An Autobiography Of A Rock: Making I&S interesting for 6th graders!

Being an Individuals and Societies (I&S) educator is super exciting as not a day resembles the other. I am constantly on my toes when it comes to ideat-ing about ways to empower learners to write stories. Most of the ideas that come to me are usually at a flick of a second. I realize no matter how much i plan, i am an on-the-go educator. Although i would have a basic framework of a lesson or unit planned but my tasks for the learners are usually unplanned and intuitive.

One such task that excited me was, when with my class of sixth graders, learning about rock cycle and the types of rocks. The unit was on physical geography where we were inquiring into the ways physical geography informs us about the formation of the earth. While investigating about the types of rocks- sedimentary, igneous and metamorphic, we went out in search of rocks and collected as many rocks of different kinds as we could. Later, we brought them all back to the classroom and invited our senior geography educator to tell us about the ways in which we can identify the types. No doubt, the learners were super excited but i didn't want them to consolidate their ideas in a form of a report or paper. That i was sure of!

Well, one thing with me is that i always know what i don't want.

Which opens a gateway for me to what i'd like to create for myself and my learners. Thus, struck the idea of - An Autobiographical account of a Rock! If the rock were to tell its story then what would it be like. I roped in my colleague - an English educator, to take a master class on " Writing Autobiographical Account". Oh Boy! the result i got was astounding even to me.

See for yourself..

The autobiographical account was followed by peer feedback session.

This didn't stop here, the impact of the task was such that learners kept collecting rocks wherever they went and brought back interestingly shaped ones to class. They would often research about it on their own. So much so that they gifted teachers with rocks with a taglines such as : " You are a Rock-star", "Thank you for being the Rock of my life".

It was indeed humbling to see the impact of an of-the-head idea take shape like this. I decided not to grade the work but the students assessed their own understanding of the lesson against a check list.

I might have simplified the impact that the task had on the learners and myself. But, through sharing this i want to urge educators to take risks, smaller or bigger, and enjoy the process of learning and unlearning as educators. You will see it making difference in small or big ways! It's worth trying!