Decision08- The Next Step

For the fifth and sixth graders in enrichment, this year's presidential election provided numerous opportunities to learn about our government and to experience citizemship in action.

The week before the actual election, students worked feverishly to prepare our classroom and transform it into the East Vincent Election Center where students from every grade was able to vote for their candidate of choice through the Kids Voting USA Program. This followed two to three weeks of public service announcements and posters to inform students and help them meet our slogan, THIS YEAR - YOU DECIDE.

In the weeks prior to the election, the fifth and sixth grade students also worked on a collaborative project with classes from across the United States to study the issues and each candidates views. Working with partners in our own class, students researched information and posted it on our class website, LearningHub. Students then posted their research on the Collabortive Election Project site and were able to review and identify significant findings about the issues gathered from all participating students. An Elluminate session enabled all of the students in the project to talk about all of their issues.

While the election is over, the fifth and sixth graders are turning their study of the issues into a Call to Action for President-elect Obama. They will work with the other classes in our project to craft a video message to President-elect Obama. Partners will work collaboratively with students in the other classes using a jigsaw model with each set of partners adding their one sentence on their Hot Issue Topic to their call to action. When all of the students and partners have finished collaborating, we will have a call to action message for each Hot Issue the students studied. We hope that every student in the project will feel empowered to voice their ideas and recognize the power of citizens take an active role in our democratic process.

Be sure to check back to see our video message just in time for President-elect Obama's inauguration.