First Graders as Researchers!

I'm so excited to share with you about the research the students did this week! I divided them into groups, and each group was assigned an animal. I would have let them choose their own animal but our options were limited to the books that were available in the library and those that the students would be able to read independently. In the library, I found the perfect books made my Scholastic that were non-fiction leveled readers.

On the first day of their research, they were given one of the Scholastic non-fiction leveled readers and read about their assigned animal. Before they started reading, I modeled how to work cooperatively. I also showed them a poster I had made about ladybugs and modeled the process of researching and designing the poster.

 On the next day, they were each given responsibility for finding a particular piece of information about their animal. I created research notes for them to record their information. Some of the groups had an odd number of students so in those cases two students worked together to record the information.

On the third day, the students designed posters about their animal. Finally, on the fourth day, students presented their poster and reported about their animal to their peers! Here are the posters they created:

Angelfish

Bear Cubs

Bunnies

Seal Pups

The students got really into their posters and were so excited to share! They also impressed me with how they worked together in cooperative groups. Only one of the groups was having trouble getting along so I had to do some extra modeling for them, and their poster turned out great!

What other research projects have your students done?