Designing a Connected Learning Plan: Earth Day Unit Plan

This culminating task helps me to bring together my learning from all five modules during the course of PME 832 - The Connected Classroom. For this culminating task, I am envisioning what connected learning could look like in my Kindergarten/Grade One Montessori classroom.

I design a connected learning plan for Earth Day that I could use with my students this year. Earth Day is around the corner. We are planning some learning tasks that are centred in a theme of Earth Day – they are focus on the protection and conservation of our environment and explore ways we change our actions to help the environment stay green.

Our school is in British Columbia. There are 20 divisions in our elementary school. My classroom and infrastructure are incorporated real-world problem solving and creative thinking within the school setting. Our school is based on the commitment that nurtures creativity including literacy and fine arts areas within our school community. This unit plan is planned for a group of 20 Kindergarten and Grade One students who are curious, energetic, and creative. One of the school growth plans is to prepare students to be community of thinkers in terms of encourage critical, creative, and collaborative skills to solve real-world problems. The students are in their sixth year of learning through the new BC curriculum with the focus on the three core competencies: Personal and Social, Communication, and Thinking competencies.

Connecting the Core Competencies with First People's Principles of Learning

BC Core Competency self assessment with The Six Cedar Trees : http://www.rubberbootsandelfshoes.com/2018/05/bc-core-competency-self-assessment-with.html

The Six Cedar Trees helps students to draw connection with our land and animals. While Eagle flies over the each cedar she learns about each animal and the importance to our community, our selves and impacts of each core competency. Each animal is broken into different values and principles to cover the BC curriculum. We learn and role play about how these animals help our community. We learn about BC's coast and land focusing on our Pitt Lake and the marshes. This directly draw connection to Earth Day where students take our environment very seriously and help clean garbage around the parks and school and eventually leading to our water clean-up learning tasks.

Lesson Plans - There are 3 different lesson plans in this Earth Day unit plan (See lesson plans)

Lesson 1: Day 1 – 2 Poetry , Garbage Pick Up, and Waste Free Lunch Day

Lesson 2: Day 3 – 5 Media Study: Public Service Announcement

Lesson 3: Day 6 – 7 Water Clean-up Learning Tasks

Lesson 1: Day 1 – 2 Poetry (The Lorax), Garbage Pick Up and Waste Free Lunch Day

Lesson 2: Day 3 – 5 Media Study: Public Service Announcement

Students are encourage to use different technological tools to create a public service announcement for audiences to go green, recycle, and/or save the water and energy.

Lesson 3: Day 6 – 7 Water Clean-up Learning Tasks

Rationale - Designing a Connected Learning Plan: Earth Day Unit Plan