View Content #7672
| Contentid | 7672 |
|---|---|
| Content Type | 1 |
| Title | Ideas for Teaching a Thematic Unit on Monsters, Part 1 |
| Body | Ñandú listserv users responded to a recent request for ideas for a thematic unit on monsters for elementary students with the following suggestions, among others: --- I've thought of doing a unit using Where the Wild Things Are and one thought I had was to have students create a forest in the classroom, making trees and putting them up on the wall. Then do a traveling monster activity-similar to a Picasso dictation- have stations out with one large piece of paper and crayons or markers. The children work in small groups, "traveling" between the stations in their group. At the first station you could say "draw the body,” then they rotate. Then at the next you say "draw the head(s).” Etc. You can either tell them how many, what colors, what shapes (if you want to do shapes in the unit too) to draw each body part, or let them determine themselves. I envision using this more as a culmulatory activity, letting the children determine how many and what color of each to draw, and then have to report back to the class on what their monster has as an assessment. In the end you have several monsters that were all created by the group, and I would have each group place which ever one they worked on last where they wanted in the forest on the walls of the classroom to create our very own wild things forest in our class. This is a better activity for the higher levels, for a K class I would probably just do a Picasso dictation and have each student create their own wild thing. Roussos, S. Re: [nandu] monsters as thematic unit. Ñandú listserv (nandu@caltalk.cal.org, 9 Apr 2008). --- When I teach body parts with monsters, I have them do an archeological dig in Transylvania to find the body parts of various monsters who went to a party in Dracula's castle years ago.... I created outlines of the monsters Franco (Frankenstein). Murcielago (Dracula), Mo (the mummy) and lobo hombre (wolfman). I got pictures of the monster faces from a halloween shop (or enlarge something you find on the internet) laminate the bodies and place velcro on the various places on the body to attach the parts (i.e. arm, leg, foot, heart, brain, nose.....) Using wooden shapes (found it a craft store), color code a label each wooden part as a body part of a specific monster (i.e. write in green for Frankenstein, black for dracula, etc...) I attach a velcro on each of the wooden shapes that depict the body parts and place them in boxes of either packing noodles or rice. Each child gets a plastic spoon for digging up the parts. No hands can touch the body parts or the soil. Divide students into an amount of archeological teams that match the amount of different monsters. Assign a head archeologist for each team ie. Doctor Carlos Darwin, Doctora Carlota Darwin, Doctor Carlitos Darwin, etc. These team heads stay near the body and receive the body parts found by their specific team members. They place the parts on the body in the appropriate location. Team that finds and places all the parts to their assigned monster first wins a certificate from the mayor of Transylvania in a special ceremony. Functional language expressions include: I have the + body part Please give me the + body part I need the + body part Where is the + body part? I don't see it. We're finished! Myra M. Rios, M.A. FLES teacher Merion Elementary School, Lower Merion School District. Re: [nandu] monsters as thematic unit. Ñandú listserv (nandu@caltalk.cal.org, 9 Apr 2008). Read more ideas for monster activities and materials in next week's InterCom! |
| Source | Ñandú |
| Inputdate | 2008-04-20 01:40:54 |
| Lastmodifieddate | 2008-04-20 01:40:54 |
| Expdate | Not set |
| Publishdate | 2008-04-21 00:00:00 |
| Displaydate | Not set |
| Active | 1 |
| Emailed | 1 |
| Isarchived | 1 |
