Teaching the Declaration of Independence in 5th Grade

In bringing history to life this year, we reenacted the actual writing of the Declaration of Independence.  Two leaders were voted based on their platforms of being fair and just leaders who wanted to handle a group writing activity.  We discussed the meaning of the Declaration and paraphrased its meaning as a whole group.  Then, we rearranged our room to resemble the convention.

Students debated over wording and declared their independence from homework, with some guidance from me.  We had some serious debate over our list of rights that related to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.  We had to make sure our meaning was what we intended.  Overall, it was a fun activity and we really lived through a Declaration of Independence from something!  Students felt what it was like to be a part of a team of people trying to express their ideas as a group and organizational techniques that helped, just as in the original meetings.  They felt passion for the activity and we even saw that the person who felt strongest wrote his name largest, just like the real John Hancock.

There's something to be said for actually acting out events from our history and seeing how things naturally unfolded.

 The next Monday I rewarded the the class with an actual day off from homework.

Spring Meme: Flight and Forces 5th-8th

Spring 2013 we doubled back to the topic of forces and focused on flight!  Here we are in teams flying kites!  Many of us had never flown a kite before.  We learned the forces, participated in a demonstration, and later drew our experiences with various levels of explanation to reinforce the concepts.  Differentiation at its best!

Density Experiment 5th

Realism in Teaching History 5th

In writing dendrite developing plans, I had a few simple exercises demonstrating taxation, representation, and declaring independence.  They are reenactment-style history lessons.

For representation, I had a simple vote for president and vice president.  These are our representatives.

For taxation, I handed everyone a few pieces of fake money and had the president and vice president decide on a tax, how much, and what it would be used for.

Now, I didn't expect these experiments to get so real so quickly.  The president and vice decided on a 25% tax, one bill from each student, to go towards military protection and safe roads.  But, the citizens noticed that these two leaders did not pay the tax themselves!  It was a hard lesson on what leadership can mean: greed!  It will transition nicely into a "Checks and Balances" lesson later!

So, I asked the students what can be done so that the leaders follow the rules.  We had calls for reelections and some students started writing a form of the constitution, rules on how power should be handled in our government.  It was a natural progression.  Power, corruption, and then more laws.

Later, for declaring independence, we had a reelection and students chose two leaders that would assist the class in writing a declaration of independence from homework.  I must say, it was hilarious.  It was so fun to watch this debate.  We arranged the classroom like the photo below as much as possible.  We read through the real declaration of independence, and rewrote the sentences based on the new terms.

I have video clips.  I hope to eventually get them up here. 

Food Web and Energy 5th

How do you demonstrate food webs and the interconnected relationships between organisms?  Each student pretends to be a producer, consumer, or decomposer.  I gave each student a card with one listed.

Next, act out a story!  The energy travels to the Earth from the sun as light and heat.  Pose questions about what consumes the sunlight, what consumes plants, and what consumes animals.  As students volunteer their organism to be a part of the food web, pass a ball of yarn around to show how interconnected these relationships can be.  Continue the same ball of yarn.  I allow one student to be the sun.

Last, ask one organism to step back and out of the circle, pulling the string with them.  Discuss why that organism pulled others with it as it moved.  I link this to how populations of animals can grow or shrink or even become extinct.  I allow one organism to drop their strings, like extinction, and describe how that effects the other beings that share the same habitat.  Or, have the sun pull the string and have anyone effected raise their hand.  It's a great visual to help understand the concept!

Civilization Song

Repost!  What a magical and motivating moment this year!