Research at the 4/5 level

As the culmination of two units–slavery in cultural studies and informational writing in writer’s workshop–Cerrito students are writing research papers. For many, this is the biggest project they have undertaken in their school careers. Our job is to scaffold it very carefully so they can be successful. Here are some of the questions students have: What should I research? Which questions will guide my research? What makes a good source? How do I synthesize the information I read and put it into my own words? How do I write a cohesive research paper? This  is what I hope to address here and in my teaching in the days and weeks to come.

They chose topics from a long list of people and events in African American history, from life on a  Southern plantation all the way to Beyoncé. At the core of the slavery unit is this question: How can cultivating an understanding of the causes of conditions of slavery help us understand current race relations and politics?  It’s a lofty goal for fourth and fifth graders to really be able to answer that, but it’s important to understand from whence the project was born.

The next step is creating research questions. This is remarkably hard for students. To get beyond a yes or no-type question is a struggle. When was such and such born? What color hair did they have? These are typical first draft questions, and we try to frame this process by having students ask themselves the following question: could you write three notecards full of bulletpoints to answer your question? If not, it’s probably not a great research question.

Then, after getting teacher approval, students write their questions on half envelopes and glue them into a manila folder. These are pockets for the notecards where they will write their bulletpoints. We provide a number of safe websites to start with, talk about the danger of open source sites (biography.com or wikipedia.com, for example), and give some tips for narrowing the search. Rebecca, the information literacy teacher, put a bunch of books on hold through the public library, which they will get later this week, to supplement their online research.

The final step is to write a research paper with an introduction, conclusion, and four body paragraphs. Each paragraph will be headed by one of their research questions. Teachers will provide a rubric that guides them to use good adverbs for transitions, structure their pararaphs effectively, etc. They will eventually publish their work in our literary magazine, the Chanterelle, with a piece of artwork and share it in an author’s chair celebration.

You can help by asking your child about their topic (why is it important?), what their questions are, and what information they’re having trouble finding. They will write much of their paper at school, but some of it may come home next week. We will be pushing everyone to get back to that big question of “so what?” What was this person or event’s impact on history and African American identity? Always bring it back to that.

Homework

Math

• 4th graders have Spectrum pages 131-134
• 5th graders have pages 33 and 34 in their homework packets.

Reading: students formed partnerships today and will begin reading a book tonight they chose to read alongside one of their classmates. There is no homework other than keeping up with the reading assignments they created for themselves on Google Classroom.

Spelling: practice your vocab words on Quizlet

Cultural Studies: 2 more research notecards. Each notecard should have three bulletpoints of facts, at the very least.

http://www.arcademics.com/games?grade=5