Phenology Data Exchange/Grade 2/Organization
Strategy
Betsy Hawes
Blooming Grove, NY
Our "Phenology Data Exchange" was one of the highlights
of the year for our second grade class. After signing in to exchange
data, we contacted other second grade classes who had also signed up.
After a while we had a little "network" of about 7 classes.
On the suggestion of Karin Sanders, we used a 20 questions sort of
format to find the locations of the schools in our network, moving
from N-E-S-W to "Is your state one of the 20 largest?" to "Does
your state touch an ocean?" to the start of learning about latitude
and longitude. After several months , lots of list-making and chart
making, lots of data analysis, and greatly increased interest in geography
we were able to narrow down the questions and locate our "tulip-pals".
We also then exchanged information on the development of our tulip
gardens.
Some members of our network "disappeared" and didn't send information
(only a couple.) Some teachers had more student involvement than others. Some
signed on much later and had to be "caught up" on information. Some
of us
were more accurate than others. Some of us were better at using e-mail than
others. None of that was a major problem! My class went on to read literature
set in the states they had had tulip-pals in. They were especially interested
in the emergence and blooming data from those states and had some idea of the
places they were learning about. They sang the names of all the states. They
worked with maps and they wrote. It was a wonderful central idea for much of
the school year!
Changes: Perhaps you might mention in the invitation to sign on for the phenology
exchange that some teachers might like to form small networks to share information
from several areas or throughout a grade-level. It would help newcomers know
that it was a possibility, as well as individual communications. ( On the other
hand, we did that without the suggestion.)
At any rate, please do it again! I hope it was as successful on other grade
levels as it was for us at second! The possibilities for older kids were very
exciting!
If you have tips you'd like to share, please
write to Journey North: jnorth@learner.org
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