Podcast Script

Hello and thank you for listening to our podcast.

My name is Chad Boender.

And my name is Stephanie Hirdning

Throughout the past couple of months, our students have focused on studying the local history of Kalamazoo, Michigan, as well as, the local history of one’s family heritage. Studying ancestral heritage is very important because it defines who we are as individuals.

Throughout the unit, our students have created heritage dolls, researched the population of Kalamazoo, Michigan and the State of Michigan, created a family photo album, and discovered some of the tourist attractions that Kalamazoo, Michigan has to offer.

The heritage dolls turned out excellent and are hanging up in the halls of our school, for everyone to see! In this lesson, the students learned how to use a hot list, the importance of safe surfing on the web, and eventually created a heritage doll, based on their family’s place of origin. Constructing a heritage doll is a fun and creative way for students to study their own heritage and to better appreciate one’s place of origin.

Our students were introduced to Snapfish and became comfortable using the program to produce their family photo albums. They were advised to discuss their family history with several of their family members. After their discussions, they generated their photo albums and were able to present them to their classmates.

As a class, we took a field trip to the Kalamazoo Valley Museum located in downtown Kalamazoo, Michigan. The students were able to explore the exhibits and make sense of what a local landmark has to offer. This field trip was an introduction of the many tourist attractions in Kalamazoo. The students created a table based on which attractions they have had the opportunity to visit, during their lifetime. They then compared their data with the data constructed by another first grade class and two second grade classes. Lastly, they generated a table and graph using Excel to represent their data on which tourist attractions they have visited in Kalamazoo, Michigan.

Throughout this unit, students have focused on building professional learning communities by managing time wisely, sharing responsibilities, and communicating effectively. Students communicate daily through the use of Wikis. We still have some fun and exciting lessons planned for the unit and we promise to keep you updated!

Thank you for listening and we hope to see all of you at Parent Night, where the students will present their learned information on local history!