Saturday, March 21, 2015

Landforms with Susana Nicolau

Hello!!! I am Mrs. Nicolau from Brinca Into Bilingual and I am so happy to blog today to " show-n-tell" you what I have done with my students when teaching about Landforms!! :)


We studied them for so long that we were able to do several activities with them and my students knew the types of landforms so perfectly that it made me even more proud of them!! :)

We first did our vocabulary words in our journals with the Frayer Model. After we discussed and review our words, we create a landform foldable with the different types of landforms. My students and I were so happy and proud of their work!! :)
In my school, we have an early exit, so by 3rd grade, science and math is taught mainly in English, that's why you can only see English words. 
Here are some pictures to show you how they turned out!!






Click HERE to get your FREE copy (English and Spanish)!!!


Then we worked in cooperative groups to create our own sketch of landforms. We used play-doh and some thick foam poster as a based. I honestly did not give any instructions to my students. I just asked them to grab their vocabulary words and create a scenario that had all the landforms that we have been studying. You could hear all kind of good conversations around my room!! Isn't it what we all want to happen?!!? It was an amazing experience, and the kids did sooo well!! :)
They would come to show me their work and I would ask them which one is the hill? mountain? Valley? and they would explain which one it was and their characteristics!!
Here are some pictures of them working and creating their project.



We also incorporate a graphic organizer; we used a Venn Diagram to compare a hill and a mountain. This was the hardest for them though. They would come up with "A Hill is green, a mountain is black"; I had to check their work individually. I had to explain over and over again that they needed facts and not only their color; HOWEVER, it was a great learning lesson because it made them think hard and check on their journal to come up with valid comparisons.




Last, but not least, we had some fun with food and learning!! Any time I can use food, I try to do it!! Until I was told schools are getting very strict with what you use as a snack. My principal let me do this activity at the end of the day and on a Friday, so students could just take it home at the end and not tempted to eat it in class or at lunch.
As the play-doh activity, I let them do their work in partners and without any instructions. I gave them 4 Hershey kisses, green and blue frosting, a Graham cracker and some fish sprinkles. They had so much fun and were so engaged that I would do this activity over and over again!!!





Our final product!!



Thank you for stopping by our blog today, I hope my post was helpful and you come by to visit me again!! See ya next time!!! :)

           
Mrs. Nicolau (Brinca into Bilingual)
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PK-3rd Early Exit Bilingual/Dual Lang.
Texas, USA

10 comments:

  1. This is fabulous! Thanks so much for sharing!
    LOVE the hands-on experiences !
    Mrs. Samuelson's Swamp Frogs

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  2. These are such great activities for studying landforms; it looks like your kids had lots of fun! I also love the Frayer model you used to teach the vocabulary words. Makes me wish I was still in the classroom! Teaching about landforms and how the Earth's surface was formed was always one of my favorite units. One activity the kids really enjoyed was when we made chocolate pudding, put it in a pan, and laid graham crackers across the top and then jiggled it to demonstrate the plates of the Earth rubbing together. The best part, of course, was getting to eat the pudding and graham crackers. :)

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    1. Thank you so much for your comment and sharing such a great idea!! I'll have to try it next time!! :)

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  3. I really love these ideas! The 3d idea for the notebooks looks awesome! I can't wait to try out your freebie! Thank you so much!!
    Melissa from Mrs. Dailey's Classroom

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    1. Thank you Melissa for your comment!! I look forward to hearing how it turned out!!! :)

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  5. Such great hands-on ideas! I'm sure your students will never forget what they learning about landforms.
    Peggy at Primary Flourish

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  6. I am teaching landforms for the first time at the end if this year - your ideas are great! I love the hands-on playdough idea. I'm definitely going to use that! You can see that your students learned so much! ~ Lisa

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  7. What a fun way to teach landforms that students will always remember! :)

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