Great Resources to Have on Hand
The Content of the Newspaper
Many of these activities we did together, but C11 loves anything literary and asked if her project could focus on Chaucer rather than Da Vinci. Of course I said yes, and together we decided that her main project could be creating a newspaper containing everything Chaucer related.
It contained A Retelling of A Knight’s Tale:
A simple advert for A Play of the Nun’s Priest’s Tale:
Using Chaucer’s Prologue the children created their own in Cartoon form using Modern Day Authors:
Charlotte also wrote a recently found long lost tale of Chaucer’s:
She then gathered bits and bobs on line and printed them out for her very own ‘The Chaucer Tymes’
And gradually she cut and stuck everything in place to create her newspaper. She used butcher’s paper I bought off Amazon, which was perfect for this purpose:
I giggled when she exclaimed how much work had gone into creating just two pages. She asked whether newpaper printers had machines which did the outlay for her. On finding out they did, she begged me to buy her one!
Reflections
This was a good project for her to do. She did it completely alone and finished it, seeing it through and keeping her interest right until the end. I am beginning to realise that project based learning works best when the student is engaged fully with her learning; when the subject matter is interesting enough to stand the test of time (6-10 weeks) and when they are using their strengths to complete a project which is neither too easy nor too hard. The dynamics of project based learning are not quite as simple as I first thought. It is building skills in C11 which she did not have at the beginning – the ability to pace herself, plan her work, carry it out and produce a final piece of work she is proud of. It all takes time and we are inching towards success. I am very proud of C11 because, although she loves this way of home schooling, she doesn’t always find it easy. This time however, she worked hard and created something to be proud of. Well done sweetie pie!
That’s a lot of effort, and really well done putting the newspaper together! 🙂
Thanks Hwee, I’ll let C know. I thought she did really well this term.
Really nice! My children like to draw comics, too. But they use to write in books.
I like your idea of making newspapers! (I guess I´m going to use it for description and practice of newspaper-relevant words (headline, article, announcement)!)
Thank you once again for your inspiration…
My pleasure, Karin!
What a marvelous project. She must feel good with a project well done.
Blessings, Dawn
Thanks Dawn. This was the first project she has been completely happy about.
Butchers paper? What a great idea! We’ll definitely try this. Thanks for the inspiration!
It worked really well and is fairly inexpensive as well.
This is a great project! She must have been so proud of her work!!
Thank you, she really was!
What an excellent project! I’m impressed with all the work she put into this, especially the “long lost tale”. She has just raised the bar for the rest of us studying Chaucer this year.
Thank you Christy. It was a good project for her to do and hopefully has given her confidence for the future.
I love projects like this. My kids aren’t quite as amused by them as I am, but I think some of that is their age.
It’s funny, we’ve done newspapers before on the computer but there was something quite special about cutting and sticking and actually working out placement of articles using real paper! I always knew I was born in the wrong century!
I love C’s newspaper. Great job! Isn’t is just so much better than some fill-in-the-blank worksheet?! She learned so much more than just Chaucer. Your children are doing fantastic in their project-based learning. I think when they are studying the topic that interests them, they seem to throw themselves in and really learn. Home school is just so much fun!
Chaucer is on our list for this year, so I will be visiting this post again.
This was definitely the best project so far for C, which I am so pleased about. It took a while, but she got there in the end and really did herself proud this term.
I just love this newspaper – looks like quite a fun read 🙂 C did an excellent job – this format would be great to have other kids learn about Chaucer! Glad to hear this project worked out so well for her.