Traveling Tourists and a FLASH GIVEAWAY!



I had all intentions of sharing some AWESOME pictures of my class this week working on our U.S. Symbols unit and lo and behold...I have pneumonia!!  Yep...in bed..and feeling terrible..but at least I can connect with the blogging world still.

I was so excited to get my unit off the ground this week as my class became the Traveling Tourists.  They are going to "travel" around North America with their "passport" to different states and learn about different U.S. Symbols and Tourist Attractions.  So all of this is going to have to happen hopefully at the end of this week or maybe even the beginning of next but I literally couldn't wait to share my unit with you :)

This unit is going to take about 4 or 5 days to complete.  I am going to set up 3 - 4 different destinations in my classroom that my kiddos are going to travel to each day.  At each destination, they first must have their passport "stamped" with the state/country they are in and write it in their passport.  Each destination has a specific stamp that they will glue into their passports. At the first stop, they will create their "Suitcase" that will hold all of their flip-flap books of their new learning.  Then we will begin our travels...

This is the front cover of the suitcase that they will be traveling with.  I have one for boys and one for girls.


Here is the Passport that the children will be traveling to their destinations with! 


 After their passports are stamped, they will read through the information file that is in the center.  I created Destination Files that tell the students where they are on the map and then inside the folder is an information card with the specific U.S. Symbol or Tourist Attraction that is associated with the destination. (Pennsylvania has two attractions:  The American Flag because Betsy Ross sewed the first American Flag and lived in Pennsylvania and The Liberty Bell.  Washington D.C. also has two attractions:  The Lincoln Memorial and The Washington Monument.)

This is one of the Information Folders.  I took a large piece of construction paper and folded it in half.  I glued the "Welcome to...Poster on the front cover and on the inside I glued the U.S. Symbol or Tourist Attraction information card.

They will work with a partner at each destination and read the information card together.  After they read the card, the students will do a "Turn and Talk" session and share 2 facts they learned from each information card.  Then they will complete the Flip-Flap book at each destination writing down 2-3 facts about their new "schema" (new learning).

Here is what the inside of the suitcase will look like when they have finished traveling to all of their destinations.

After traveling to all of our destinations, I will teach the children how to write an opinion paragraph.  They will get to choose from two topics:  The Best Tourist Attraction or The Most Important American Symbol.  They will organize their thoughts and arguments on the graphic organizer and write a rough copy of their paragraph in their Writer's Notebook.  After our editing and revisions, we will write a final copy of our opinion paragraph and add it to the back cover of our suitcase as a culminating activity.  

Here is the Graphic Organizer for The Most Important American Symbol Opinion Writing Activity.


So...that's it in a nutshell :)  I was soooooooo excited to get this off the ground this week, but I think I am going to have to move it to next week :(  I hope you find this unit interesting.  If you do, check it out in my TPT Store.

Oh....and if you have read to the bottom of this blog post...Thank You!  Leave a comment below and I will pick a winner in a few days to win this unit!!! Woooohoooo!!!

Hugs,
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