At Laketon Elementary School, the fifth grade girls and boys love to talk and have been called, “the unhushables.” One day after Dave Packer reads about Mahatma Gandhi, a man who would go a whole day without talking to bring order to his mind, Dave starts his own challenge. He wants to go one day without talking, even at school. Soon Dave shares his idea with fifth grader, Lynsey Burgess, who he thinks cannot go 5 minutes without talking. She believes it’s the boys who cannot talk. Dave and Lynsey make a bet between all fifth grade boys and girls. They will all go two days without talking! They can only respond to teachers with 3 word sentences and they cannot talk any at home. They will count points for every extra word said by any fifth grader. The challenge is on to see who can keep quiet!
After reading this book with my students, I would challenge them to try one of Mr. Burton’s experiments from the novel. I would have the classroom create their own story together using only three word sentences. The children would get into a large circle and take turns (one by one) adding on to the story, each student saying only 3 words. After this, we would have a classroom discussion about the difficulties, benefits, and challenges of this activity.
No comments:
Post a Comment