I can't really speak for my students, but I was really interested in my lessons this week for History (English Speaking Culture History). I finally am on track with some units that I really enjoy, and I hope the kids will actually take something away from.

Fifth grade is all about the American Revolution. It is really fun! We started off the year with Vikings, the discovery of America, and the first Thanksgiving. That was ok, but the Revolutionary war is really fun to teach about. This week I assigned each student to be a British or American Soldier. They all got to color one and glue them in the books they are making. Then we reinacted the Battle of Bunker Hill. All the American Soldiers were standing in one corner dancing because they were excited that they had already dumped all the tea into Boston Harbor. Meanwhile the other corner of the room was full of sneaky British soldiers who were going to surprise the Americans with a battle of "rock paper scissors"

The books we are making are really cool too, they fold out and have all kinds of pop up type pictures with information on the back. This one is a grassy hill that folds down and has information about the battle on it. The kids are really starting to get into it. Yay!

Sixth grade this week was my favorite. We started off the year talking about ancient Egypt. Now we have begun learning about the slave trade. I wrote an article about how the europeans kinapped slaves from africa and brought them to the Americas. We talked about the boat. I layed them next to each other on the carpet, snug and tight as an example of how the slaves were transported. the first question was "How long is the boat ride?" (three weeks to three months). and the second question was "where do we go to the bathroom?" they were pretty discusted with the answer....

Buska, Jozef's daughter, got really upset when I was explaining why europeans treated people like this. All of the sudden she bursts out (in slovak) "YOU ALL DONT UNDERSTAND??? They thought the africans were like animals. they treated them like sheep, pigs, or cows. they DIDNT care how they felt!"

I reached at least one person with that lesson!