Social Studies
/As we continue with our social studies unit we have been discussing just and unjust actions. We sorted actions into categories of just (fair) and unjust (unfair). We also wrote our own lists of just and unjust actions. We read about Martin Luther King, Jr. and Ruby Bridges and discussed their roles in the civil rights movement and how their lives were impacted by laws that were unjust. While working on informative writing, we wrote a collaborative paragraph about Martin Luther King, Jr. Pairs of students wrote two sentences about MLK focusing on who he was, what he wanted, and what he did. Next, we put them all together in a pocket chart and then rearranged them until we felt they had formed a well-organized paragraph.
Our next step has been to describe what it means to be a citizen or member of a community. We defined rights (freedoms) and responsibilities (things we should do). We gave examples of the rights and responsibilities of citizens in different communities. We have been applying what we learned to our own roles as citizen of the ELC. We worked together to write a list of responsibilities that we each have to make our groups work smoothly together. We wrote another collaborative paragraph about being a citizen. Next, we will use our experience with collaborative paragraphs to write informative paragraphs on our own.
As we wrap up our unit we will touch on the formation of government, the office of President of the United States and voting. This week we have spent a lot of time talking about voting and practicing different ways to vote. We have also written and got signatures on petitions for things such as more food at snack time, more time on the iPads and candy for breakfast.
