2nd Grade

Upcoming G/T Activities:

We will be studying convergent thinking/questioning in which we will focus on being logical.  Students will learn how to ask these types of questions to further their reading comprehension.

February G/T Activities:  We are doing "hink pink" word riddles as opening brain teasers. The answer to a hink pink riddle is two rhyming words of one syllable each.  For example a big feline is a fat cat.  Students love the challenge of hinky pinkies (two syllables)and hinkety pinketies(three syllables)!  Mrs. Knapke had her students make their own in class!

We are continuing our study of divergent questioning (see January for details).  We are practicing this skill by asking divergent questions about pictures and in our reading.

January G/T Activities: We finished  the book CDB by William Steig.  (See September for details.) 

We read a book called Leo Cockroach: Toy Tester by Kevin O'Malley and discussed how he evaluated the quality of toys.  Students put all their  knowledge of the creative thinking process together and designed their own toys from miscellaneous materials.  Each student was given an identical kit of  common items:  clay, pipe cleaners, etc.  Each student presented his or her toy to the class and we discussed in detail the creative process used in making them.  

We began a new unit of study on questioning.  We discussed how creative thinking is also called divergent thinking.  Students learned how to ask questions to encourage this type of thinking.  We can think divergently when asked questions that begin with words like "why, I wonder, what would happen if,..."

December G/T Activities:  We continued opening each lesson with more riddles from the book CDB by William Steig.  (See September for details.) Students also worked on asking questions to find the differences between two different Christmas pictures. (See October for details.) 

We continued our study of creativity by studying the component called originality. We met Sybil the Scientist who helped us understand that originality is being different from others.  She uses originality to invent new things.  We sang a song about originality and learned sign language to help us  remember this important part of creative thinking and writing.  We read a book called Q is for Duck by Marcia McClintock and Mary Elting.  Students enjoyed guessing the riddles in this crazy alphabet book in which the letter stood for something about the object, not for the first letter of its name!  They discovered that Q is for duck because ducks quack!  They then made a class book called T is for Our Class (because we think!)  Each student was responsible for one page and all came up with very clever ideas.  

November G/T Activities:  We continued opening each lesson with more riddles from the book CDB by William Steig.  (See September for details.) Students also worked on asking questions to find the differences between two different Thanksgiving pictures. (See October for details.) 

We continued to work on creativity.  The next component of creativity we studied was flexibility in which students look at things in new and different ways.  This is called "getting out of the box".  We read a book called That's Good. That's Bad by  Margery Cuyler.  Students were challenged to make their own short book modeling her technique of having something good or bad happen on each page which then leads to another good or bad thing happening. She has many books in this series available at the public library.  We met Max the Magician Rabbit who uses his flexibility to look at things in different ways.  He pulled buttons out of his magic hat and students answered many questions that made them look at buttons in new ways.  We sang a song about flexibility and learned sign language to help us  remember this important part of creative thinking and writing.

October G/T Activities:  We continued opening each lesson with more riddles from the book CDB by William Steig.  (See September for details.)  Students also worked on asking questions.  They worked  with a partner and were given one of two different Halloween pictures. Without looking at each other's pictures, they asked questions to find the differences.  Some found as many as ten of the twenty differences !  

We continued our unit on creativity. We completed more activities using fluency in our writing.  We worked on turning boring skeleton sentences into awesome elaborated sentences. Students  began to learn about another  component of creativity called fluency.  They were introduced to another friend - Isabel the Squirrel who uses fluency to have lots of ideas. She uses fluency to come up with new ideas to write about.  Students sang a song about fluency and learned sign language to help them remember this important part of creative thinking and writing.

September G/T Activities: We started every lesson with a brainteaser using the book CDB by William Steig (author of Shrek).  Students enjoyed solving these "text message type" sentences using the pictures for clues.  For example CDB = see the bee.  This book and others in the series are available at the public library.  Students enjoyed making their own as well.

We began our creativity unit. Students learned the component of creativity called elaboration.  They met a new friend - Yolanda the Spider who spins webs of great sentences to make wonderful stories.  She uses elaboration to make her writing the best it can be.  Students enjoyed singing the elaboration song and learning sign language to help them remember this important part of creative thinking and writing.

First G/T Activity:

Students in G/T Literacy classes  were challenged with getting a “bird egg” back to its “nest” without touching it or dropping it.  (If you don’t have an imagination you might have thought they were getting a marble from point A to point B!)  They could use plastic tubes as tools and had to make a plan so they could work as a team.  Some students faced extra challenges along the way such as using only one hand.  Many students got out of the box with their thinking and came up with very creative methods of completing the task.  We followed this activity with a discussion of the roles different students took as they participated and how each team worked together. Then students took a personality test to determine their personality styles. It is important that gifted students participate in these type of activities so that they can better understand and appreciate the thinking of other students as well as themselves.   Each grade level used a different theme.  We discussed how we each have a little of all the personality styles but one style is our strongest gift that we bring to a team. We followed up this lesson with reading an article or story and analyzing the personality style of the character. 

Personality Test - Shapes

 Squiggles are creative.  Circles are peacemakers.  Squares are planners.  Triangles are leaders. Ask your child about the personality style of Curious George!

3rd Grade

February G/T Activities:

We continued starting each lesson with a  brainteaser using a booklet called Think-About-Its.  (See January for details.)

This month's Bloom' Taxonomy focus was on the Create/Synthesis Level.  Our fiction work was a culmination of studying Mo Willems' books.  Students created their own Pigeon book modeling Mo Willems' style and techniques.  They also were given the opportunity to enter a contest for Mo Willems' next Pigeon book.  Details can be found at his website:

http://www.mowillems.com

We had a lot of fun sharing our Pigeon books with family and friends at our Coffehouse.  We enjoyed hot chocolate and cookies while reading our books aloud.

January G/T Activities:

We started a new type of brainteaser using a booklet called Think-About-Its.  The booklet has a brainteaser for each day of the week plus a weekly challenge.  They are language arts based short questions that help students analyze and think about word structures.

The next level of Bloom's Taxonomy we studied was Evaluate/Evaluation.  At this level, we make judgments and decisions based on what we know.  It is crucial that decisions have a reason supported with evidence! We read Mo Willems' book Leonardo, the Terrible No Good Monster.  Students made the decision that Leonardo was not terrible because he was mean; he was terrible because he was no good at scaring any one.  They completed activities in which they rated monsters on a scale for scariness including their reason.  They also played a game designed after the popular board game "Would You Rather".  They took turns deciding what kind of monster they would rather be and earning points if they could correctly guess what other players would rather be.  As always, it was important to explain their reasoning behind each decision. 

Our non-fiction work with the Evaluate/Evaluation level of Bloom's Taxonomy began with a power point presentation of  a class Mrs. McDonough took through Miami University at Yellowstone two years ago.  Students enjoyed learning about the complex ecosystem of the area.  The focus was on the role the wolf played in the past before the entire species was exterminated.  The wolves have been brought back to Yellowstone through an extensive program and there have been many positive impacts on the habitat.  The students then read an article about the effects of the wolf on the area and made a list of the pros and cons.  From their lists, students wrote a paragraph supporting their decision of whether or not the wolves should remain in Yellowstone. 

December G/T Activities:

We continued using Stores With a Hole to open each lesson.  (See October for details.)

The fourth level of Bloom's Taxonomy is Analyze/Analysis.  We read the Mo Willems' book called Don't Let the Pigeon Stay Up Late. Students played a  game designed after the popular game called Mastermind. They had to solve a color pattern their partner made with the least amount of guesses.  The color pattern represented books and each turn was a time increment.  The more turns it took to find the color pattern, the longer the pigeon got to stay up.  Students learned how to ask Analyze  questions using the book and wrote prompts for this level in their flipbooks. We sang the next  verse of the Bloom's Taxonomy  song and learned sign language to help remember this level.

Our non-fiction work on this level involved reading a book called Dear Katie, the Volcano Is a Girl by Jean George.  This beautifully illustrated book compares the Hawaiian myth of Pele to the scientific theory of volcanoes.  Students completed a Venn diagram comparing the two and also enjoyed interpreting graphs of active volcanoes in the United States.  They were surprised to find there is a pattern - all are on the west coast!

November G/T Activities:

We continued using Stores With a Hole to open each lesson.  (See October for details.)

We continued our study of the levels of Bloom's Taxonomy (see previous months for details).   The nonfiction activity for the Apply/Application level involved taking a one inch square drawing and enlarging it to six inches.  After each student enlarged their drawing to six inches, they discovered they made one large puzzle.  After working together to assemble it, they found they had a life size tyrannosaurus rex head! Their skills of applying what they knew about measuring and scale drawings helped them understand this level.  The next  lesson involved reading an article about how fast t.rex's grew.  We practiced asking questions at this level about the article, sang our song and did the sign language.

Students struggle with elaborating (using details) so we practiced it in our next lesson.  Students working in small groups were given a page of about twenty similar pictures and assigned one to describe.  They then read their description to their group members who guessed which picture was being described.  Students repeated this with many different sets of pictures.  We discussed how they were applying what they knew to elaborate their descriptions.   

October G/T Activities:

We opened each lesson with a brainteaser called Twenty Questions taken from Nathan Levy's books called Stories With a Hole.  Students read a short story and then asked questions in order to solve it.  Each question had to be worded so that the teacher could answer yes or no.  If the students were able to solve the problem in the story in 20 questions or less, they scored a point; if not, the teacher scored a point.  The stories helped students focus on asking questions that gave the most information, inferring, problem solving, and thinking out of the box! (Similar brainteasers were used in 5th grade but they were much more difficult!)

We began a unit of study on Bloom's Taxonomy.  Bloom's Taxonomy includes six levels of thinking.  Each level progresses in difficulty and uses more in-depth thinking.  Research shows that when a student understands his or her thinking, students learn better.  Students will be introduced to each level and then use each through reading fiction and nonfiction text.  The fiction text will be children's books by Mo Willlems.  The nonfiction text will be articles related to science and social studies topics being studied in class. 

The first level of Bloom's Taxonomy is Remember/Knowledge which means to know the facts. Students were introduced to the concept of Bloom's Taxonomy and were given  flipbook that will be used in each lesson.  We played a memory game using the names of the levels of Bloom's Taxonomy. The concrete example of playing Memory helped students understand that this level of thinking is simply remembering facts but it is important to learning.   They also learned sign language for the word "remember" and sang the first verse of a song to the tune of B-I-N-G-O to help them remember this level. In the second lesson for this level we read a Mo Willems' book from his popular Pigeon series called Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus!  Students learned how to ask Remember questions using the book and wrote prompts for this level in their flipbooks.  They also played a memory game using words from the book. We sang the first verse of the Bloom's Taxonomy  song and practiced our sign language to help remember this level.

The second level is Understand/Comprehension which means to explain in your own words. We read a Mo Willems' book from his popular Pigeon series called The Pigeon Finds a Hotdog!  Students learned how to ask Understand questions using the book.  They also played a  game called Password using words from the book.  They had to describe the word, without using the word, to a partner so that the partner could guess it.  We discussed how they had to understand the meaning of the words to play the game. We sang the second verse of the Bloom's Taxonomy  song and learned sign language to help remember this level.  For the second lesson of this level, we read an article about the formation of soil.  It was chosen for its high reading level purposefully so that students had to work at understanding it.  Students practiced asking Understand level questions using the article and wrote prompts for this level in their flipbooks. We sang our Bloom's song and practiced our sign language.  

The third level of Bloom's Taxonomy is Apply/Application which means using what you know to solve problems, sometimes in  different situations. We read Mo Willems' book Knuffle Bunny.  Students learned how to use their knowledge of puzzles to make special puzzles called tangrams.  They enjoyed completing tangrams of Knuffle Bunny and other characters and objects in the book. Students learned how to ask Apply level questions using the book and wrote prompts for this level in their flipbooks.  We sang the third verse of the Bloom's Taxonomy  song and learned sign language to help remember this level. 

September G/T Activities:

Students in G/T Literacy classes  were challenged with getting a “bird egg” back to its “nest” without touching it or dropping it.  (If you don’t have an imagination you might have thought they were getting a marble from point A to point B!)  They could use plastic tubes as tools and had to make a plan so they could work as a team.  Some students faced extra challenges along the way such as using only one hand.  Many students got out of the box with their thinking and came up with very creative methods of completing the task.  We followed this activity with a discussion of the roles different students took as they participated and how each team worked together. Then students took a personality test to determine their personality styles. It is important that gifted students participate in these type of activities so that they can better understand and appreciate the thinking of other students as well as themselves.   Each grade level used a different theme.  We discussed how we each have a little of all the personality styles but one style is our strongest gift that we bring to a team. We followed up this lesson with reading an article about Thomas Edison and analyzed his personality style. 

Personality test - Animals

Monkeys are creative.  Dogs are peacemakers.  Owls are planners.  Lions are leaders. Ask your child about the personality style of Thomas Edison !

4th Grade

January - February G/T Activities:

We  continued doing brainteasers from our Think About It booklets (see September for details) to open each lesson.

We began a unit of research in January on the Wonders of the World by watching a short video on the Seven Ancient Wonders of the World.  We made a chart of criteria that students felt should be used in deciding if a structure is a world wonder.  We then compared our list to a professional list and found that we were very accurate in our ideas. Students then brainstormed a list of of structures both man made and natural that they felt matched our criteria.  Students listed their three favorite and were put into small groups to research their wonders.  A teacher model project was shown of the Statue of Liberty so that students had an example of what to do.  Project guidelines included:  location, when and how it was built, important facts.  Students also had to figure the cost of traveling to the wonder and staying there for one week.  A paper model was built and souvenir book marks, shrinky dinks and wooden nickels were made.  The students made displays using science fair boards.  Their projects will be presented in a travel show format to Mrs. Hennessey's third grade class who will use play money to purchase the souvenirs. Each student may choose to write an essay on their wonder or a creative short story as if they were visiting the wonder. 

December  G/T Activities:

We  continued doing brainteasers from our Think About It booklets (see September for details) to open each lesson.

Our focus this month was creativity.  We reviewed the four components that students learned in the past:  fluency - brainstorm lots of ideas, flexibility - look at things in a different way or get out of  the box, originality - develop ideas that are different from other people, elaboration - use details. 

We read aloud from the book Scranimals by Jack Pretlusky and Mixed Beasts by Kenyon Cox and  Wallace Edwards. These beautifully illustrated books of poetry show funny combinations of different animals and plants.  The names of the new creations are mixed syllables of the original names; for example mangorilla.  Students were challenged to create their own "scranimals or mixed beasts".  The process started with students brainstorming lists of fruits, vegetables and animals on chart paper to practice fluency.  Each student then chose two or more things to force fit together (flexibility).  The names had to share common letters or syllables.  They used their skills of originality and elaboration by actually creating new creatures and writing poems about them. Students shared their illustrations and poems they wrote while enjoying hot cocoa and cookies at our coffeehouse.

September - November G/T Activities:

We  started each class with Language Arts brainteasers from our Think About It booklets. These brainteasers help build vocabulary skills.

Students reviewed the levels of Bloom's Taxonomy that they were introduced to in third grade.  Bloom's Taxonomy is the name given to the six levels of thinking.  By studying these levels, students have a better understanding of how to think through problems.  We read a reader's theater style article on Protoceratops.  Ask your child about "Proto Andy"!  The article was written in a talk show interview format.  Students enjoyed analyzing the  levels of the questions in the article.  Students were then assigned one of two different stories to read.  Each student wrote several questions for their story at different levels of Bloom's Taxonomy.  Students were excited to see their questions  typed into a worksheet and handed out to them.  They then read the other story and chose questions to answer from each level.  These activities helped them to analyze the importance of what they are reading and to ask good questions that help improve their reading comprehension.

First G/T Activity:

Students in G/T Literacy classes  were challenged with getting a “bird egg” back to its “nest” without touching it or dropping it.  (If you don’t have an imagination you might have thought they were getting a marble from point A to point B!)  They could use plastic tubes as tools and had to make a plan so they could work as a team.  Some students faced extra challenges along the way such as using only one hand.  Many students got out of the box with their thinking and came up with very creative methods of completing the task.  We followed this activity with a discussion of the roles different students took as they participated and how each team worked together. Then students took a personality test to determine their personality styles. It is important that gifted students participate in these type of activities so that they can better understand and appreciate the thinking of other students as well as themselves.   Each grade level used a different theme.  We discussed how we each have a little of all the personality styles but one style is our strongest gift that we bring to a team. We followed up this lesson with reading an article or story and analyzing the personality style of the character. 

Personality test - Colors

Yellow is creative.  Red is a peacemaker.  Green is a planner.  Blue is a leader.   Ask your child about the personality style of Thomas Edison!

5th Grade

Upcoming G/T Activities:

Students will use their skills of problem solving, inferring and determining importance to solve a chocolate mystery!

January G/T Activities:

We  started each class with Language Arts brainteasers from our Think About It booklets. These brainteasers help build vocabulary skills.

We took a test to determine if we are more of a right or left brain thinker.  Left brain thinkers are more logical and right brain thinkers are more creative.  We discussed the strengths of both and how to become more whole brain with our thinking.  

Students worked in small groups to analyze the illustrations of Harry Potter book covers from around the world. They discussed different aspects of the illustrations from a left and right brain point of view.  Students then shared their ideas with another small group.  They wrote a description of the book cover using right and left brain thinking.  

December G/T Activities:

We continued using Stores With a Hole to open each lesson.  (See September - November for details.)

The focus this month was creativity.  We reviewed the four components that students learned in the past:  fluency - brainstorm lots of ideas, flexibility - look at things in a different way or get out of  the box, originality - develop ideas that are different from other people, elaboration - use details.

Students wrote and illustrated books based on the Animagical series by Carol Diggory. Students chose the topic of Native Americans or Explorers from Social Studies class. They used the four components of creativity to help them. Fluency - they made a list objects in the area of their theme and then chose their favorite.  They listed attributes of their object. Flexibility - they listed animals that shared an attribute of their object and then chose their favorite.  Elaboration - the challenge was to draw the object and then make a flap that opened to show the animal.  Students had to find a way to make a part of the object overlap with a part of the animal.  A favorite was making an arrow that became part of a swordfish.  Each student wrote a poem about his or her "animagical".  We put our pages together to make a class book.

September - November G/T Activities:

We started each class period with a Stories With a Hole brainteaser (author Nathan Levy).  Students read a short story and then asked questions in order to solve it.  Each question had to be worded so that the teacher could answer yes or no.  If the students were able to solve the problem in the story in 20 questions or less, they scored a point; if not, the teacher scored a point.  Students won:  8 to 4!  Some students even wrote their own to share with the class.  The stories helped students focus on asking questions that gave the most information, inferring, problem solving, and thinking out of the box!

Students participated in an in-depth study of Bloom's Taxonomy.  Bloom's Taxonomy is the name given to the six levels of thinking.  By studying these levels, students have a better understanding of how to think through problems.  We studied the life and accomplishments of Thomas Edison and did activities for each level.

Remember/Knowledge:  know the facts - we read an interesting article about his childhood and listed important facts on a picture of his face.

Understand/Comprehension:  explain in your own words - Students read another article about his life and summarized a section of it in 30 seconds to a small group.

Apply/Application:  use what you know to solve a problem- Students read in small groups about one of Edison's inventions (phonograph, motion pictures, light bulb) and organized the information into a concept map. 

Analyze/Analysis:   examine the facts - Students compared and contrasted the three inventions by using the concept maps they made.  They used a three ring Venn diagram to display their information.  They also did a written activity in which they did vocabulary activities using an article.

Evaluate/Evaluation:  make judgment or decisions - Students rated some of Edison's inventions and wrote a short essay on the one that had the most influence on their lives.

Create/Synthesis:  develop new ideas and make connections - Students designed business cards for Edison based on their knowledge of his life and accomplishments.

First G/T Activity:

Students in G/T Literacy classes  were challenged with getting a “bird egg” back to its “nest” without touching it or dropping it.  (If you don’t have an imagination you might have thought they were getting a marble from point A to point B!)  They could use plastic tubes as tools and had to make a plan so they could work as a team.  Some students faced extra challenges along the way such as using only one hand.  Many students got out of the box with their thinking and came up with very creative methods of completing the task.  We followed this activity with a discussion of the roles different students took as they participated and how each team worked together. Then students took a personality test to determine their personality styles. It is important that gifted students participate in these type of activities so that they can better understand and appreciate the thinking of other students as well as themselves.   Each grade level used a different theme.  We discussed how we each have a little of all the personality styles but one style is our strongest gift that we bring to a team. We followed up this lesson with reading an article or story and analyzing the personality style of the character. 

Personality test - Toys