Fourth Graders Learn about the Underground Railroad and create posters online

As part of their Civil Rights unit, the fourth graders visited Newton's own stop on the Underground Railroad. on Thursday, March 22nd they toured the Jackson Homestead on Washington St. They learned about how the Jackson family helped African Americans to safety and freedom. They saw many interesting artifacts and heard stories of people in Newton fought slavery.

In library class students used an interactive web site created by Scholastic called "The Underground Railroad-Escape from Slavery. They answered questions about how and why African Americans and others took great risks to deceive slaveholders and make the journey to freedom. You can take a look at this activity at:

http://teacher.scholastic.com/activities/bhistory/underground_railroad/escape.htm

Then they used a web 2.0 tool called "Web Poster Wizard" to share their findings. Please take a look at their posters online at:

Underground Railroad posters

You can also listen to an explanation of this assignment at the following link:

Cinch broadcast

They learned a lot, and so will you!!

Voicethreads by the Second Grade

Voicethead is a web 2.0 tool that allows you to upload videos, images, and other media. People can comment using audio and the written word. Our second graders have created a talking library ABC book using voicethead. Each class created their own book. They also created KidPix slideshows to present demonstrate their understanding of fables. Students worked in partners to read a fable, write a moral, and illustrate it on KidPix. We then uploaded it to voicethread. Please take a look at our voicethreads at this link:

Class Projects created in the library: Newton.Public Schools