade Project) 9-06/1-07
Prerequisites: An ability to communicate via email.
What is the cost of living in your town? In this project I will make a questionnaire that can be printed out or downloaded to your computer. The questionnaire will ask for basic cost of living information.
Gas (fuel for automobile)
Utilities
Water
Heat
Garbage
Food (Basic)
Bread
Milk
1lb of meat
Housing
Clothing (Basic)
Pants
Shirt
Shoes
Average Working Wage
U.S. minimum wage
This project can be achieved in groups of students or as a classroom. I personally prefer cooperative group learning.
Step One: Brainstorm using any graphic organizer software or template. Address this issue: How will one gather the above information? Are you going to divide your students into team to gather the above information, or is each student going to gather the information on their own?
Due Date: 9-30-06
Step Two: Once the above information has been gathered, build a basic spreadsheet using the gathered information. (Please email me your information and please do not convert your currency to U.S. dollars.) I will have my class convert the different currency into US dollars using the Universal Currency Converter site or Currency Calculator. We will also convert using the old tried and true method; paper and pencil.
Due Date: 10-30-06
Step Three: Once all the information has been gathered and put into a spreadsheet. Graph your information without the other school's (countries) data. I will put these graphs on this web page for viewing. Discuss the data with your classes and have them write up a report using any word processing software. If you are using another program other than Microsoft Word, you will have to save you students work as a PDF file. If you would like them posted on this web site's project page, please email me, or I will have an option so that you may post them yourself to the final project page.
Due Date: 11-30-06
Step Four (Final project) This is where you will have your own creative input! To finish up this project I would like the students to research and produce a project. They will do research on one of the participating countries, cities, towns, states etc. This project could be a report, PowerPoint, Imovie, podcast, wiki, poem, art piece etc.. The possibilities are endless! I will want all final products posted to the "Project" page. (still under construction)
Due Date: 1-30-07
Project Two:PowerPoint (or iMovie) for Peace
Open ended project
This is a simple but profound project. Have your students design a PowerPoint presentation that expresses their views, opinions or ideas about "World Peace." The project could include a poem, art work, story (fiction or non-fiction) anything that the student wishes that conveys in some way the subject of "World Peace." (with teacher approval).
The PowerPoint should be at least 5 slides. Make sure it has been proof read and checked for errors. You can save the presentation as a .ppt, .mov or .pdf file. Remember if the student chooses to add sound or animation and you choose to save it as a PDF file, you will loose all sound, animation and transitions. For those adventurous teachers an iMovie or equivalent would be great as well. I would like to send the outstanding projects to the United Nations Cyber School Bus web site.
Some possible ideas:
What does Peace mean to me?
How do we obtain World Peace?
What can I do to help bring on World Peace?
Discuss an issue that is hindering World Peace.
Write a poem and illustrate it.
Make a song and add photos.
Write a story about what the world would be like if there was World Peace.
Write a story about an act of war that effected you or your family.
Make a movie, write a play.
Make a virtual collage.
Please let me know if you will be participating in this project. The due dates are open. The project will be closed by 5/1/07. If you have any further questions about this project please don't hesitate to contact me.
Project Three: School Lunch and Physical Fitness
(My 4th Grade Project) Year long project
I love this project! I don't know about your schools, but our school wastes a lot of food and produces a lot of garbage at lunch time. This has been a problem that drives me crazy! This project addresses two needs: waste and obesity in our schools.
Step One: Assign a group of children with the assistance of a teacher and possibly your custodian, to make sure the school lunch garbage is separated. We need one garbage of non food items and another garbage of food items. The students need to measure an empty garbage so that when they weigh the filled garbage they can subtract the weight of the empty garbage can. We need to keep records for two or three days. Due Date: 9-30-06
Step Two: Build a spreadsheet to keep track of the data that is being recorded. Once all the data has been collected figure out how much food will be wasted in one week, one month, and one year. Graph your data. I will post the spreadsheets and charts on the project page of this web page. Due Date: 10-30-06
Step Three: Discuss the findings with your students. Share your findings with your school. Have your students discuss and figure out solutions to this problem. This web site will be very helpful: Waste Free Lunches. Write down your solutions and email them to me to put on the project page. Due Date: 11-30-06
Step Four: (*Idea from Epals) *Share your school lunch menus with the other participants. I will post them on the project page. Discuss the differences or similarities of the menus. Send in pictures of students eating school lunch. I will post the pictures on the project page. * Share some lunch ideas. I will later bind the lunch ideas into a school lunch idea book and distribute it to all participating schools with pictures of the participating students. Please also encourage your students to also add their own lunch related artwork.
Due Date: 1-30-07
Step Five: Fitness Have students keep track of their physical activity. I will have a pre-made chart you can download or print to fill out. Our wonderful coach has already created this. He doesn't know yet that he will be involved! Make sure each student keeps track of their information. These will be put into a spreadsheet and graphed. I will put these on the project page. Please remember to make sure that there is no personal information on any work that is to be posted on the projects page. First names or initials or a username would be great.
Due Date: 3-15-07
Step Six: Discuss the results. Is there need for more physical fitness? If so brainstorm ideas using a graphic organizer. Share your results.
Due Date: 3-30-07
Step Seven: Final Step (And this is my favorite part!) Send in your student's favorite games. Make sure they include rules and instructions. Make sure the games are predominately active games. I don't mind non active games...we want them playing not watching TV! If your students have any jump rope songs, send them in. Teachers if you have fond memories of playing a specific game or activity, please share those as well. I will bind everything I receive into a book for all participating schools. I will also post all ideas on the web page. I would also like to receive pictures of children playing the games they have submitted. Due Date: 5-15-07 (binding the books and sending them out will be in the summer months)
I am very anxious to see the results of our findings from countries outside of the U.S. If you have any further questions about this project please don't hesitate to contact me.
