Where I live, we have very few natural disasters. We get occasional flooding in lower parts of town during heavy rainstorms, but other than that and massive amounts of snow, we are usually lucky in that we do not get struck by natural disasters. This makes it difficult for students to fully understand what a natural disaster is like because they have never experienced it. I can help them in this aspect by reading them fictional and non fictional stories about disasters such as Night of the Twisters by Ivy Ruckman (one of my favorites) or stories written by victims of past disasters. They can also view storm visualizations online to see what type of damage can be done. They can view before and after photos of an area struck by disaster and discuss what happened to the victims.
We can practice what to do in the event of a disaster and they can prepare evacuation plans with their family. They can write paragraphs about what they would take with them if they had to evacuate their house in a hurry.
As a class or school, the students can either collect items such as non perishable food items or clothing to send to victims of a natural disaster or raise money to help relief efforts. This could become a good community project as students can hold a regional drive to collect items. Many relief efforts can accept the help of children such as the American Youth Red Cross.
Students can search for information about historical natural disasters. They can graph the locations of these disasters on world maps and make charts indicating the number of deaths and casualties reported to compare the severity of the disasters. Students can break up into groups. Each group can research a different natural disaster and then present that information to the rest of the class in a visual presentation. Students could choose to present a visualization of the storm by recreating it in a controlled environment such as a tornado in a pop bottle or flooding in a large tupperware container.
Emily,
ReplyDeleteStudents do want to make a difference in the world (wherever that may be). Often their voices go unnoticed, yet it is through their unspoken words where changes frequently take place.
I like your thoughts on having students research different natural disasters and graphing locations where each may have occured. I believe this has the potential for an engaging integrated unit.
Thanks for sharing.
Jill
Emily,
ReplyDeleteHurricanes are a reality here in Florida. Your activity where students write their evacuation plans would be worthwhile for any student, but especially ours here in FL. I think it's a great idea to have the students thinking about and preparing for natural disasters. Better to be prepared!
Heather
Emily,
ReplyDeleteAs usually you have brought out some interesting suggestions. I agree with Heather having students writing out a plan for evacuation shows students just hard it is with a large group of citizens. My class talked about the people that would not leave their homes. It was enlighting for students to think about things that they would not think about until it was too late.