Students were flexing their creativity and communication muscles in one fifth grade class as they used the app Toontastic to tell the story of a rock's life (tie in to content here!). Students planned and then created a narrative about how a rock changes throughout its' life. During the planning phase they developed rock characters who would convey various emotions as while moving through the conflict, challenge, climax, and resolution of the story.
The assignment required students to have the rock transform through all three phases of the cycle, but was otherwise open-ended. This was purposeful in order to create an activity that would allow students to be creative in demonstrating their understanding of the rock cycle.
A student creates her rock character
A student works on narrating his "Toon"
A powerful component of this lesson was that students saved their completed work to Seesaw. This allowed them to view and comment on one another's work and provided parents access to their child's creation. Additionally, the teacher was able to share some videos via projection in the classroom to help clarify common misconceptions.
Students helping one another publish their "Toons"
Students accessing the class Seesaw account to share their "Toons"
Fifth grade science was one of my favorite subjects as a classroom teacher. After this lesson, I realized that while I thought many of my students understood the rock cycle, it was really on a superficial level. After reflecting on these student stories, I realized how abstract the idea of rocks changing deep within the Earth is for students (and me!). Through this activity, students had the opportunity to be creative and communicate; however, it was equally as powerfully to me as a teacher in better understanding the content I teach as well as creating a lesson that engages students and develops life long skills.
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