"I'm Editor-in-Chief!" Magazine Project

This week each student in Room A-4 became an editor-in-chief of their very own magazine!  To practice functional reading, students will preview (real documents), plan, and publish their own letters from the editor, advertisements, news articles, technical directions, and several other types of pages seen in magazines today.  Students began by analyzing and taking notes on real advertisements seen in magazines, billboards, online, and more!  Then, students created their very own advertisements to become pages in their very own published magazine. The magazine project will become the students 4th quarter district benchmark test, which is an oral presentation, in which they must present their magazine within an Adobe portfolio to the class (including a show-and-tell or demonstration) trying to persuade their classmates to subscribe to their magazines!  Check out the entire project from last year here!  Check out some finished ads below--several students even added 21st century twists to their ads with their very own created QR codes too!  They even enjoyed following the codes using their Smart Phones to find out more about each other's products!

Mesoamerican Museum Day!

Students enjoyed sharing their Mesoamerican 3D Models today by recreating a "museum-like" atmosphere to view and take notes on each other's hard work!  Enjoy the festivities below!

Watch a video of this Mayan volcano erupting here:

Students also reflected on their classmates' and their own models through interactive message boards on ThinkQuest.org:

 

Check out a video explanation of the "night vs. day" Mayan model (above) with a hanging moon and sun and shaded pyramid sides:

 

Watch a video of the Incan achievements such as the clever irrigation system (displayed in the model above):