Ancient Egypt Interactive Notebook

 So, it is finally Winter Break.  In Social Studies we have successfully finished Mesopotamia, Egypt, China, and Greece.  I am grading notebooks over the break and thought I would share some of the highlights.  

Egyptian Society Triangle

Egyptian Work and Daily Life

Gods of Egypt

We also spent some time in the computer lab using The British Museum website.  This is a great slideshow about how mummies are made.  I created this organizer to go along with it.

British Museum - How Mummies are Made

The British Museum also has its Young Explorers pages.  We use those to learn about Ancient Egyptian Artifacts and fill in the graphic organizer for our three favorite artifacts.

Ancient Egyptian Artifacts Organizer

Tuck Everlasting Foldable - Reviewing for tests

So on top of working with visual notetaking, the kids are always preparing for their weekly novel quizzes.  This week was Tuck Everlasting for chapters 19 through the epilogue.  Lots to remember.  We used a standard foldable and some visual note taking to review the main events and some vocabulary.  I just HAD to share this one.

Tuck Everlasting Foldable Organizer

I use these a lot the day before a quiz.  I give them guidelines about the topic of each box and then they use all of their resources from the week to fill each area with as much detail as possible.  Then they get taped into their Reading Response Notebooks as a reference that can be used to study for the final test.

Vocabulary Advance Organizer - Novel Study

I have a few of my book units on TeachersPayTeachers and I have had a few people ask how I have the kids do vocabulary every week for the chapters that they have been assigned.  So here is a quick run down on our weekly vocabulary.  This particular week, one of my reading groups read chapters 11 - 14 of the Devil's Arithmetic.  When I do a book unit, I basically just go through and decide what words I think will be good for each set of chapters.  They use their finished organizers to study for the quizzes each week and their final.

I start with a simple graphic organizer (AKA a table).  I have 4 columns that are labeled context clues, part of speech/definition, new sentence, synonym.  I usually pick about 7 words for each set of chapters.  I type the sentence/s from the book with the word and anything else needed for context.  Those get typed into the first column of the organizer.  The students must circle at least two good context clues in each box before they can try and determine the definitions.  And my policy is NO CONTEXT CLUES, NO CREDIT.  Here is a student example of the first column.

circling context clues

I type all the definitions at the bottom of the organizer for them to pick from.  They are scrambled up, so they need to use the context clues to pick the correct part of speech and definition.  These go in the second column.

The students must then use the word in a new sentence of their own.  They must include at least two context clues in their new sentence as well.  By the time the year is over we have thoroughly covered context clues :)

Then, they come up with a synonym for the word in the last column.  This often just comes from definition, but sometimes there is no definite synonym.  If that happens they are allowed to write a word that is related or helpful to remember the meaning.

When they are done, they get glued or taped into their Reading Response composition books.  By the end of the book they have a complete set of vocabulary to study from.  And here is what it looks like finished (or at least almost finished).

vocabulary advance organizer finished

Visual Notetaking Part Two: Student Check-in

So I decided to grab a few interactive notebooks to see how some of the kids were doing with their visual note taking.  We have started out pretty basic, but some of them have really done a great job putting their own ideas, doodles, and personality into it.  Here are a few examples from our "genre" notes.

I am pretty darn impressed!

Visual Notetaking - 6th grade style

So, we are halfway (or so) through the year and most of my students are pros at notetaking.  They keep 3 notebooks covering 5 subjects and notes can get a little boring for them.  I began introducing Visual Notetaking to the ones who are ready to move on and put their own personality into their notes.  Austin Kleon is awesome at introducing some basics that are do-able for my kids.  Check out his website http://www.austinkleon.com/visual-note-taking/  and books.  Another great resource is Sunni Brown.  This is a hot trend in business right now, so a google image search will result in a boatload of great pics.

This week we are just covering the basics of fiction and non-fiction genres.  Basic notes and vocabulary so I thought it would be a good week to spice it up.  This is what one group started with yesterday...

Stay tuned for more as the week progresses...

Ancient Egypt - Art Project

We are long since past studying Ancient Egypt in my class, but I wanted to go back and share this SUPER easy art project that all the kids are successful with.  All you need is the following materials to make this happen...

• gold wrapping paper (cut into 10"x14" pieces)
• cardboard or card stock 9"x12"
• sharpies
• copies of Egyptian coloring pages
• paperclips

Have the kids wrap their piece of gold paper around their piece of card stock or cardboard, then glue the back edges down.  Each kid should have 2 paperclips to hold down their coloring page onto the gold paper.  Remind them that the paper CANNOT move once they have started.

Have them trace over the lines of the coloring page with pressure.  This will leave an imprint of the lines on the gold paper.  Once they have completely traced the picture, then they should take off the coloring page.  They will be able to see the lines of the picture in the gold paper.  Have them use a sharpie and trace over those lines in black.  You should end up with something that looks like this (yes, a kid did this!).

King Tut's Mask

Greek Mythology Organizer - Winged Sandals

We have time in the computer lab once a week and I occasionally put together some fun learning activities for our Ancient Civilizations notebooks.  This one is for the website www.wingedsandals.com.  Before the kids can explore the sight (AKA playing games), they must watch two of the "storytime" stories and fill out this graphic organizer.  It is a great site for learning about Ancient Greek Mythology and the kids really enjoy exploring the sight.  Here is a completed one from one of my student's notebooks...

Winged Sandals Organizer

 Once they complete the organizer, they tape it into their Social Studies notebooks and add it to their table of contents!  Please click here for the blank organizer for free :)