21st Century Learning
This current school year we broke our double block of ELA (English Language Arts) into two courses, ELA1 and ELA2. ELA1 would be considered your "typical" middle school English class with students learning through works of literature and writing.
For ELA2, we wanted to center on 21st Century learning of communication, collaboration, critical thinking, and creativity. In the sixth grade, where Ms. Fisher and Ms. Borges is teaching, their course is called "Read Your World," which has the students learning about themselves and how they are as a learner to help them succeed in the world around them.
ELA2 in 7th grade is centered on writing through newspaper articles, and they have Blogs for their writing being taught by Ms. LaPerriere and Ms. Weaver.
ELA2, in 8th grade, the teachers, Ms. Delano, Ms. Emmons, and Ms. Evans have named the course, "21st Century Skills," and here we wanted to have a project be the culmination of all the skills they have practiced over (eventually) all three years to connect themselves and their learning to the community around them.
This year, again, was our first foray into doing English Language Arts in this manner, and below are some descriptions of some of the projects the 8th grade students completed to show their 21st Century skills.
this class has emphasized our six "power words" that we have discussed throughout the year: communication, collaboration, leadership, individuality, problem solving, and critical thinking. For this project, students were "leaders in their education" and chose a community issue that interested them and worked to make a positive change in our community.
Here are a few highlights of the many student successes from our 21st Century Skills class from their 8th grade teachers:
"Project Bingo" - team of students spending time with the residents at Golden Living Center"Books for the World" - students scheduled a Red Sox apparel day with book donation today and it was a huge success! Collected over 240 books (and counting!!) to donate to Big Brothers/Big Sisters - in addition, "Fuzzy Hearts" member collaborated and donated books collected at Middleboro Public Library when he realized that he would not be able to follow through with his original plan of taking his books to Children's Hospital"Clothing for a Cause" - a team of girls and a team of boys collaborated and donated over 200 items of clothing to the Red Cross"Team 21" - team of dancers organized and performed a dance for the residents of the Nemasket Nursing Home
"Nichols Neat Team" - team cleaned up around the Nichols School - 9 days and 27 trash bags later...well, what more can we say!"Muffins for Massachusetts" - team created a fully-functioning website to raise money for local food pantry"Support our Troops" - team collected money and games for Wounded Warrior Project"Project Wiffle" - team organized and held a wiffleball tournament and raised over $100 for Jimmy Fund"Hospice Remembrance Service" - team participated in remembrance service for families who have lost family members"Cards for Veterans" - team met with elementary principals and teachers then went into classrooms to talk to students about making cards to be delivered to veterans"Helping Those in Need" - team donated time on Saturday mornings (and are continuing to volunteer!!) at the St. Vincent de Paul food pantry"Project Clean up Middleboro" - team cleaned up Stuart F. Morgan conservation area (and enlisted the help of a local Boy Scout troop)"Smash Bros. Tournament for Hunger" - team organized a very successful after-school video tournament and collected at least 74 food items for the food pantry (approximately 30 participants, many of whom receive special education/counseling services)"Making Everyone Feel Special" - team worked in our building with students with special needs in Ms. Charrbonneau's class"Cribs for Birds" - team raised awareness for the decreasing bluebird population
We could go on and on! Several teams showed true collaboration and "joined forces" to make their projects even more successful. The wide range of student interests from special education, veterans, food pantry, conservation clean up, etc, has just been amazing to watch.
Here are some pictures of the students doing their projects:
