Driving Question
4th & 5th
What PBE Principles were highlighted in this project?
Community as Classroom, Inquiry-Based, Interdisciplinary, Learner-Centered, Local to Global
Project Description
Students originally brainstormed topics they were interested in covering in Social Studies. They had to include a “why” along with an expression of interest. The class voted on this topic. They used the KWL process to come up with guiding questions for the study. From there, teachers started making connections with the local community.
Visiting Experts — male and female experiences:
Air Force Veteran
A military vehicle museum representative
Vietnam scrub nurse
Green Beret
Military Intelligence
Two other video conferences with veterans with connections to our local community.
Following each visit, students brainstormed continued questions or interests to pursue as individual projects. For example, after the military vehicle presentation, each student picked a vehicle to research further.
An educator from the JH Historical Society: Discussion of Heart Mountain Japanese Internment camp in Cody, WY; examination of local newspapers from 1916-19402 that published letters from veterans Students imagined the perspective of the veterans and wrote their own letters.
Essay writing: students chose one of the guiding questions to research and write about for this final project.
How did this positively impact community? How was it shared?
