A Peek at My Week {4.7.14} Wagons Ho!

Happy Sunday, Friends!  I'm refreshed, rested and ready to head back to school after an awesome SPRING BREAK!  I also am excited because as I planned this week, my official countdown of 9 days of work left will start tomorrow, and then I start my maternity leave.  I'm linking up today with my fabulous co-worker, Jennifer from Mrs. Laffin's Laughings.  Her weekly linky 'A Peek at My Week' is a great way to share what you have planned.  Be sure to stop by her blog and see what everyone has going on. 

As I posted on Saturday, my team and I are leaving for Oregon tomorrow, to travel like the pioneers did!... Ok, well we aren't really leaving for Oregon, but we're pretending that we are. I'm even dressing up like a pioneer teacher, and signaling the start of the school day with a small bell ringing like an old school house bell..  My pioneers and I officially start our journey tomorrow.  This week we've got a lot to do to start moving on the trail.  Here are a few of the highlights:



**We're tallying points for the first time as teams this week.  Each team needs a certain number of points to travel dots on our map along the trail.  It depends on how big the teams are.  A team of 4 needs about 175 points to move one dot.  We keep track of team points, and delays on the board (see below).  It's hard to do at first, because we take into consideration a team's energy factor (which is 50 at its highest) and also their delays or fates (things that happen to them along the trail). I'll share how this looks when we actually do points for the first time. 

** We're writing our very first diary entries this week on the start of our journey.  Students need to share the following in their first entry: describe yourself, your family, and your animals.  Explain why you're going to Oregon on the trail.  Tell about your last home and your feelings about going west.  Mention your last job and what you plan on doing when you get to Oregon.  Describe your trip to Fort Independence.  Explain what you expect will happen to you on your trip.  I know, I know... a lot.... but we'll start small and use some graphic organizers to put our thoughts into order and I'm also having students use their email addresses for the first time this week to email me and answer some of these questions ahead of time so that they already are thinking about this.  I did have students draw pictures of what their house looks like to use for this entry too.  We looked at old sod house pictures and log house pictures to discuss what houses looked like back then to help us. 

**We are also making timelines about our journey to document important events along the trail.  We will start our first timeline segment about leaving Fort Independence in early May.   



I hope you all have a great week ahead! I'm excited to hear what you'll be doing. :)