Past projects 3
Kindness Rocks! #Winspired
Funded Sep 8, 2017Thank you so much for your kind contributions to our Kindness Rocks Campaign. Students loved creating and painting their rocks and especially enjoyed the Kindness themed stories we have shared. They are currently hiding their rocks in Palatine and the halls are buzzing. The students invented a hashtag for the project so it can be more accessible to others and that stemmed from our school's theme of being "Winspired at Winston." The hashtag is #rockspired. We have created a Facebook group titled Winston Campus Kindness Rocks, where we have started posting pictures of rocks in their hiding spots. The goal is to hide the rocks in the community. Then, those who find them are encouraged to Find-Post-Rehide the rocks to keep the momentum going. Students are sending each other Snapchats with new rock sightings and they've even started their own acts of kindness calendars where they are challenging themselves and each other to do nice things each day. This is normally something we wouldn't get to do in our writing class, and taking on the theme of kindness in our writing and in our actions has changed us all for the better. We all end our day on a positive note and the ripple effect is really starting to reach outward. Thank you again for believing in this idea enough to set it into motion. Your generosity and kindness have truly impacted us at Winston Campus Junior High.”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Robinson
Roses are Red- Novels in Verse
Funded Feb 23, 2016Students are loving their verse novels! We let students preview the books and rate them according to their interests, then watched some book-trailers online that would help them decide which novel to choose. After that, we let students read and react to their texts independently. The focus of our novel study is to notice what their characters are struggling with and note how they cope with those struggles. The variety of texts we have cover so many topics, and in turn, struggles, and the students are really reacting to their character struggles and challenges. What I love about the unit is the wrap up. Students are writing 6 Word Memoirs about the 2 novels they chose to read, in addition to creating new Blackout Poems, writing knock off "Good Reads" Book Reviews, and transforming a passage from their free verse novel into a more structured poem of their own. These creative pieces are really showing off their comprehension of the novel study and character analysis. It's amazing to see girls and boys alike loving a good book and talking about them, being creative with their responses, and cleverly creating new poetry inspired by their stories or characters. Thank you again, for your contribution to this unit of study. They are truly being enjoyed!”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Robinson
Boom! Crash! Pop! Graphic Novels for 8th Graders!
Funded Oct 20, 2015I wanted to take the time to thank you for your generous donation to my classroom. The 7 graphic novels you purchased for my 8th graders are really a great addition to our literature circles, and are giving students a new approach to reading! I co-teach for my Reading classes. Mrs. Paprocki teaches with me 2 periods, and Mrs. Park teaches with me in another, and together we came up with a great plan to introduce and implement the novels.
First, we introduced the concept of graphic novels with a video on history of graphic novels. Then, we had students look at samples without speech bubbles filled in. They filled in their own inferred dialog and the scenes were so funny. Students also created their own graphic novel pages from their winter break moments. Everything was really catching on. After we introduced the types of panels, bubbles, and scenes, we let students preview the 7 titles. The titles are "The Hobbit," "City of Ember," "Legend," "Coraline," "Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children," "The Graveyard Book," and "A Wrinkle in Time." Students previewed the books and rated them in order of what they'd like to read. Following the book previews, we showed book trailers from You Tube to get them even more engaged. Once their ratings were finished, we sorted their preferences into groups of 5, and all students got their first, second, or third choice. From there, groups were given their books and a schedule, and they had to divide their books into chunks in order to finish on time. Each day, the groups rotated through a schedule. Read, Read & Blog, Read & Record, Read & Conference were the 4 rotations, and each group responded to their reading by blogging in Google Classroom, or recording discussions fueled by their reading.
The enthusiasm for reading was so high, it was really exciting to be a part of. 87 students read these novels, and they read them from cover to cover. It was painful for some of them to stop at our predetermined stopping points because they loved them so much! Now that we are finished with the literature circles, students are trading titles and reading others they didn't get a chance to read. It really is a wonderful sight to see my 8th graders so invested in their reading. A few of them even checked out the full-length novels of their books and read those stories outside of class on their own! Thank you for supporting my idea and helping me put these books in their hands. It truly is a gift that will continue to give students reading opportunities and success. I'm honored to have your support and thank you immensely for your contribution!
Thank you so much! Your generosity is greatly appreciated!”
With gratitude,
Mrs. Robinson
This classroom project was brought to life by NEA Foundation and 8 other donors.