Natural Disasters : Volcanoes, Hurricanes and More! FLEX Class

This is a FLEX class where children will be able to explore awesome natural events while honing their comprehension skills. 

During these four week, we will explore the wild world of nature together from volcanoes to wildfires, from hurricanes to tsumamis. We will explore amazing facts and share information. 

Children will learn all about Volcanos and can complete project work in different forms in order to comprehension skills. 

There are different options to demonstrate understanding depending on the preferred learning style of the student and age:

* Videos that explain facts or a pretend television report
* A written report with a scaffold to guide writing
* A picture or diagram depicting parts of the volcano 
* Label the volcano

I will present some awesome information,  Children will read along with me through passages and answer and discuss information via the inbox- this lesson has cross curricular links between science and nature and reading comprehension skills.  There will be some fun homework weekly too!

So how will children interact and share their work?
I will be setting learners a variety of questions, tasks, mini-surveys and activities while encouraging children to interact as much as possible to get the most out of each lesson:

* Labelling pictures.
* Foldable - information activities.
* Children make a pretend tv or radio weather or natural event report to share in the classroom - children can film an audio or video where they pretend they are reporting from the top of a volcano or in the middle of a hurricane. The sky is the limit! The main objective is to motivate learners to process the information learned during the video lessons and to put them in their own words. 
* Matching activities
* Writing a report - with writing scaffold. 
* Painting / modeling / illustrating the weekly theme. 
* Vocabulary homework.

In addition,  I will be posing discussion questions that children can answer offline (asynchronously). I will be interacting with learners via message and video for the duration of the course. I will be posting videos and responses during the week to ensure that learners and I interact as much as possible. 

Children, as well as learning about how amazing our planet is - will be increasing their confidence in answering the following types of questions as we go along:

* Factual
* Inferential
* Primary / main idea
* Author's intent
* Structural

Each week children will learn about different awesome weather or natural phenomenons as listed below:

Week 1 -  🔥 Volatile Volcanoes 🔥

The exciting natural event of the volcanic eruption and the volcano itself have fascinated both adults and children for many thousands of years.  Scorching melted rock originating from under the earth's crust forcing its way up through cracks in the earth's crust only to erupt causing chaos and fascination at the same time. The fury of the volcano can affect people far and wide for weeks to months to possibly years! This class explores a little history (Pompeii, La Palma), a little science (extrusive and intrusive rocks), a little English comprehension skills with a lot of fun and action. Join me as we discover famous volcanoes, lava, magma, ash, igneous rocks and plumes of ash cloud. 
 
Children will have a choice of homework that links to their style of learning:
- Make a video / radio report about a volcanic eruption past or current - feedback and interaction from teacher and replies and interaction with fellow students. 
- Write a report (with scaffold) about the volcano
- foldables / vocabulary work 
- comprehension 
- wordsearch
- Label the volcano
- Volcano art gallery - children to positively discuss each others art or collage work. 

Week 2 🌧 🌪Fierce Hurricanes 🌪🌧 

Fierce hurricanes and tornados have terrorized humans, animals and plants alike for millions of years. Destroying and uprooting everything in their path. This lesson will explore nature's most dangerous and destructive forces.  As we journey together through this topic we will explore striking images and videos that offer a view of catastrophic weather conditions. Learners will be able to   to see into the eye of the hurricane via video and photos. Hurricanes and tornadoes are not just wind, with them they bring torrential weather such as hailstones the size of tennis balls! They can turn a gentle stream into a raging surge within a few minutes. We will also discover how scientists learn the techniques developed through the centuries to forecast the weather and finally how human impact has affected the frequency and location of hurricanes through climate change. 

- write a report (with scaffold) about the hurricane 
- foldables / vocabulary work 
- comprehension 
- pop quizzes - children to answer
- videos to watch and answer questions about.

Week 3   Terrible Tsunamis
-Make a video / radio report about a famous Tsunami - feedback and interaction from teacher and replies and interaction with fellow students. 
- Write a report (with scaffold) about tsunamis
- foldables / vocabulary work 
- comprehension 
- Tsunami art gallery - children to positively discuss each others art or collage work. 

Week 4  Enormous earthquakes
- Write a report (with scaffold) about a famous earthquake
- foldables / vocabulary work 
- comprehension 
- pop quizzes - children to answer

Week 5 - Landslides and avalanches
- Write a report (with scaffold) about a famous landslides 
- foldables / vocabulary work 
- comprehension 
- pop quizzes - children to answer
- activities

Week 6 - Terrible Torndoes!
- Write a report (with scaffold) about a famous tornado!
- foldables / vocabulary work 
- comprehension 
- pop quizzes - children to answer
- activities