Beyond Civics: Teaching Dragonfly Pond

After attempting the Dragonfly Pond activity in class, I was skeptical about ever actually using it as a teacher. However, when I found out that so many of the third grade standards discuss communities and civics, I begrudgingly took a second look at the idea. That's when I truly saw the genius of it.

As I said before, this activity can go far beyond just learning about what a community is and how to be a productive citizen. A well integrated unit could potentially cover every content area. For my three lessons, I integrated language arts by having them write persuasive letters, slogans, and reflections; I included art by having the students create posters and of course the buildings for the community.

In a longer unit, students could decide where in the world their community was and analyze the soil types that would be found in their community (Science standard 3.2.2), make buildings that are different 3D shapes (Math standard 3.G.1), estimate the length of different roads in their community (Math standards 3.M.2, 3 & DA.2), hold a trade fair where each student has a booth that represents their building in the community (Math standard 3.M.4), and much more.

This activity also fosters collaboration between students, since it is impossible to build the community without compromise and whole group decision making. These are obviously third grade standards, but with a little thought this activity could be used in almost any grade.

My first lesson consisted of a simple discussion of the different types of communities and what establishments would be in each. This was the resulting list:

The students were very excited to use the knowledge they already had about different communities to come up with buildings. They had just finished learning about public services, so those were eagerly included in the list.

After writing persuasive letters to their classmates about which community should be built and a nearly unanimous vote, the class chose to build a city.

My second lesson in this unit incorporated Earth Day and how the students would improve their community so that it would be more ecologically responsible.

The students wrote slogans to encourage others to participate in Earth Day and drew posters to spread the word.

                                                              

My final lesson for this unit was to have the students actually build the city. They were so excited to finally build it they nearly jumped out of their own skin, and once they had their materials it was chaos. The students worked individually for almost an hour on their respective buildings and they came out looking really amazing.

I could not have been prouder of the students' work and how their city turned out. It was an amazing thing for me to see, the students working together to decide where each building should be placed, as well as thinking up ideas as to what they were missing and how their city could be improved.

 Overall, I think the unit was an amazing success. I had the students write reflections about how they thought the city could be improved and if the citizen's would be able to survive if the city were real. They had a little bit of a hard time answering these questions, but I chalk that up more to lack of time than anything else.

To create virtual cities as practice for this lesson or an extension afterwards, MyMiniCity, CityCreator, and MillionaireCity are great resources. As an introduction to the different types of cities, I added Eduplace has a great interactive map for students to play with and learn about what buildings are found in which communities.

Art As Expression

The day their principal had his last chemo treatment, all the students in the school made signs of encouragement and waited on the sidewalk for him to drive past. It was really moving for me to see every single student standing out in the cold without any incentive other than putting a smile on their principal's face.

The student's were really invested in the whole thing too. I wasn't there to see them actually make their signs, but it was obvious that they'd spent a lot of time and effort on them. It was great to see that, even though most of the students didn't know the principal all that well beyond hearing him on the announcements, they used art to express what they were feeling as well as their support.

These are a few of the signs my class made:

School News Network has an interesting article on one teacher's efforts to help students express themselves.

ISTEP Graders

My third grade class doesn't always have a lot of time to do art; however, when the students do have time to create anything, they go all out. I honestly have never seen students so invested in their work as this class is.

These are their pictures of the people they think might be grading their ISTEP tests.








This student has incredible artistic abilities. It is amazing to watch him draw anything; he focusses and knows exactly what his finished project is going to look like before his pencil draws a single line.

Some of the portraits were more realistic than others, but either way it was fascinating to see what the students thought the people who graded their tests might look like.

 

I also found it very cool to see each student's distinct artistic style. No two portraits look anything alike, which tells me that they've been given a lot of creative freedom in the past. No cookie-cutter art here!

For information about why art integration is so important, visit the Teaching Channel.

Civics and Community: Dragonfly Pond Activity

Civics was always a difficult concept for me to get a true grasp on as a child because it's not necessarily something that young children usually get to participate in or see first hand. Therefore, I was very happy to start the Dragonfly Pond activity in class.

This activity is so great in my opinion because of it's versatility. Building a community out of cardboard boxes and paper doesn't sound like much, but when taught the correct way can integrate so much more than just art.

To be honest, in class this activity meant very little to me because of the circumstances and confusion involved when we started it. However, once I took a good look at it and worked with it to create a short unit for my third grade class, it took on a whole new life. I'll be writing more about that unit later.

Our Dragonfly Pond Community

For more information on teaching civics, visit the National Constitution Center.