Unit Goal: SEE BEGINNING OF UNIT
Essential
Question: What is a neighborhood and what do we see in our
neighborhoods (meaning people and places)
Standards and Benchmarks:
GEOGRAPHIC PERSPECTIVE: STRAND 2 -students will use knowledge
of spatial patterns on earth to understand processes that shape human
environments and to make decisions about society.
IV b. INDIVIDUAL DEVELOPMENT & IDENTITY: describe
personal connections to place- especially as associated with immediate surroundings
IV h. work independently and cooperatively to accomplish
goals.
Objective:
to have students understand the concept of a neighborhood through
vocabulary and discussion and also to identify the explore the different types
of neighborhoods as they relate to their location (farms, large cities,
suburbs)
Essential
Knowledge and Skills: listening knowledge and also the ability to
identify different types of establishments such as houses, apartments,
buildings, and stores around their own neighborhoods.
LESSON:
Material
Needed:
White
roll paper or posterboard
Art
supplies (crayons, pencils, markers, paint, glitter, anything that children can
create art with)
Old
Magazines
Scissors,
Tape, Glue
Neighborhood
Vocabulary
Overhead
Projector
Literature:
Come Home with Us by Annie Kubler
Core: this lesson is to
begin by introducing the question of, “what is a neighborhood to the children?”
The children should give a variety of answers and that will probably be geared
toward the idea of what their own neighborhood looks like. Once there has been
about 3 to 4 minutes of brainstorming, the vocabulary list for NEIGHBORHOODS
should be introduced. The teacher
should say the vocabulary words to the class and then discuss why they are
important when talking about neighborhoods. The activity will then follow the
discussion.
Key questions
to ask during the discussion are:
“What does your neighborhood look like?”
“ Do you live in a house or an apartment?” (you can make
use of an overhead projector to keep a tally of how many of your students live
in either a house or apartment or another establishment)
“ Are there other houses on your street?”
“ What is good about your house?”
“ Is there a park or playground around your house?”
“ Are their animals that live in your neighborhood?”
Key questions
to ask about neighbors
“ How many of you have people that live next door to you
that you really like?”
“ What are some of things that you or your mom and dad do
to help the neighbors?”
The activity for
the this lesson is to have the students draw a picture of their homes on the
white paper or posterboard and using the old magazines, they will search for
things that are found around their own neighborhoods and cut them out to paste
or tape on their drawings.
Then they need to write one thing about their neighborhood
and their neighbors that they really like. For the children that do not have
neighbors that they are familiar with, they can simply write about a place that
they enjoy going to in their neighborhood besides their own home.
The students will be sharing them during the discussion
time after the lesson.
Modified/Reteach:
the teacher could escort the students around outside to look at the
neighborhood that the school is in and identify various types of buildings and
other establishments that are around the school.
Extension:
my extension for this lesson
would be to have the children draw their own neighborhoods that they create on
their own; meaning they come up with their own buildings and living quarters as
well as businesses and other establishments and they have to write a sentence
and explain what their neighborhood had in it and why.
Aligned
Instructional Resources:
Text/ Resources: vocabulary on neighborhoods for
discussion
Support: pictures of a neighborhood or the neighborhood
that the school is part of. The magazines also contain a primary source of
photographs.
Technology/ Media Application: use of the overhead
projector to keep a record of how many of your students live in houses, apts,
etc.
Interdisciplinary Correlation:
Objective: to have the students use their artistic
abilities to draw and create their own special neighborhoods and also to use
their writing and speaking skills to describe to the teacher and the rest of
the class why they drew their neighborhoods they way they did and to explain
the sentence that they wrote.
Assessment:
the students will demonstrate their understanding of neighborhoods by
discussion about their drawings and also active discussion within the class
when they are asked to share their pieces that they have created.
Essential
question: Can there be neighborhoods that look differently than ours
that are still as special as our own neighborhoods?
Standards
and Benchmarks:
GEOGRAPHIC PERSPECTIVE: 2.1 DIVERSITY OF PEOPLE, PLACES,
AND CULTURES – all students will be describe, compare, and explain the
locations and characteristics of places, cultures, and settlements.
GEPGRAPHIC PERSPECTIVE: 2.2 HUMAN/ENVIRONMENT INTERACTION-
all students will describe, compare, and explain the locations and ecosystems,
resources, human adaptation, environmental impact, and the interrelationships
among them.
GEOGRAPHIC PERPECTIVE: 2.3 LOCATION, MOVEMENT, AND CONNECTIONS-
all students will describe, compare, and explain the locations and
characteristics of economic activities, trade, political activities, migration,
information flow, and the interrelationships among them
III g. PEOPLE, PLACES, & ENVIRONMENTS- describe how
people create places that reflect ideas, personality, culture, and wants and
needs as they design homes, playgrounds, classrooms, and the like;
IV f. INDIVIDUAL DEVELOPMENT & IDENTITY- explore
factors that contribute to one’s personal interests, capabilities, and
perceptions;
IV h. work independently and cooperatively to accomplish
goals.
Objective: to have students make a picture
web to describe a neighborhood other then their own after the characteristics
of other neighborhoods have been discussed. The similarities and differences
will be shared and discussed after the activity is complete.
Essential
Knowledge and Skills: the children need to have the background knowledge
to describe what a neighborhood is and what sorts of things we find in it.
Lesson:
Materials: Paper ( white paper or construction paper)
Magazines ( new or old), scissors, art supplies, glue or tape
String
Growing Corn Activity
Literature: Night City by Monica Wellington
The Other Side by Kathleen Krull
Core: this lesson is designed to aid the children in seeing the differences between the different types of neighborhoods that there are. The children will discuss for a short amount of time the characteristics of a city, a farm, and a suburb. Then as a class, there will be a discussion on the types of things that will be found in the given places. The children will be broken into groups and given a picture of each place. They will create a picture web to share and discuss with the rest of the class.
Key questions to ask
“ What kinds of jobs are there in a city, on a farm, or in
a suburb?”
“ What kinds of animals are there?”
“ What kinds of buildings are there?”
Explain to the students,” today we are going to make
something called a picture web so that we can see what sorts of things are in
other neighborhoods that we don’t live in, but that are as special as ours.”
The children will
be given a picture of a city, a farm , and a suburb. In their groups they will
work to glue and tape corresponding pictures to the right location. The pictures will be connected to the words
using the string.
When they are complete, we will share and discuss them as
a class. Our last step for the first part of this activity will be to compare
each new neighborhood we have discovered with our own neighborhoods.
Before the activity, read the children the book LIVING ON
FARMS so that they will have an idea bout how important farms and farmers are
to their neighborhood as well as other people in other neighborhoods.
ACTIVITY:
the children will be planting and growing their own corn so that they can see
how a person who lives on a farm( one of our new neighborhoods) must rely more
on themselves for food as well as food for others.
For this
activity, the class must be split into groups no more than 5 children per group
so that they can each have a chance to grow at least one stalk of corn. The
stalks will be transplanted outside (this activity is for the spring/early
summer) so that science related exploration can take place.
Materials:
see the instructions for “growing corn.”
Extension: my
extension for this lesson would be to have the children actually visit a
different neighborhood and write something about the neighborhood that they
really liked and that makes that particular neighborhood special.
Another activity for the children would be to for us as a
class to discuss and explore the different things that we found in other
neighborhoods that our neighborhood does not have.
The children could also take the time to grow other items
that can be easily monitored and cared for by kindergartners such as beans or
perhaps a spice of some sort.
If the lesson were geared towards older children, there
could reference made to other books that make reference to other the
neighborhoods that I have literature on.
Aligned
Instructional Resources:
Text/ Resources: Map to show location to show location of other neighborhoods, instructions for growing corn.
Literature: LIVING ON FARMS by Allan Fowler
Support: outside speakers, photographs of different
neighborhoods listed
Technology: photographs from magazines, a camera
preferably a digital one so that the life cycle of the corn can be monitored.
Interdisciplinary Correlation:
Discipline: Science
Objective: students will learn about how to grow something be it a stalk of corn or a flower. They will learn that all things need water, sun, and food to grow. Also that plants evolve through a scientific process.
Assessment: I will
have the students illustrate their understanding of the different types of
neighborhoods through the discussion in class, the construction of their
picture webs, and their involvement in the “growing corn” activity.
Essential question: Has our neighborhood always looked this way?
Standards
and Benchmarks:
HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE: 1.2- COMPREHENDING THE PAST- all students will understand narratives about major eras of American and world history by identifying the people involved, describing the setting, and sequencing the events.
HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE: 1.3- ANALYZING AND INTERPRETING
THE PAST- all students will reconstruct the past by comparing interpretations
written by other s in a variety of perspectives and creating narratives from
evidence.
II d. TIME, CONTINUITY, & CHANGE- identify and use
various sources for reconstructing the past, such as documents, letters,
diaries, maps, textbooks, photos, and more
VIII a. SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY, & SOCIETY- identify and
describe examples in which science and technology have changed the lives of
people, such as in homemaking, childcare, work, transportation, and
communication.
Objective: to have the
students listen to a story that deals with the continuity of history and to explore
how neighborhoods in our city used to look and the limited resources and
supplies that were available.
Essential Knowledge and Skills: the children will need to understand the concept of change over time
which can be achieved by asking simple questions such as
“ Do places and
buildings always look the same?”
“ Has our city and
buildings in our city always looked the same?”
Lesson:
Materials: Literature- WHO CAME DOWN THAT ROAD? By George Ella Lyon
Access to take the class on a field trip to your local museum so that they can get an up close look at change.
Core: this lesson is
designed to give the children a look at how a neighborhood changes over time.
In almost every city, there is a place be it a museum or a historical site such
as a famous house or building that can have visitors. Instead of sitting in a
classroom, constantly discussing and showing pictures of neighborhoods in the
past, the children get to explore the possibilities of life in the past through
seeing how buildings, homes, and living necessities have developed over time.
Modified/Reteach- If I
were reteach this lesson to my class, I would absolutely love for them to see
as much change in homes and neighborhoods over time as they could. I think that
a trip to Greenfield Village or Henry Ford Museum would give them a great idea
of how life in the state of Michigan has changed tremendously over time.
Extension: my extension
for this lesson would be to have the children participate in a role playing
activity where the children could get a feel for the past vs. the present. This
is the activity that I would use for the lesson.
Activity: To have the children play the role of business owner and customer in a general store from the 1900’s.
Materials: old clothes that the children can use for costumes
Pretend food, tools, and clothing that can be used for
The children to purchase in their pretend store.
Play money
Explain to the children that they will be doing a role play activity where they will be workers and customers in an early 1900’s general store.
Tell them what they will need to do and make sure you explain to them that all of the items that they can go to the store and get today will NOT be available to them in this type of setting.
Make sure to review the types of things that they seen or heard when they were on the field trip so they will have a good idea of what to do and how to act.
Aligned Instructional Resources:
Text/Resources: Who Came
Down That Road? By George Ella Lyon
www.michsite.state.mi (
Michigan’s Historical Sites Online)
Kalamazoo Museum
Henry Ford Museum
(website)
Greenfield Village(
website)
Support: primary
sources: photographs, letters
Technology: interactive
displays at the museums, displays at the museums, questions about the trip and
the types of things seen.
Interdisciplinary Correlation
Discipline:
Math
Objective: students will use money to purchase items in the role play activity of the general store and they will learn how to purchase things from a store and they will also learn certain denominations of money ( coin and paper up to $5)
Essential Question: Do neighborhoods in other places in the world look exactly like ours?
Standards and
Benchmarks:
GEOGRAPHIC PERSPECTIVE: 2.1 DIVERSITY OF PEOPLE, PLACES, ADM CULTURES- all students will describe, compare, and explain the locations and characteristics of places, cultures, and settlements.
2.2 HUMAN/ENVIRONMENT INTERACTION- all students will describe, compare, and explain the locations and characteristics of ecosystems, resources, human adaptation, environmental impact, and the interrelationships among them.
I a. CULTURE: explore and describe similarities and differences in the ways groups, societies, and cultures address similar human needs and concerns.
I d. compare ways in which people from different cultures think about and deal with their physical environment and social conditions
III g. PEOPLE, PLACES,& ENVIRONMENTS: describe how people create places that reflect ideas, personality, culture, and wants and needs as they design homes, playgrounds, classrooms, and the like.
IV b. INDIVIDUAL DEVELOPMENT& IDENTITY: describe personal connections to place-especially place as associated with immediate surroundings.
Objective: to have the students explore how the neighborhoods and homes look in Africa and Mexico through constructing homes made out of clay.
Essential Knowledge and Skills: the children will need to know how to work in groups and individually. They will need to that all neighborhoods do not look the same which will be done through review of exploring other neighborhoods.
Lesson:
Materials: molding
or sculpting clay
Plastic
knives
Old
containers
Newspapers and wax paper to cover the work-stations
Old
clothes (shirts or t-shirts for the children to
Wear)
Pictures
of houses from Africa and Mexico that are
composed
of clay
Literature
on clay houses:
CLAY
HOMES by Judy Langley
THIS
HOUSE IS MADE OF MUD by Ken Buchanan
THIS
IS MY HOUSE by Arthur Dorros
Core: this lesson is designed to show the students that there are many neighborhoods and homes that that look very different from ours but that are still special to the people that live in them. The children will also be introduced to the cultures in Africa and Mexico and learn the reasons why their neighborhoods and homes look the way that they do.
The children will be listening to various stories that have to do with homes and neighborhoods around the world. The stories that they will be listening to and discussing will be about different types of homes that are present around the world and we will be discussing how those homes are different from ours but they are still special.
The stories that we will be playing close attention to will be CLAY HOMES and HOUSE MADE OF MUD. These books will help the children’s understanding of how the homes made of clay look so that they will have a better idea of how to construct their own homes that they will be making out of clay.
Activity: explain to the class that we will be making our own houses and buildings out of clay.
Let them know the supplies that are available to them, and how they will be making use of them.
Explain to the children that they will be using their hands and the plastic utensils to make homes out of the clay.
You will definitely have to do a demonstration of how to use the clay for the children as well as help them during the actual process.
Help them to get started and allow them time to work.
Extension: the extension for this lesson would be to have the children focus on homes from many other countries and have them make their own versions of those homes. The focus can be on countries other than Africa and Mexico.
Aligned
Instructional Resources:
Text/Resources- Literature for lesson:
CLAY HOMES, THIS IS MY HOUSE, and HOUSE MADE OF
MUD
Information on dwellings in Africa and Mexico
HOMES AROUND THE WORLD by Mike Johnson
HOUSES & HOMES by Ann Morris
TO BE A KID by Maya Ajmera
Interdisciplinary
Correlation
Discipline: Art & Music
Objective: students will make their own sculptures through creativity and also be exposed to music of the African and Mexican culture while they are working on their projects.
Ajmera, Maya., and Ivanko, John.D. To Be a Kid. Charlesbridge Publishing.1999
This book
does a great job illustrating that no matter what the culture or language
climate or customs a kid will be a kid. Being a kid can mean doing any fun
activity a kid may find to do whether it is in America, Mexico, or South
Africa. This book shows how children from every part of the world engage in
activities that are the same. (Ages 4-8)
Buchanan, Ken. House
Made of Mud. Northland Publishing.1994
This book is
about an adobe house that was built in the Sonoran desert by a Mexican family.
The book does an excellent job illustrating life in the desert with references
made to the peaceful environment and also the relationship that is present
among the inhabitants of the house and the habitat that surrounds them. This
book is a Reading Rainbow selection, and has a bilingual version available. The
rhyming text and vivid illustrations are sure to captivate the eyes and ears of
children. (Ages 3-6)
Dorros, Arthur. This
is my House. Scholastic Inc. 1992.
This a
wonderful story about a houses that are found all around the world and the
materials that they are made of. The book gives insight as to where people long
ago lived and what they used to build their homes with. The book makes
reference to homes found from Turkey to Norway to the United States. Each
country also illustrates how to say, “ this is my house” in their native
language. ( Ages 5 and up)
Fowler, Allan. Living
on Farms. Children’s Press.2000.
This book is
a simple introduction to the history, animals, products, and tools that are
important to farms. The story features many animals that are found on a farm
but also shows all the work that must be done in order for a farm to be
successful. Farms in the past were thought to small and diverse. Now they are
larger and there is more of a variety of types of farms. There is even a list
of vocabulary words at the end that contains words about farms that was seen in
the text. ( Ages 3-6)
Jackson, Mike. Homes
Around the World: Level A. 1995.
This book
gives a simple explanation of the world and introduces the elements of time and
place. The titles and the fictional children that explore factual topics will
help the children learn about nature, history, and international cultures.
There is a small map that explains to the children which part of the world that
they will be reading about and visiting. This is a good choice for small
children that are curious about other places in the world. ( Ages 5-8)
Kubler, Annie. Come
Home with Us. Child’s Play International.1996.
This book
help us to discover that the way people live is different in many parts of the
world but they whether they are rich or poor they are still people and that
makes them very special. This book shows children how there are many ways of
life and how different another child’s home or neighborhood may be entirely
different form their own. The main idea form this text is to find the thing
that make us different and also the things that tie us together. ( Ages 5-8)
Krull, Katheleen. The Other Side: How Kids Live in a California Latino Neighborhood. Dutton Children’s Books.1994
This is a book about the lives of three Mexican- American children: Cinthaya, Francisco, and Pedro living in California. The book shows how the children enjoy living in a bilingual culture. The positive view of a immigrant experience is shown by the three children who have successfully adapted to a new culture. The book addresses some of the stereotypes and difficulties that many immigrants face. The book also shows how the children are still in touch with their Mexican heritage, even though they now live in America.( Ages 5-11)
Langley, Judy. Clay Homes. New Hope.1997
This book gives an insightful look at child growing up as a missionary but it geared toward small children. The book looks at how the living environment and dwellings in which the missionaries live are designed and what they are made of. In this instance, the dwellings are made of clay. I chose this because the book can catch the eyes of readers and at the same time make them aware of the role that a missionary has in this story about Africa. ( Ages 3-6)
Morris, Ann. Houses
and Homes. Morrow, William & Co. 1995
This book is
about how a world is full of houses. Houses that stay put and house that move.
The photos show the different types of materials that houses are made of. The
book also shows how the families are special and how the places they live in
are special. There is a map that shows that the location of the home as well as
a real story about the materials that make the home and the people that live in
the home. The books will help young children to understand and appreciate all
the neat types of homes there are and that the resources and location of a
place have a lot to do with how a home can be built. ( Ages 5-8)
Lyon, George Ella. Who
Came Down That Road? Orchard Books.1996
This book is
about the a mother and child that ponder the past by discussing who might have
traveled down an old, old road, from he pioneer settlers to the prehistoric
animals to presently. The road is just a trace through the woods but the
concept is that the road has been traveled down by thousands of years. This
story addresses historical continuity to children as well a giving them insight
to some of the events that have occurred over time. The story fosters an
understanding of our world and the history that has taken place.
Wellington, Monica.
Night City. Dutton Children’s Books.1998.
In this book,
nighttime may fall and bedtime may follow, but this city never goes to sleep no
matter what the hour. Explore a day in this city from dawn until duck and learn
all the many activities that take place in the city. This book shows that the
city never sleeps and that is exactly what the text and the illustrations show.
This shows how a neighborhood in the city may function on a daily basis.
Children will enjoy it.