Why Your Brain Needs to Dream
5th graders have been learning about the importance of sleep and dreaming for the health of our bodies and minds. Recently, we reviewed main idea and details and applied our learning to read an article titled, Why Your Brain Needs to Dream. The original article can be found here. However, I made a few adjustments to make it more 5th grade friendly. That version can be found here.
Students worked in partners to read one section of the article. As they read, they stopped after each paragraph to write the main idea in the margins. Once they had completed this step, they worked independently to complete a thinking routine called Color, Symbol/Image, Number from the book Making Thinking Visible. I've mentioned this book before, I love it!
In this routine students had to think about the main ideas and most important details from their section of the article. Then, they had to represent those ideas with a color, a symbol/image and a number. I am so proud of the thinking they did on this assignment. They were so creative and really had to think critically about their section and communicating the important ideas!
After, we did a gallery walk so students could read about the ideas presented in all of the sections of the article. Then, we discussed something they learned from another student's work.
Not only did this assignment align to the standards, it allowed me to see each student's thinking process and THEY LOVED IT! It was fun for them and they were doing some amazing thinking at the same time.
