Jenuine Tech has opened up a new online project called "Everyone Counts" The theme of the project is the US Census that will be happening this year. She has setup a website with information regarding the project. There are two question sheets that can be used as well as a number of extension activities. This seems like a great project to work on with your class. I have a few ideas regarding extension activities as well. Here is the link to the project information and registration info. I listed some extension activities that I thought were interesting.
http://www.jenuinetech.com/Projects/ec20/welcome.html
- Global Collaboration - We are starting to make a number of connections with schools in the US and overseas for video conferencing and collaboration. A comparison of census data that the students collect would be an interesting idea. I can help make the connection with another class. Jen also offers the opportunity to find another class through her Ning site.
- Math - The collection of census data is a great way to incorporate MS Excel into your curriculum. Students can add the data to a spreadsheet and create graphs to display and interpret the results
- Social Studies / Geography -After reviewing census data for locations students can take a trip on Google Earth to visit these locations. They can identify the type of community and take note of the physical characteristics of each location in relation to the census data (i.e suburban, vs. rural, vs. urban communities)
- This site has some ideas for teaching about the census in your classroom. http://www.census.gov/schools
As always I am available to assist with and plan all stages of such a project! I would also appreciate it if you would share any additional ideas you have to add to this project.
