Around the World in 40 Days Update!

Around the World in 40 Days! 

The Question: How can my experiences, knowledge, and research help me to be informed and inform other about animals and their environment? 

The Launch:  Skyping with a zoo keeper from Omaha's Henry Doorly Zoo......
http://www.omahazoo.com 
This is the site that we researched on Thursday so students could formulate questions to ask the zoo keeper. Students if you think of any other questions to ask the zoo keeper write them down and bring them to school tomorrow. 

Each 4th grade classroom will be transformed into a distinct environment, (polar region, rivers and streams, desert, swamp, and rainforest) students will be researching what their specific region is and then decorating the classroom to match what they have learned.Parents don't forget we would love your help on Monday and Wednesday after school! 
After all regions are decorated students will be traveling to each room over the course of 20 days to research and be informed about the plants, animals, and characteristics of each environment. A field guide will be in the hands of each student so they can take notes on their findings and work on their final product.
Decorating in progress 

Our class visiting the stations in our own environment 

Finished Product and touring other environments 

Students learning about the desert environment in Mr. Carroll's classroom. 

Mrs. Johnson's class visiting our Polar Region. 

Kellan testing to see which hand was warmer, the one with blubber or the one without. 

Our igloo thanks to Mrs. Blackburn! 

Visiting Mrs. Gidaro's room in the River and Streams environment. 

Visiting the Rainforest 

Mr. Carroll's boys visited the Polar Region 

Our class visiting Mrs. Johnson in the Swamp Region 

Mrs. Hyder's first graders came to visit the Polar and Swamp Regions last week, we showed them around and answered questions they had about the different regions. 

Culminating Assessment: At the end of researching students will create their own magazine, travel brochure, or children's book to display what they have learned while traveling. No matter what the students decide to create, they will understand how to use text features while writing, summarize multi paragraph texts using key details to support central ideas, draw logical conclusions from relationships and patterns discovered during the inquiry process and much more!