5E Day, 2011 version

So, I’m still thinking about 5E Day. (see earlier posts here and here).

I followed the same format as before. I showed the Daniel Pink book trailer video for Drive which asks “what is your sentence?”. I gave some examples. I allowed about a week of think time. I waited.

Once again, great success. This time I even had time to make an animoto video with a picture of each child and his or her sentence before back to school night so that I could show it to parents. I don’t know what is going on with my photography skills, but they need work.

There is nothing like hearing about your students’ interests, on day 8 of school, in a real, in-depth, but not heavy, way with props included. This year we even had someone bring in a short video clip. I have three new students and for them it was a great way to catch up on common knowledge about returning students, become known themselves, and become part our shared story right away. And, I think that is the key. For a classroom or any learning community to become a real community there has to be some shared story to connect all those spinning parts into something.

Here are we are in all our 1 sentence glory:

• She’s a swimmer.
• I am interested in all things mechanical and finding out how things work.
• He loves to play sports and math.
• She likes to make cookies with her mom.
• I like rocks.
• She loves the Phillies and sports.
• He likes reading.
• I am creative.
• I love reading.
• Violin is my specialty.
• The more eggs the merrier.
• She likes to read, laugh, act, and play soccer.
• I love baseball.
• She likes sports.
• I love horseback riding.
• I love skiing.
• I like activities.
• I like karate.
• I love baseball.

Some highlights of the discussion:

Q: What made you get into the Phillies?

A: Well, you can’t just sit there and just eat the food. You have to get interested.

After lots of oohs and aahs over the rock collection:

Q: Which ones did you find?

A This one’s a good skipping rock. I found this one in my creek.

Q: What made you start to get into it?

A: Well, I like archaeology so I started collecting rocks.

Student sharing an egg-head pin, “I would share this everyday if I could.”

Q: When did you start liking eggs?

A: 2 years ago. I didn’t really show if off last year.

Student who likes riding, “this is my helmet. It has all these dents from falling off. Don’t be scared. If you’re going to do it, it will happen.”

“What got me hooked on reading was Harry Potter.”

“I’ve been making things around the house.”

Q: What was the first thing you built?

A: A Lego ferris wheel. Then I had a remote-controlled car and took apart the weed whacker and put the engine in the car. I got in trouble and had to put it back.” (Lots of appreciative oohs and aahs here!)

“I have lots of medals (for swimming) at home, but I don’t like to take them out of the house because they’re so special to me.”

“Good luck for testing on your black belt in April.”

“I think it’s really cool that you do so much creative stuff. I didn’t realize you had so much talent.”

“I like making cookies with my mom. She’s the only one I really do it with. I love chocolate chips and I just go in the closet and eat them sometimes.”

We are individuals. We are 5E.

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