Pourquoi Tales

After reading countless Fairytales and Folk Tales over the past few months, we zoomed in on a specific type of Folk Tale that explains why things happen and why things are the way they are in terms of animals and nature. Here are some examples:

These kinds of Folk Tales are called Pourquoi tales, literally meaning "why" in French. 

After reading a few examples, we began brainstorming kinds of Pourquoi tales we could write: why a cheetah is the fastest animal; why an elephant has a trunk; why a giraffe has a long neck; why a rainbow is colorful; why the sky is blue... our list goes on! With the help of many graphic organizers, students have been writing their own Pourquoi tales for a few weeks, and they are coming out beautifully. The details are creative, the characters are developed well, and the structure of this writing has been strong. We cannot wait to share them with you!

(Disclaimer: I had hoped we could send these home before February vacation but the wrath of Mother Nature has put quite a damper on our Pourquoi publishing. They will be sent home as soon as we are finished after break!)

How are we the same? How are we different?

The 2 main guiding questions for our China unit of study have been

How are we the same?

How are we different?

By experiencing some of the cultural traditions of children, students, and families in China, we have been able to compare what we know about our day to day lives with theirs. We first began learning about typical meals of students in China by viewing photos and reading descriptions. Ask us about some of the things on the menu!

Our favorite part was definitely when we had the chance to use chopsticks during snack. We watched a video showing us how to use them properly, and then tried it out ourselves!

Last week we also began practicing how to say numbers 1-10 in Chinese! We listened to a silly rap song that includes auditory and visual cues in a catchy rhyming pattern. We'll be continuing to listen and practice. After reading the book My Pet Dragon that aligns Chinese symbols with illustrations, we painted Chinese characters with black watercolor paints, even making up our own. We learned that although the symbols in our language may look much different, we all use them in the same way.