We're back after break and the kids seem to be in good moods and ready to get to work! We are starting a unit on the Great Depression and relating that to our current economic recession. We're starting with the "Ordeal by Cheque" assignment.
It's actually really neat. We read a story written in the form of checks. Through these checks we're able to figure out what is going on in the life of the characters. The story is set between the years of 1903 and 1931. Now the students are working on writing their own stories in the form of checks - very interesting!
I hope everyone had a wonderful break and I think 2010 will be a great year!
Danielle,
ReplyDeleteWhen Melissa showed this to me two years ago, I loved it immediately. The question i have for you now, two years in is this: do students understand what checks are?
The reason I ask is that checks are becoming one a cultural relic of sorts because how much people rely on online banking now. Will our students ever actually have a checkbook? I wonder about that.
Regardless, this assignment is one of my favorite that we do because of how little it relies on the written word to tell a story. You know how much I love brevity in writing, and this one forces students to tell a story using a form of "negative space"--the story occurs between the objects used to tell it.
Pat -
ReplyDeleteThat is a very good question, I did have to explain how a checkbook works to them before we started and very few of them knew how to write a check, which I expected - I didn't have a checkbook until I graduated from high school!
They did a great job on the stories too! I think that checks will continue to be used less and less but how else will we give someone a gift for graduation or a wedding? :)
Thanks for your comment.