SuccessLink Missouri Department of Elementary & Secondary Education Friday, September 3, 2010

Great Teaching Ideas

lesson & unit viewer

Learning Through Native American Folktales

published on: 2/28/2003

Contributing Teacher(s): Sharon Freeman

Subject Area: Communication Arts/Presentations

Grade Range: Lower Elementary (K-3)

Materials Needed: See material listings for each day

Instructional Strategy: Prior Knowledge & Connections

Process Standards:

Goal 2.4 present perceptions and ideas regarding works of the arts, humanities and sciences
Goal 2.6 apply communication techniques to the job search and to the workplace

Content Standards:

Communication Arts 6. Participating in formal and informal presentations and discussions of issues and ideas

G.L.E.:

CA - Re - 1 - I - 04
(Reading, Develop and apply skills and strategies to the reading process, Making connections, Grade 4.)

Time Allowance: Approximately 13 days

Description: This unit crosses the curriculum with a hands-on approach to learn about Native American folktales.

Classroom Component:

This unit crosses the curriculum to use the subjects of communication arts, math, social studies, science, and fine arts. This unit uses a very hands on approach and covers the eight multiple intelligences.

This unit is based on different Native American folktales. The students will be able to gain the importance and meaning of folktales, while gaining a greater understanding for Native Americans.

Day One
Introduction day. On day one we will review what a folktale is. We have covered folktales before, so the students will be able to give me a definition and examples of popular folktales. They may use their personal dictionary that we keep if needed. The definition we will be using is that folktales are stories that are passed through word of mouth from generation to generation and are transmitted through a culture.

List the examples of popular folktales that the students suggest on the chalkboard.
Explain to the students that we will be working with mostly Native American folktales for our unit.
Name a few of them and ask if anyone knows what they might be about.
Explain some of the unit to the class and give them a brief run down of how our unit will progress.
Hang a United States map on the wall.
Plot where the tribes are as we read about them.
Use this map later in the unit.
Place a sticker where our town is.
Have the students sit on the reading carpet as I read Arrow to the Sun and Raven.
Discuss these two stories and their illustrations.

Examples include: Myths, Legends, and Fairy tales.

Day Two
On day two we will be practicing our sequencing skills using the book Coyote Stories. The students will move to the reading carpet where I will read The Coyote and the Doe. After reading the story I will ask the students questions.

Questions might include:

What was Coyote really wanting?
Did Doe really do that to her children?
What was the point of this story?
Was this a true story?
How can you tell?
What does this story explain to the Native Americans?

I will then tell the students that I need their help in putting the story together again. I will tell them how I have made teepees that go with the story, but they are out of order. I have broken this section into three parts.

Part One:

Choose five students to go to the front of the room.
Hand one of the five teepees to each of them.
Remind them not to read their teepee or show the back of it to the class, yet.
Make sure the teepees are not in the correct order.
Have one of the students read their teepee.
Have the class decide where it should go in the story—beginning, middle, or end. As each person reads the teepee the class will decide if the teepee is in the correct spot or needs to be moved.
When the class has finished moving the teepees, the five students will open the teepee flaps to reveal the correct position.

Part Two:

Read The Coyote and Badger and go through the same process. Six students will be needed.

Part Three:

All students should go back to their seats.Briefly review the two stories from yesterday. Tell the students that they will be making their own teepees for one of these stories. Hand out the construction paper and teepee patterns. The students will create their teepees using the same method as I did.

Materials:

Coyote Stories
Prepared teepees with Teepee patterns
Construction paper

To make the teepees I cut file folders in the shape of teepees. I could get six on one file folder. I decorated one side of the teepee. On the other side I wrote one part of the story and where it should be placed in order.

Multiple Intelligences:

Linguistic, Kinesthetic, Artistic, Intrapersonal

Day Three

What is a legend?

Today we will talk about legends and why they are used.
Students will sit on the reading carpet as I read The Fire Bringer.
After reading and discussing the story the students will go back to their seats.
Each student will think of an object or event and write a legend on how and why it is here.
Students will write and illustrate this story and share these legends.

Materials:

The Fire Bringer

Multiple Intelligences:

Linguistic
Intrapersonal

Day Four

Day four will depend on the weather. It might be switched with another day.

We will go to the outdoor classroom and I will read The Legend of Bluebonnet.
After discussing the story we will take a nature walk. I want the students to try and see the nature as the Native Americans did.
Students will collect up to five different leaves, flowers, or weeds.
Collections will be taken back to the classroom where the students will make nature windows.

To make nature windows, the students will need to collect the different flowers, weeds, and leaves.

They will need to dry for 24 hours.
After they have dried the students will press them between two pieces of contact paper.
Then punch a hole in the top of the finished window and hang with yarn.

Materials:

Contact paper
Hole punch,
Yarn
The Legend of Bluebonnet
Flowers, etc.

Multiple Intelligences:

Naturalistic
Artistic
Kinesthetic
Intrapersonal

Day Five

Today we will play a game I call "Back To The Village."
The class will need to be split into three groups.
Label four parts of the classroom as the river, the valley, the mountains, and the village.
Play Native American music. As the music plays, the groups travel from each part of the room skipping the village.
When music is stopped I will ask questions to each group.
They must decide on the answer as a group.
If the answer is correct the group continues playing. If the answer is wrong the group must go to the village and sit out a turn.
Questions I might ask could include math problems, spelling words, definitions of words from our folktales, or even questions from the folktales.
This game is a variation of the game Trip Trap from Famous Threesomes by Becky Johnson and Toni Frandsen.

Multiple Intelligences:

Kinesthetic
Interpersonal
Linguistic
Musical
Logical/Mathematical

Day Six - Day Seven
These two days will concentrate on the Cinderella folktales.

Students will sit on the reading carpet as I read Walt Disney''s Cinderella. Is this the way they remember the tale?
Then I will tell the students that over the next two days they will be working with Native American Cinderella folktales.
We will first predict if the class thinks her name will be Cinderella, if the fairy godmother is the same, and if the story will end "happily ever after."
We will record the predictions on a chart.
We will do these predictions before each of the stories is read.
After reading the stories we will discuss the story and see if the predictions were true.
We will then do a Venn diagram on the board comparing the traditional Cinderella story to the Native American stories.
The class will then work in pairs to create a Venn diagram between two of the Native American Cinderella folktales.
Finally each student will get to rewrite an ending to one of the Cinderella stories.

Materials:

The Turkey Girl
The Rough Face Girl
The Algonquin Cinderella
Walt Disney''s Cinderella
Venn diagram worksheet.

Multiple Intelligences:

Interpersonal
Intrapersonal
Linguistic
Logical/Mathematical

Day Eight

Day eight will be all centers. I will have six centers throughout the room. Native American music will play as we do center time.

The centers are:

Bean Count: As each student sits criss-cross they will put the beans in the bowl and toss them into the air. They must try and catch the beans in the bowl. The student will then add the numbers that are showing on the beans. Each person will get a turn. The winner is the person who has the highest total.
- Materials:
  - One large wooden or plastic bowl
  - Six large lima beans with numbers on them
  - Scrap paper and pencil.
Favorite Scenes: At this center each student will draw with oil pastels their favorite scene from one of the folktales.
- Materials:
  - White drawing paper
  - Oil pastels
  - The folktales should be accessible to the students.
Paper Bag Skins: Each student will use a paper bag to write pictographs on. The students will tear the edges and crumble the bag. After the bag is prepared the pictographs can be drawn on.
- Materials:
  - Precut paper bags
  - Scissors
  - Markers
  - Chart of the different pictographs that could be used.
File Folder Games: I came up with a variety of file folder games. I know I will include these four: math pictograph problems, sequencing cards, counting the number of legs, and transforming pictographs into sentences.
- Materials:
  - File folders
  - Game ideas.
Memory Game: I will have two memory games at this center. The cards will have pictures from the various folktales. The students will play memory.
- Materials:
  - I cut index cards in half and colored one side totally with marker.
  - On the other side I drew various characters and pictures of things from the folktales.
  - There need to be two pictures of each.

Jewelry Making: At this center each student can make a band for their head, arm, or ankle, a necklace, or bracelet.
- Materials:
  - Glue
  - Scissors
  - Yarn
  - Beads
  - Buttons
  - Shells
  - Feathers
  - Foil
  - Noodles.

Multiple Intelligences:

Throughout the centers all of the intelligences were used. When doing centers I completely go over each center with the class before we actually do the centers. We go over the rules. Each student must move with his or her group from center to center. I have already preselected the groups. I usually allow about 15 minutes for each center. We take a restroom break after the third switch.

Day Nine

Day nine will start by reading to the students a few folktales from From Sea to Shining Sea.

We will then briefly review the folktales and I will display all of them.
Today will concentrate on graphing.
We will graph on the board which folktale was each person''s favorite.
The class will then split into groups and complete a chart for two of the folktales.
The graph must include: the title of the folktale, the setting, the problem and how it was solved, the main character, and if the group liked the folktale or not which will be shared.

Materials:

Folktales
Chart paper
Markers

Multiple Intelligences:

Interpersonal
Linguistic
Logical/Mathematical

Day Ten

I will begin by reading a couple of folktales from From Sea to Shining Sea. I will explain to the students that our Native American Activity Day is coming up.

The students will need to work in their groups.
Each group will decide on one folktale they will present. There should be no duplicating with the folktales.
One person will be the storyteller while the rest of the group acts out the story.
They will be responsible for really learning the folktale, presenting it, and making all of the props and costumes.
Let the students brainstorm for about 20 minutes and then we will begin our lesson on measuring.
Measure on the map the distances between each of the tribes we read about and our town.
Discuss real distances and measurements. Then write on the board the actual mileage between each.
The students will then measure and record in their math journals the different measurements of things in our room.

Examples are a desktop, a pencil, a tile square.

Materials:

Completed map
Tape measurements
Prepared mileage
From Sea To Shining Sea.

Multiple Intelligences:

Interpersonal
Logical/Mathematical

Day Eleven - Twelve

Over these two days the students will be working in their groups to prepare for their presentations. They may also use free time.

Materials:

Whatever items the students need for props or costumes.

Multiple Intelligences:

Interpersonal
Linguistic
Possibly all depending on the group

Day Thirteen

This will be our final day. It is our Native American activity day. The students will perform their presentations. A letter will be sent home at the beginning of the unit explaining today and what items or help will be needed. The parents are welcome to attend. After the performances the students and parents will be free to move throughout the room and experience the different Native American activities.

Some ideas I might include this day might be: making roasted corn and eating buffalo burgers for lunch, guessing how many kernels are in a jar, basket weaving, dyeing paper, performing a rain dance, a hoop and arrow game, playing Trivial Pursuit game I made about the folktales and Native Americans, sand painting, making dream catchers, looking through a historical trunk on Native Americans (our art museum loans these out to teachers), looking at items that were brought in (arrowheads, moccasins, etc.). These are just a few of the ideas I might do.

Multiple Intelligences:

All are used today.
The students will write a reflection on the unit.
Each student will pick two items that will be placed in their portfolios.

Assessments

This unit is worth 100 points. All students should be able to get most of the points.

Content Areas	Criteria	Points Each		Total Points
Sequencing Guide	Teepees are in correct order and match the folktale	10	=	10
Legends	Illustration Legend makes sense Correct grammar usage Neatness	3 2 3 2	=	10
Cinderella Tales	Complete Venn Diagram New ending is complete and written correctly	5 5	=	10
Centers	Works with group Has finished work from centers 2, 3, and 6 Evaluation of centers	3 6 1	=	10
Overal Participation		10	=	10
Group Presentation	All members have an active role Accuracy to the story Presentation Costumes and props	10 10 5 5	=	30
Additional Points	Individual points given for performance. Active role in preparation Cooperates with group Follows rules and guidelines Completes self-evaluation Completes reflection Listens to other presentations	5 4 2 3 3 3	=	20
Total Points				100

Center Evaluation

Name ____________________________________

Did you do all six centers?

Yes

No
Which center was your favorite?
_________________________________________
_________________________________________
Did you work well with your group?

Yes

No
What was one thing you did not enjoy?
_________________________________________
_________________________________________
Which center was the hardest for you to complete?
_________________________________________
_________________________________________
Why?
_________________________________________
_________________________________________
_________________________________________
_________________________________________

Self Evaluation

Name ____________________________________

Did you enjoy this activity?

Yes

No
Why?
_____________________________________________________________
What were the problems you faced in your group?
_____________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________
How were they solved?
_____________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________
What was the best part of this unit?
_____________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________
What part was the most difficult for you to do?
_____________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________
Were there any activities that you did not know why we did? _____________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________
What was your favorite Native American Folktale?
_____________________________________________________________
Do you think you played an active role in the presentation?

Yes

No
Could you have done something different?
_____________________________________________________________
What are two things you learned about Native Americans? _____________________________________________________________ _____________________________________________________________
Overall rate this unit.

Great!

Good

Needs Improvement

Poor

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For additional information contact :
Sharon Freeman
Hillsboro Primary
Hillsboro R-III
(636) 789-0050